This Tuesday, October 21st, the Common Front envisaged a “major strike” by the public administration on Friday against the Government, which it accuses of degrading work and public services and wanting to imply that there are “more safety problems than health problems”.
“It will be a big strike and it will force the Government, if it has common sense, to realize that it is buying social conflict and that it will not stop because workers demand different policies”, said the coordinator of the Common Front, Sebastião Santana, at a press conference in Lisbon.
The union leader predicted the closure of many schools, disruptions to health and justice services, as well as a strong turnout of workers in local authorities, central public administration services and in culture and monuments.
Asked if he really believes that the executive will be able to reverse its policies, Santana stated that he does not expect “the Government to give in without a fight”, but that it was “always the struggle of workers that overthrew Governments and guaranteed the appreciation of work in other years”.
For the union leader, workers cannot accept a State Budget for the degradation of working conditions and disinvestment in public services.
Sebastião Santana said that the increase in the health budget in 2026 is even below inflation, in addition to the fact that, of the total of 17 billion euros, more than half is channeled privately (in exams, surgeries, medicines, etc., financed by the State).
“There are 760 thousand people [que são] Public administration workers have a very large weight in Portuguese society. If the Government does not take this into account, it is very serious shortsightedness”, he said.
Asked whether there would be room in the State Budget to accommodate the 15% salary increase required by the Common Front (at least 150 euros), taking into account the slight surplus of 0.1% of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) predicted for 2026, the union leader responded affirmatively as long as political priorities were changed.
“There is every margin. If the State Budget proposal does not have tax freebies of 1,700 million euros for companies, if there is no IRC break of 300 million euros (…). It is not a question of lack of money, it is a question of political choice”, he stated.
Sebastião Santana also mentioned that the budget proposal includes an increase in defense spending by 14% and that an investment of 50 million euros was recently announced in the acquisition of North American weapons to be delivered to Ukraine.
“It makes us believe that today we are in Portugal with more security problems than health problems, which is not true”, he stressed.
Asked whether the strike could bring any changes to the approval of the budget in parliament when the PS has already announced a “demanding abstention”, Sebastião Santana said that the PS “there is still time to change its opinion” and that the political process does not only concern parliament and is conditioned by social struggle.
Regarding the minimum services in this strike, the leaders of the Common Front explained that the strike notices defined, as usual, the minimum services and that in health, for example, they include emergencies, scheduled surgeries considered urgent, treatments such as fertilization, home hospitalization, etc.
So far, around 20 entities (mainly health) have contested the defined minimum services, with the decision being left to the arbitration court.
“What’s a shame is that essential social needs are not always considered by the Government, only on strike days”, stated Sebastião Santana, adding that it is common for minimum health services to involve more workers than on a normal working day.
Still at the press conference, the Common Front said the labor reform package was “shameful” and that the State reform is an “earthwork of public services”starting with the creation of the Agency for the Management of the Educational System, which considered that it will have a business logic and that it will be the first phase of the deconstruction of the public education system.