SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE, May 1. (EUROPE PRESS) –
Hundreds of people have demonstrated this Sunday in Santa Cruz de Tenerife and Las Palmas de Gran Canaria on the occasion of May Day, Worker’s Day, to claim the improvement of the living and working conditions of the Canarian society and to demand a general rise in wages.
In Santa Cruz de Tenerife, the demonstration started at 10:00 am from Plaza Weyler, going through the main streets of the city until reaching Plaza de la Candelaria. In Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, the march went from Calle San Telmo to Plaza de Santa Ana.
The unions have also called events in other parts of the Archipelago. Thus, this noon there has been a concentration in front of the Insular Directorate of the Government in Santa Cruz de La Palma, while in Teguise the ‘Miguel Barrios’ prizes have been awarded and the May Day manifesto has been read.
The marches have been uneventful and have served to draw attention to the need to address issues such as better wages for workers, whose purchasing power has been eroded by rising costs of living.
In this regard, the Secretary of Organization of the UGT Canarias, Héctor Fajardo, considered that the Government “has to activate some model or protocol to contain prices” and, at the same time, understands that the employers “must have high sights to reach an income agreement in this country”.
According to Fajardo, employers must propose wage increases in sectoral collective agreements and in company collective agreements. “If there is no wage increase for all workers, it is clear that there is going to be a much more radical mobilization, much more present in the streets and conflicts in the companies and in the productive sectors of this country,” he warned.
