Brussels, 30/01/2012
CONSEQUENCES OF IMPOSED AUSTERITY
Belgium 30 January : General strike against austerity measures and in favour of jobs.
"It is clear to see that these austerity measures are having a particularly serious effect on four groups which are already in a very fragile position on the employment market: young people, the long-term unemployed, older workers and women”.
{{General strike organised by: CSC
FGTB
CGSLB}}
{{THERE ARE ALTERNATIVES }}
"Young people who do not immediately find a stable job will now have to wait twelve months before they are eligible to receive any benefits;
Benefits for the long-term unemployed will drop after 15 to 24 months and fall back to a minimum that is below the European poverty threshold;
Older workers are liable to be sacked without being able to take early retirement and thus join the ‘ordinary’ unemployed;
Women will be hit hard by the limits on access to measures to balance work and home life and will remain the most seriously affected by the limits on pension rights for periods without contributions"
We need to see alternative policies
• Explicit commitments by the Regions and the Communities in terms of the quality and suitability of management, training and employment for these four categories;
• Stronger protection against insecurity in employment;
• An ambitious policy to allow all women to have a proper career;
• Implementation of fairer taxation on property income and wealth via the introduction of a genuine register of property asset holdings and its corollary, the real and effective scrapping of bank secrecy laws regarding taxation in Belgium;
• The introduction of a minimum taxation scheme as an alternative to corporation tax in order to ensure that businesses based in Belgium make a minimum contribution to the funding of the national socio-economic model.
The ETUC is putting its full weight behind this day of action