The self-employed ask to extend the ERTE and the aid for cessation of activity until May 31

The state of alarm decreed yesterday by the Government and the new measures to contain the wave of infections have led self-employed workers to request the extension of emergency financial aid until next May 31.

The time restrictions imposed by the Government could be prolonged, according to President Pedro Sánchez yesterday, for six months, until next May 9 and the aid scheme agreed with the social agents is extended until January 31. In addition, this scheme focuses on returning the economy to normal, while the measure announced yesterday goes in the opposite direction.

“A disaster is looming for companies, the self-employed and workers if it is not accompanied by an urgent plan of economic measures,” he warned Lorenzo Love, President of the Association of Self-Employed Workers (ATA).

The request of the self-employed consists of a decalogue which includes lower social contributions and freelance fees, extend ERTE and aid for cessation of activity until May 31, suspend tax increases and lower VAT to sectors especially affected such as hospitality, hairdressing, gyms, increase one more year the grace periods for repayment of capital of ICO credit lines, rent aids for the self-employed who are forced to completely close their activity, as well as moratoriums and tax deferrals until June 30, among other measures.

The economic impact of the administrative measures to curb the second wave of infections remains to be seen, but since last week different economic and social agents announced a hard blow in the form of employment regulation files that will put the schemes of income protection launched by the Government last August.

This is what the Labor inspectors, the College of administrative managers and self-employed workers. The former fear in particular an avalanche of files as of today. The current income protection scheme in force since last September 1 contemplates different types of ERTE that replace the old figure of the file due to regrowth. Now the justifications are for impediment, for limitations caused by health decisions and for belonging to a sector especially affected by the crisis. This last chapter includes those of companies that are linked by their value chain to a particularly affected sector.

In the new scheme, approval by the labor authorities is mandatory, with five days to report. “In the last week, the inspectors have been accumulating up to 10 files per official to resolve and with the next perimeter confinements and the restrictions on schedules and capacity we expect an avalanche from next monday, fundamentally of hotels, restaurants and small businesses “, explained last Friday Ana Ercoreca, president of the union of Labor Inspectors.

Only in Catalonia, where last week bars and restaurants were closed to combat the pandemic. The number of temporary employment regulation files (ERTE) has shot up again, which, in just one week, rises to 4,871 and affects a total of 41,054 workers

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