Almost 40% of the staff –38.5% pending the final figure, which will be made public tomorrow–, according to the Generalitat, and up to 80%, according to workers' representatives. The educational strike called this Tuesday in the Valencian Country by the unions STEPV, Comisiones Obreras, UGT, and CSIF has achieved significant participation from teachers who have also filled the streets of the main cities to denounce the "critical situation" in public schools that are "overcrowded and lacking human and material resources". A discontent that, if negotiations between unions and the administration do not prevent it, could lead to an indefinite strike at the end of May.

Concluding a week of nationwide strikes, Teachers have blocked the Ronda de Dalt ring road at several points this morningShortly before 7:00 a.m., approximately 400 people blocked traffic in both directions in Santa Coloma de Gramenet, just before the La Trinitat interchange. Later, about 100 protesters blocked the same road near Vall d'Hebron Hospital, followed by another blockade on the B-20 highway near Finestrelles, in Esplu. This action is a response to the agreement the government reached two weeks ago with the CCOO and UGT unions, presented as a "national pact," but which did not receive the support of Ustec, the largest union in the education sector, or the Secondary School Teachers' Union, the largest union in secondary schools.

The Catalan Railways (FGC) transported over one hundred million passengers last year, a record figure, with a punctuality rate exceeding 99% on all lines and overall user satisfaction. Anyone who doubts these figures need only ask the passengers. They'll surely tell you that the lines connecting Sabadell and Terrassa with Barcelona, ​​and vice versa (60,000 people commute to work in Sant Cugat every day, though not all by train), are packed early in the morning, and that beyond Sant Cugat, it's a real squeeze to board the carriages, but that the service is exceptionally punctual. For all these reasons, I listened with interest to the arguments given by José Javier Bleda, the regional railway secretary for the Semaf union, to justify the strike that began yesterday and will continue next week. In an interview on Radio 4, Mr. Bleda spoke of "latent risks," such as "in certain areas of the network, trains begin to skid, preventing the driver from braking where they want"; that, ultimately, "many general issues have specific underlying problems"; that they have been reporting everything; that the reports have been ignored; and that patience has its limits.

Nine Tuesdays of difficulties in rail mobility, this time also affecting Ferrocarrils de la Generalitat de Catalunya (FGC). The Catalan train operator faces the first of the five days of strikewhich has called on the Semaf union to strike on February 24th and 25th and March 2nd, 3rd, and 4th to demand greater safety on the service.

The Catalan government already has several proposals on the table to improve the working conditions of teachers, but has not yet presented them to the unions. With less than 24 hours to go before the teachers' strike called jointly by all the sector's unions, sources from the Department of Education insist that the government "remains at the negotiating table and is committed to reaching agreements to improve the working conditions of teachers and educational support staff." Although last week's meeting between unions and the department to continue negotiations was canceled, the government maintains that it has prepared a proposal to improve working conditions "which it hopes to begin discussing at the sectoral bargaining table." Furthermore, the same sources assert that the department "already has a proposal ready" to improve the specific supplement—the remuneration given for the particular conditions of the job, such as technical difficulty, level of dedication, responsibility, incompatibility, or hazardous nature. According to the Department of Education, which has not specified exactly what the improvement will entail, this is one of the measures they believe "can respond to the demands of the educational community and incorporates all the requests from previous meetings." They also assert that the proposal "aims to address the historical underfunding of the Educational Support Staff (PAE)." Aside from salary aspects, the Government's proposal also includes a reduction in student-teacher ratios and progress in streamlining bureaucracy, as well as more resources for inclusive education and recognition of the different roles of each teacher. However, the proposal, which the Government has reportedly finalized, will be contingent on the executive's budget situation, as the current budget remains extended. USTEC denounces "abusive" minimum service requirements.

On Monday night, the Department of Business and Labor sent the unions the minimum services required for Wednesday's strike in schools and institutes. The limits set by the Catalan government are one teacher for every three classrooms in preschool, primary, and secondary education, and 33% of the staff in daycare centers. For special education centers, at least 50% of the staff must be working. In addition, all centers must have at least one member of the management team present. According to USTEC, "these minimum services are clearly excessive and reflect an attempt to limit and render meaningless the fundamental right to strike." They denounce that, according to their calculations, in many small schools and rural schools, "these minimums could completely neutralize the mobilization, without guaranteeing essential rights."

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Excluding the pandemic, the rail crisis is, due to its magnitude and duration, one of the most serious infrastructural—and by extension, economic and social—episodes that Catalonia has experienced in recent years. After decades of neglect, it will take time and money to modernize the commuter rail network, and it will take even more to regain the trust of users and citizens as a whole. A systemic failure like this only deepens political disaffection and puts the institutional system in a precarious position, currently giving wings to anti-establishment parties of the populist far right. In this sense, it is actually worrying that Saturday's demonstrations did not have a massive turnout: it means that people don't really believe in a possible solution and it also means that the protest will be channeled through other false and more unpredictable avenues.

