This initiative takes place at the important moment of discussion of the State Budget, which will define a series of policies for next year and which we can confirm right now that they continue the orientation of the previous ones adopted by this government with an absolute majority of the PS.
The PS wants to sell us the idea that this Budget, adopted in general a few days ago, is the best of all, the most responsible and the only one possible.
It's so good, so good, that it leaves PSD, CDS, Chega and IL without any issue. Watch, each in their own way, twisting and squirming, but all in visible difficulties in stating what, in fundamental matters, and besides the speed, they would do differently.
This is the difficulty faced by the right in the face of yet another Budget of the absolute majority that places itself even more at the service of economic groups.
Contrary to what they try to convey through their well-oiled propaganda machine, there is neither justice nor balance in the Budget, there is, rather, a clear option at the service of a handful of privileged people to the detriment of the lives of the workers and people.
It is a budget that curtails the valorisation of wages, especially in the Public Administration, but also due to the negative signal it gives to employers in the private sector.
What the situation needed and needs is a general and significant increase in wages by 15%, by at least 150 euros, as well as setting the National Minimum Wage at 910 euros in January, and reaching one thousand euros during the year 2024.
When what was needed and is needed is an increase in pensions by 7.5%, with a minimum value of 70 euros, the Budget chooses to limit the valorisation of pensions.
A Budget that halts the necessary public investment and increases the deterioration of public services.
When what was needed, needs and is seen by everyone, is the urgency of strengthening the National Health Service, starting with the fixation of more professionals, particularly doctors.
Witness what happens every day at the doors of healthcare centres, witness the closed emergencies and the thousands of people, sick and in need of medical support, people who feel rightly wronged, desperate, in disbelief, but who despite their just feelings, look at healthcare professionals as one of their own, they look at the NHS as rightfully theirs.
This municipality feels these difficulties well with more than 75 thousand users without a family doctor, 55 thousand more than a year and a half ago, as a result of the drain on professionals.
And don't sell us the return of the PPP as a solution to problems when, while it existed, emergency closures were also continuous, in a context in which there were not so many users without a family doctor and two healthcare centres that have since been closed.
It is necessary to stop the ongoing dismantling of the NHS, we must continue to demand answers, measures and solutions that respond to needs. And from here we make the call for this fight to intensify.
Users and professionals are united in defending the NHS, this is a determining element that the government wants to break, trying to create an artificial divide between users and professionals.
They may well try but fail, because users know and know from their own experience the effort, commitment and dedication of doctors, nurses and all the professionals who, every day, guarantee, with many difficulties and too many hours of work, the functioning of the NHS.
The workers deserve respect and the valorisation of their careers, an aspect which, once again, is ignored in the State Budget.
An appeal that extends to the drama that involves the lives of millions of people who live and work here, housing.
When there are those who can take it no longer and it was and is necessary to prevent the increase in rents and not increase them by another 7%, when what was needed was to put the banks' 11 million daily profits to support the increase in payments to the bank that result from interest rates, when what was more than fair was to end the tax benefits that protect real estate speculation and definitively stop subsidising speculation, here is a Budget that, in addition to not solving any of these problems, also worsens them.
When what was needed and is needed, and increasingly so with each passing day, is the fixing and reduction of fuel and food prices, there we have a Budget at the service of speculation.
This is a Budget that is part of the option to continue with privatisations, namely of TAP and Efacec.
We learned a few days ago that the government wants to hand over Efacec to a German fund.
A deal that, on a different scale, is similar to other economic crimes that have already occurred.
The State, each one of us, transferred millions of euros to Efacec and now adds another 200 million, a clean, capitalised company, with contracts, and given this what is the option: hand over the company, because that is what it is about.
The buyer acquires the company with the company's own money, we have already seen this picture at TAP, and it wasn't that long ago.
And let's see if this type of manoeuvre is also intended for TAP.
When what was needed and is needed, when the only way to safeguard the national interest is to maintain public control of TAP, a public company, with public management, a management that, once and for all, is placed at the service of the public interest.
This is what is necessary, it is still possible to stop the ongoing economic crime, it is still possible to stop the privatisation of TAP, for the good of the workers and for the good of the country.
This is the Budget that, in the wake of the abstract talk on taxes, maintains, contrary to what is said, fiscal injustice and extends privileges to big capital.
What was needed and is needed is the reduction of VAT on electricity, natural gas and telecommunications, the reduction of the Income Tax for workers and those who have worked for a lifetime, relief for micro, small and medium-sized companies and taxing large fortunes and profits.
This is what is needed, this is not what the Budget puts forward.
The PS managed to present a Budget in which it leaves out its own proposal for especial taxation on profits, we know that the final formula that is in force today, in practice, resulted in little or nothing, but this time, and by choice, the 25 million euros of profits per day from the main economic groups are not pinched by even one cent.
And here we have the returns already known from Galp, EDP Renováveis, BCP, BPI, Novo Banco in the third quarter of 2023, and others will follow in the same direction. The country's economy is dragging on, but like a miracle of multiplication, profits are increasing visibly.
These returns have nothing divine in them, they are earthly returns, which come from the efforts of workers, they come from the creation of wealth, wealth that is poorly distributed, they come from exploitation, precariousness, injustice and increasingly evident inequalities, they come from options, such as those contained in the Budget, favouring the 5% who concentrate 42% of the national wealth in their hands, while millions of people, who work or have worked their entire lives, live with incomes below a thousand euros gross per month.
Millions who make the economy work, produce wealth.
Millions who are being pushed towards impoverishment with each passing day.
