Barcelona City Council social service workers mobilise against Colau's government
They regret the "little political support" they have received after the attacks on some of their equipment
BarcelonaGraffiti with writings such as "Either with us or against us", and broken glass in five Social Service centres of Barcelona, have finally exhausted the patience of the council's social service workers, especially because they accuse Ada Colau's government of not having shown them political support when some movements in defence of the right to housing put them at the centre of the protests because of their presence in the evictions. Today they have met in assembly, with representation from all the unions, and have agreed that on 20 April, coinciding with the celebration of the municipal commission of social rights, they will concentrate in the Plaça de Sant Miquel to make their complaints heard.
The list of criticisms is long and includes points such as not having been vaccinated against covid despite being essential services, or facts such as not being given computers to be able to work remotely. But the trigger, they say, has been the lack of "public support" after the attacks on Social Services centres. They explain that the staff only received an internal mail, signed by the Deputy Mayor for Social Rights, Laura Perez, to express the support of all municipal groups. "The communication has been null", laments Miquel Rubio, union delegate of the UGT, which ensures that they feel "very disappointed".
After the graffiti appeared, the collective had already expressed on the networks that some movements such as the Grup d'Habitatge de les Corts, which spread the word about one of the actions against this equipment, had the wrong objective. "We are not the interlocutor they are looking for, they have to turn to politicians. We don't have a drawer full of keys to social flats ready to hand over; we would like to. We have been calling for the expansion of the public housing stock for a long time", says Rubio. For years now, the collective has been protesting against the protocol that, since 2013, obliges them to accompany the judicial retinue in evictions.
