Days after the government scrambled to “fix” the arbitrary suspension of money-making golden visas, SEF border control agency has lobbed another politically scalding hot-potato into the fray.
Unless a decision goes their way in the next 10 days, SEF is threatening to bring the country’s airports to a standstill, causing chaos, frustrations and endless bad publicity in the busiest tourist month of the year.
At issue are the long-debated “statutes” governing pay and conditions for the country’s law enforcement agencies.
SEF claims it is being unfairly discriminated against, coming out well below PSP and GNR counterparts.
The latter are equally locked in their own wrangles. But for now, neither is threatening the kind of strike action that will reverberate on a government desperate to look good in the polls and win a looming election.
“We aren’t asking any more than our equals,” president of SEF’s workers syndicate Acácio Pereira told reporters.
“The time has come for promises to be acted upon,” he added.
Reporting on the deadlock this morning, national tabloid Correio da Manhã claims SEF will be “going ahead with a strike that should paralyse all of Portugal’s airports and ports.
“At issue is the entry and exit of foreigners - fundamental, for example, in detecting suspects of terrorism.”
Talking to reporters in Porto over a week ago, Acácio Pereira said that if SEF had not received a “clear response” over the government’s intentions by the end of July, it would “obviously schedule partial and total strikes”.
But it was only today that the implications of this threat came into sharp focus.
A paralysis of ports and airports would leave Portugal in chaos just as millions of people are due to flood in for their holidays throughout the country.
Any whiff of a terrorist “dilemma” would put Portugal in the headlines for all the wrong reasons - particularly as elsewhere Minister for the Economy Pires de Lima has been expounding on the need to get people “hooked on Portugal” as a dream holiday destination.
SEF could well have the government by the proverbial short and curlies. It remains to be seen what happens as its threat filters through to those with the power to negotiate.
According to syndicate president Pereira, the situation for the time being is that SEF is being treated in an “inadmissible, undignified, politically unsustainable and juridically abhorrent” fashion as a result of a law (the general public sector labour law) that is “not properly regulated and allows for different interpretations at the whim of the government”.
CM reports that meetings are being convened this week between SEF’s syndicate, Secretary of State for Internal Administration João Almeida and Secretary of State for Public Administration José Leite Martins.
SEF’s complaints
Among complaints, SEF is arguing that its 40-hour week should be brought in line with that of the PSP to 36 hours. This is a similar complaint being levelled by the GNR, also expected to work a 40-hour week.
Another issue centres on perks when working on “foreign missions” - both the PSP and GNR receive 100% of any expenses incurred when SEF is only entitled to claim for 60%.
“It is equal work for unequal pay,” explained Pereira, adding that this kind of disconsideration puts national security and “all the Schengen space” at risk.
“We want dialogue to pass to practice,” he explained, adding that “if there is political will, there is the possibility of reaching a good port.”
Whether this was an intentional allusion to the threat now on the table was not entirely clear.
This latest upset between the country’s border control agency and the government comes hot on the heels of another potential embarrassment - SEF’s suspension of the much-praised golden visa programme - which, happily, appears to have been nipped in the bud.
Article courtesy of the Portugal Resident http://portugalresident.com/
