Law approved recognizing the work of 3,000 social entities

BarcelonaIt has taken four years for the law of the third social sector to see the light of day. The project was dropped due to the call for early elections, and after months of new debates and parliamentary proceedings in this new legislature, the plenary session of the Catalan chamber approved this Wednesday by a large majority a text that, for the first time, officially recognizes the work of the 3,000 non-profit entities that serve more than two million Catalans –a quarter of the population–, the majority of whom are vulnerable groups. The norm was passed with the votes of the PSC, ERC, Comuns, and Junts, the abstention of the PP, Vox, and the CUP, and the opposition of the deputies of Aliança Catalana.

The law is a historic demand of the Table of Entities of the Social Third Sector and of the Employers' Confederation of the Social Third Sector –which brings together employers and is responsible for negotiating agreements and salaries–, who claimed the institutional and legal recognition of the work that private entities such as foundations, cooperatives, and non-profit associations have historically done to cover the shortcomings of public services.

The big change is that from now on it "shields" their dialogue with the third sector, since “whatever the government of the Generalitat may be, it will be obliged to meet" with the entities, as the president of the Confederation, Jordi Roman, has emphasized, once the last parliamentary step has been overcome.

No, in no case. The law regulates neither services nor social policies, which remain in the hands of the administrations. But it does accept "shared design" through the new Council of Civil Dialogue, a collegiate body of maximum representation comparable to the social one, which brings together unions and employers to agree on economic policies. At this point, the president of the Table, Xavier Trabado, has indicated that this space for debate with the Generalitat will give the sector "more capacity to influence" social policies in the Catalonia of the future. For example, he trusts to be able to influence proposals to reduce the high rate of child poverty and for the improvement of services to care for the dependent, victims of sexist violence, and disability.

Not yet, because the law does not specify how the activities and services provided by the third sector should be financed, nor does it set the specific amounts to be allocated. It merely recognizes the contracting of services as the preferred formula for public-private collaboration. The sector's historical complaint is structural underfunding, because unlike healthcare and education, entities are financed through calls for grants, which can suffer delays due to treasury problems of the administrations, forcing them to borrow by advancing money to maintain activities or, conversely, to abruptly end programs. The financing itself will be handled by the future law on instruments for the provision of the public social services system, which is in an initial phase of processing in Parliament, and which must safeguard the economic contracting model, detached from budgetary volatility.

In principle yes, because it recognizes the salary equalization of the 120,000 workers in the sector with those who do the same job but are directly hired by the administrations. Today, salary differences of up to 37% on average can be found in the same service, as it is common for public and outsourced staff to coexist in certain services. The private social sector is governed by 17 collective agreements.

Both the Popular Party and the CUP have abstained, even though they have assumed the philosophy of the text. Both have raised their reservations about an excess of outsourced services, and have called for more control and oversight of the accounts and activities of the contracted entities.