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The train drivers and the rest of the Renfe and Adif workersThe strike was called off at noon The train strike that began this Monday has been called off, according to Semaf General Secretary Diego Martín, after another meeting with the Ministry of Transport. Hours later, the railway unions explained that they had reached an agreement with the Spanish government to call off the strike. This agreement includes increased investment in track and train maintenance, improved safety measures, and strengthened mechanisms to ensure compliance, as Martín explained. Thus, the planned strikes for Tuesday and Wednesday have been suspended. This Tuesday, eight commuter rail lines—R1, R3, R4, R7, R8, RG1, R15, and RL4—continue to experience service disruptions, and alternative bus services have been arranged to cover their routes. The agreement reached by the unions Semaf, CCOO, and UGT—but not CGT, which is maintaining the strike—with the Spanish government is based on improved investment in infrastructure and working conditions in the sector. "It's a historic agreement for the railway," the union leader told the media. The general secretary of Semaf explained that the more than 25-page national agreement will "double" investment in rail and should establish "clear limits and responsibilities" for the main players in the sector. In fact, the largest union confirmed that they are calling off the strike because they have achieved "all the demands" they had made. Among the main measures included in the agreement is the classification of breaks of less than 45 minutes taken by train drivers as "driving time." Regarding Adif, the agreement establishes "fixed and permanent" regular meetings with workers and a 77% increase in maintenance spending by 2030, reaching the budgeted 1.179 billion euros. Regarding high-speed rail, spending will increase by 44%, rising from €435.6 million last year to €629 million. As for staffing, an agreement has been reached to create 1,200 additional contracts for maintenance and driving, among other roles, at Renfe, and 2,400 additional positions at Adif over a four-year period. Furthermore, the agreement, which has helped to demobilize the sector, includes the creation of a working group to develop a common protocol for responding to weather alerts and the insourcing of maintenance for some trains—including those used in Tarragona and Portbou—and for any new trains that are put out to tender. The agreement also highlights the fact that a committee must be established within a maximum of one month to harmonize and coordinate railway risk management actions, that a working group must be created with Adif to monitor the implementation and removal of temporary speed restrictions (TSRs), and that a document regulating notifications must be drafted by the workers.

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The week begins under the shadow of two pieces of news, one good and one bad. The bad one? Train drivers' strikeThe good news? The AP-7 motorway reopened this morning after being closed for three weeks. All three lanes between Martorell and Gelida are now open in the direction of Tarragona.

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"Now it turns out that more than 400 points on the railway network need to be checked. And if we do nothing and don't complain, we'll just keep running as if nothing's wrong and see if another tragedy doesn't happen? That can't be. We want a structural reform and greater safety," argue sources from Semaf, the largest train drivers' union. "We thought we knew the most complicated areas, and we already thought there were many, but they weren't all of them. But we see the most serious problems: crooked trees, potholes... When you go through a tunnel, unless a piece falls, you don't know if everything is okay or not," argues Francisco Cárdenas, a train driver with more than four years of experience.

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The commuter rail service has resumed this morning.Trains are running, not with the same frequency on all lines, after two days of nationwide strikes by train drivers. Yesterday, only 6 out of 140 drivers showed up for work. While drivers in Andalusia did strike, those in Catalonia did. In the early morning, trains ran, but with delays and few passengers. This is understandable: if trains aren't running on Wednesday, and then again on Thursday, how can anyone expect them to run on Friday?

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The government of Isabel Díaz Ayuso has avoided providing figures on the participation in the strike that began this Wednesday at Madrid's public universities to protest the underfunding that is "suffocating" higher education. While the Madrid government has tried to downplay the protest, claiming that it is "politicized" and "has no justification whatsoever," the organizers of the strike say that participation has ranged between 50% and 90%, depending on the campus. The student platforms of Madrid's six public universities (Complutense, Rey Juan Carlos, Carlos III, Autonomous University of Madrid, Polytechnic University, and University of Alcalá de Henares) called the strike, which will continue until tomorrow, with the support of the unions CCOO, UGT, CGT, and CNT. The protest is in response to the budget proposal put forward by the government of the Community of Madrid.which will increase funding for public universities by 6.5%. Student groups consider this insufficient because, according to their calculations, the budget for public higher education will only increase from 0.44% of the regional GDP to 0.46%, and they believe that anything less than approaching 1% is inadequate. Conversely, the executive branch previously argued that the education budget represents more than 4% of the entire budget of the Community of Madrid.

