‘What we need is more protest’: Portuguese general strike brings cities to a halt

Portugal’s prime minister Luis Montenegro (Pic: Wikimedia commons)

Hundreds of thousands of workers in Portugal staged a general strike this week against the right wing government’s labour law “reforms”.

The country’s largest trade union federation, the CGTP, called the action on Wednesday.

Prime minister Luis Montenegro of the conservative PSD party wants to hand more power to bosses. The “reforms” would make it easier for them to sack workers, increase the working week to up to 50 hours and do away with paid overtime—even on weekends.

These are just a handful of more than 100 proposed reforms, which Montenegro insists are essential to increase efficiency.

Francisco, a school teacher in the capital Lisbon, told Socialist Worker, “I don’t want the new labour laws and nor does the vast majority of the population.

“That’s why I’m out on the streets today—and that is the response that is needed. These laws are an attack on the whole of the working class and the strikes show how unpopular they are.”

The labour minister, Maria Ramalho, tried to claim that the strike only involved public sector workers, not those in the private sector.

João, a union shop steward and worker in the Volkswagen plant in Setubol, said this was a lie. “Of workers who were out on strike today, I’d estimate that 50 percent of them were from the private sector,” he told Socialist Worker.

“In my factory, when we held two big assemblies before the general strike, workers voted unanimously to support it.”  

The strike involved all sections of workers—doctors, nurses, school teachers and transport workers, among others.

Ana and Andy, socialists based in the city of Setubal, stressed how widespread support for the strike was. “The mood on the streets was welcoming,” they told Socialist Worker.

“The press is reporting that the strike’s popularity with people in Portugal is something like 80 percent. That’s not to say that 80 percent are out on the streets. But a lot are—and a lot will simply have stayed home as well. It certainly suggests a mood.”  

Ana pointed out how crucial transport workers were to the success of the strike as a whole. “Since transport workers were out, there was a knock-on effect,” she said.

“Other people weren’t able to get to work. Supermarket warehouses were shut and the capital city Lisbon was effectively shut down.”

Andy added, “All in all, 28 cities and towns had demos or picket lines.”

Wednesday’s action comes after the general strike of 11 December, the first action in Portugal on this scale since protests against austerity in 2013.

Both Francisco and João were clear that the fight against the reforms would need to be kept up. “I think we waited too long since the last general strike,” João said.

“We should have built struggle against the government in the meantime to keep up the momentum.”

“What we need is more protest, to come out onto the streets more and more,” Francisco added.

Ordinary union members will have to push their leaders to escalate the action.