The second vice-president and Minister of Labour, Yolanda Díaz, has assured that the reduction of the working day will be processed as a draft law through an urgent procedure and has insisted that the deadlines will be met so that "on December 31, 2025" the working day will be 37.5 hours per week.

"There is room for agreement," Díaz insisted in the press conference after the Council of Ministers. This Friday, October 11, she will meet again with the social dialogue table with the employers and the unions to address the reduction of the maximum working day from the current 40 hours per week to 37.5 hours in 2025 progressively, passing first to 38.5 hours this year. This is what the Government has put forward so far, which has tried to bring the position of the employers' association closer, until now reluctant to join the pact.

In any case, it is guaranteed that the Government's agreement will be fulfilled so that on December 31, 2025 "the entire Spanish salaried population, with an impact on more than 12 million workers, will see their working day reduced by two and a half hours." Nevertheless, it has indicated that it will continue to negotiate with the CEOE-Cepyme employers' association and the UGT and CC.OO. unions to achieve a tripartite agreement and that it will not leave the table until it achieves it.

Díaz has explained that there are two "very sensitive" matters that the negotiating table is working on: remote and real-time time control, as well as the right to digital disconnection. It has also highlighted time controls for more specific professions, such as fishing, steelmaking and shift work.

"In a country that today has an average working day of 38.2 hours, we want something as simple as people in the trade, women who work in any part of the trade in our country, also having reduced working hours (...) and agriculture, which is at the bottom of all this," she argued. "The Government's commitment is clear and the accompanying plan is essential so that there are no first and second class workers," she stressed.