And it is in the face of this reality, the reality of life and not the one that they seek to impose on us, it is in the face of the pressure of the vast majority of the population that the PS government's Budget manages, incredible as it may seem, to advance even further in terms of tax benefits for capital, they are 220 million more, and reach 1600 million euros.
But as if that were not enough, there are even more measures that in practice reduce the effective collection of IRC Corporate Tax and not only continue but increase the millions for public-private partnerships, another 200 million euros, which add to the billion euros that were forecasted a year ago.
And what about the 1500 million euros in tax privileges for non-habitual residents? Amount above what is advanced by the Government in the so-called reduction in IRS Personal Income Tax collection.
But the icing on the cake is the transfer of 8 billion, more than half of the entire NHS budget, to the private disease business.
This is in fact the best possible Budget for a few.
A Budget that, at the same time as it squeezes us, lends a big hand to economic groups.
There are always reasons, sometimes because this is bad and it cannot be, sometimes because this is fine, but it cannot be so for it not to get bad.
When in reality, whatever the situation, there are always impossibilities for those same when there are always a few making profits and concentrating wealth.
They talk about the impositions of the EU and the Euro, but instead of confronting them, they accept them willingly. Standing up to them is an everyday task, and the coming elections will be a decisive moment.
They talk about balanced accounts, yet another fallacy. Even with the corset of the so-called balanced accounts created by them, it was possible to increase wages, pensions and investment.
It is not a problem of lack of resources or money, but of the option of what to do with the resources and money that exist.
It is not due to lack of money, but by option, that countless schools in this municipality remain in poor conditions, sometimes with leaks, sometimes without equipment to protect the playground from rain, sometimes in containers, sometimes with asbestos coverings... Problems and complaints abound, what is really missing is investment and political will to resolve them.
There is only one alternative to a bad Budget for the workers and people and an excellent one for economic groups.
And that alternative involves a policy and a good Budget, for the workers and people, and this implies different options, options that call into question the privileges and benefits that big capital currently enjoys.
It is really possible, with the strength of the people, with the struggle of the workers, a different policy.
It is there in this struggle that strength is affirmed, it is there that hope and trust are founded.
And this is the time to remember two issues. The first is that if two years ago the PS had opted for solutions and not blackmail and elections, many of the problems that exist today, particularly in healthcare, would have been solved. The other issue is that this same government with an absolute majority was forced this year by the struggle to increase wages and pensions, it was forced to take measures on prices and housing, insufficient measures, which did not solve the problems, but which unlocked the door. The same happened in many companies with workers achieving significant wage increases through their struggle. And today, as in the past, our role is to throw open this door that has been unlocked, to continue and intensify the fight.
There is strength for this, we have strength for this.
A strength that was very visible at the «Avante! » Festival, which we held precisely two months ago, a great demonstration of confidence and joy.
A strength that was also expressed in the results of the elections in Madeira, a result that did not fall from the sky, that was not the work of chance or luck, that faced discrimination and the operation of opinion polls, a result that is the result of work and a connection to the populations that we must continue and deepen, in Madeira, here in Vila Franca de Xira and throughout the country.
A permanent contact and action that now has a concrete expression in the national action “It's time to increase wages and pensions”.
What we have before us is to take action to increase wages and pensions, for the right to healthcare and housing, in defence of public services, free daycare for all children, for sovereignty and development, for a better future , essentially putting thousands of people to demand their right to a better life, signing the petition addressed to the Prime Minister.
We want to and will contact thousands of people, we want to and will collect 100 thousand signatures to confront the government with these demands that are so important for the lives of workers, young people and retirees and pensioners.
Let's move forward, let's take even more initiative, let's contact, in companies, in neighbourhoods, in parishes, in buildings, in transport, in each and every place, but we will also test the capacity of each one of us us.
Yes, it is necessary for each of us to take on the role of a militant in this collective task, for each of us to assume that by taking the list of signatures, talking to our neighbours, talking to our co-workers, talking to those we meet on transport, talk to those with whom we are every day.
As we said, we want to and will collect 100 thousand signatures for an increase in wages, pensions and a better life, we will do this by mobilising the Party, its organisations and militants even more, expressing what they are and what they need to be more and more, key players of the struggle and of taking the initiative.
This is how we are, and this is how we will be, strengthening the Party, reinforcing the flood of struggle that is developing for better living conditions.
Here we are in the construction, and we will be there in Lisbon on November 11, this coming Saturday, at the National Demonstration called by CGTP-IN, for more wages, against the cost of living, for a better life.
A better life that we rightly aspire to, a better life that we fight for, a better life for the workers and people around the world.
A word regarding the massacre that the Palestinian people are being subjected to, today, after decades of occupation and systematic disrespect by Israel.
A massacre that unfolds while hypocrisy, cynicism and the glaring complicity with this same ongoing massacre are paraded on television.
There is no tolerance, there is no possible understanding of what is happening, there is no patience for the crocodile tears that are shed here and there.
Here we are, standing alongside the people of Palestine, here we are as millions and millions throughout the world, here we are for their rights, for their State, for their dignity and for their right to existence.
Palestine will win is not a slogan, it is a conviction, a demand and above all a right that is needed and that, through the struggle of the peoples, we must achieve.
The demonstration on the 29th., the actions carried out yesterday, the demonstration taking place in Porto today are important affirmations of solidarity with the Palestinian people and are also strong expressions in the fight for truth, against hypocrisy and cynicism.
There is no lack of reasons to take the initiative, with confidence, determination and joy, with all those we speak to, contact, know and mobilise. A patient, exciting and necessary work for which everyone is necessary.