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Dignity was one of the concepts that appeared most frequently this Saturday at the demonstration by teachers, school staff, and families demanding improvements in the education sector. "You are dignified, you work with dignity," read one of the banners displayed by the approximately 30,000 demonstrators—according to the organizing unions, 8,500 according to the Barcelona City Police—who gathered in Plaça Urquinaona. "Basically, we're demanding a decent wage for all the work we do. We have to deal with bureaucracy, we act as psychologists, nurses; it's not dignified for the children or the families," explained Beatriz, one of the public school teachers who participated in the demonstration. This Saturday's protest was the first unified demonstration organized by unions in this sector since 2022. "You can whistle," a father told his children as the unions' chants and firecrackers echoed as the banners passed by. "A very clear message to Minister Niubó and the Government: today is a turning point; if they don't take action and sit down to negotiate improved working conditions, we will continue to mobilize and will not hesitate to call strikes starting in the second term," stated Iolanda Segura, from the USTEC-STEs union. This message was echoed by the teachers who attended the meeting. Like Joan, a secondary school teacher from Torre Baró, who demanded a "real collective bargaining process" at the Department of Education, and if this doesn't happen, he didn't rule out going on strike this school year. "We feel that our work has neither social nor institutional recognition," the teacher lamented.

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Catalonia experienced a day of strikes this Wednesday, road and train blockades that complicated mobility for hours, and demonstrations in various cities to denounce the situation in Gaza. The strike called by minority unions and the two-hour walkouts per shift supported by the majority unions (CCOO and UGT) barely had any impact on the workplace. However, the day did have a strong response in the streets, with demonstrations in the morning and afternoon that in Barcelona together drew more than 22,000 people, according to data from the City Police.

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The second day of the handling staff strike at Spanish airports has been minimally disrupted. The first, which began this Friday only with Ryanair handling staff, Azul Handling, suffered minimal impact. This Saturday, which was expected to be more chaotic due to the addition of a strike by Menzies ground staff at Ryanair, only resulted in some cancellations and delays at El Prat airport for more than ten airlines operating with Menzies, and some delays at Girona and Reus airports.

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The courts have begun a three-day strike of judges and prosecutors called by all professional associations except the progressive ones, with the strike being followed by 75% of judges and prosecutors this Tuesday. Beyond the estimate made by the organizers, who have described the protest as a "resounding success," there is no official data because the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) is not collecting it, as it does not recognize the call. The Ministry of Justice has also not received the monitoring data it had requested from the CGPJ and the State Attorney General's Office, and points out that the figures provided by the associations are not official. Furthermore, it notes that during the day "there has been almost complete normality in the courts and prosecutors' offices" throughout Spain.

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Judges and prosecutors continue their fight against the judicial reforms that the Spanish government intends to impose. After last week's ten-minute strike, associations of judges and prosecutors have announced three days of strikes on July 1, 2, and 3. They have also called for a rally in front of the Supreme Court for Saturday, June 28, at 12:30 p.m. The five associations calling for the protest are the same ones that called the previous strike: most of them are groups of judges and prosecutors, but none of the progressive ones.

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The unions and the management of the Freixenet Henkell bank closed this Wednesday a preliminary agreement that reduces the number of layoffs planned in theemployment regulation file (ERE) filed by the company last month. Thus, from the initial 180 layoffs, the maximum will be 154, giving priority to early retirements and voluntary departures. The agreement was validated by the entire workforce at a meeting this Wednesday.

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The workers of the Freixenet Henkell coal mine have decided to extend the strike until June 10. the strike that began a week ago to demand the withdrawal of the employment regulation file (ERE) filed by the company, which should entail the dismissal of approximately 180 workers, 24 percent of the workforce, according to a statement issued Tuesday by the Comisiones Obreras (CCOO) union, the majority union on the group's works council.

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Representatives of the Freixenet Henkell company's workforce gathered this Thursday in front of the Catalan Parliament in Barcelona to demand "political action" in response to the redundancy plan (ERE) filed by the company's management last month, which provides for the dismissal of almost a quarter of the workforce. The president of the works council, Antonio Domínguez, has accused Freixenet of engaging in "corporate terrorism" and has stated that they are considering taking the case to court to determine whether it is legal.

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The workforce of the multinational cava company Freixenet Henkell began a four-day strike at 10 p.m. on Monday, with 100% participation by Tuesday morning, according to Antonio Domínguez, president of the company's works council, who spoke to ARA. The workers are demonstrating outside the group's headquarters in Sant Sadurní d'Anoia (Alt Penedès) to protest the redundancy plan (ERE) filed by management to cut the workforce by 24 percent. They accuse the company of wanting to "kill cava" by focusing on the production of sparkling wines that require less labor and allow for careless production.

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