1. The PCP considers it necessary to assess the impact of the epidemic outbreak, in its various dimensions, on the situation of women, on the relationship between their professional activity and family life, and take measures to stop the deterioration of living and working conditions and enforce their rights.
In the last three months there has been an increase in inequalities, discrimination and violence that affect most women.

Being a prevailing reality before the epidemic outbreak, it tends to worsen the signs of economic and social recession, without the necessary responses to this exceptional situation being provided by the current government and the European Union.

We will not contribute to the marginalisation of the problems that affect the vast majority of women, in view of a widespread worsening of exploitation, inequalities in the distribution of national income and impoverishment. Nor will we accept that they be referred to as a mere "gender" inequality, an approach that does not respond to the spiral of inequalities, discrimination and violence that the current context fosters, nor does it contribute to affirm the demand for an alternative policy to face and eliminate them.

The increasing weight of women as workers was confirmed, but also of micro and small business women and female farmers and rural workers in the economic fabric of the country.

The value of women's work in sectors that maintained activity during the period of confinement was patent. An example of this is of the healthcare workers, essential to the response of the National Health Service, of those who guaranteed the functioning of the network of equipment and support services (home support services, homes for children and young people, people with disabilities and the elderly), in cleaning and food distribution workers, among others.

Meanwhile, the epidemic outbreak brought to light the situation of vulnerability of the working woman, adding very negative impacts in terms of her professional activity or in its absence, in the brutal drop in her work income, in addition to the great overload in the family and domestic area.

From the outset, the lack of a fair valorisation of working women’s socio-professional status, low wages and non-compliance with labour rights, although prior to the epidemic outbreak, became more evident and shocking in view of the increased demands placed on them during this period.

The great injustice and perversity of precarious work has led thousands of female workers to be left without work and without a salary.

Injustices among nurses infected by Covid-19, considered a professional disease due to the fight, but whose wage amounts to 75% for those who have individual work contracts.

The low wages and wage discrimination, direct and indirect, which affect female workers are reflected in the reduction of their disposable income, given the cuts in wages of all those who stayed at home to accompany their children, of those who are covered by the lay-off scheme, with cuts of one-third of the salary, which represents a double difficulty for those who receive lower wages.

Lower wages, which continue in the current context, is a major factor in the decision for the woman to stay at home with the children, thus ensuring smaller loss of family income.

The current context encourages the promotion of conservative conceptions about the role of women in the family, based on the idea that women should stay at home, to take care of children, the elderly and the sick.

In addition, teleworking did not represent any benefit for women, but, on the contrary, an enormous cost. Even for those who in these months felt a huge relief for not wasting time in commuting between home and work.

Teleworking, regarded as necessary in this exceptional situation, constituted a complete disorganisation of working time and personal and family time, with an enormous daily burden for the vast majority of women, given the practical impossibility of articulating working time with the time to accompany the children and respond to the organisation of other aspects of life and family.

At the same time, the practical impossibility of simultaneously transforming a home into an office, classroom, and living space for family members became patent.

It is essential to fight big capital's theses on the benefits of teleworking for women, which have been fostered by governments and by the European Union's guidelines as “good conciliation practices”. It is an old aspiration that cannot be dissociated from the increase in exploitation under the pretext of the epidemic outbreak, to increase the precariousness of labour relations and cut down labour costs.

We also want to highlight the great deterioration in the living conditions of female workers in the fields of arts and culture, as well as in micro and small entrepreneurs and female farmers and rural workers resulting from the suspension of economic and cultural activities.

2. The PCP has presented very concrete proposals that aim to respond to the increased problems that women are faced with and that are common to the social classes and strata that they are part of and who are being strongly battered in their living conditions and in their near future, as well as to answer their specific problems regarding the need to prevent the worsening inequalities, discrimination and violence that penalise them.

The PCP's proposals have aimed at the need to consolidate the National Health Service, namely with the adoption of the Emergency Plan aimed at strengthening its response capacity to patients with Covid-19 and patients with other pathologies.

But, also, proposals that have been aimed at avoiding a serious economic recession, falling labour earnings and a brutal increase in unemployment.

Noteworthy are the initiatives aimed at ensuring that parents who have to accompany their children receive 100% of their pay and extend this support to families with children up to the age of 16; the automatic extension and renewal of all social benefits; the conversion of fixed-term contracts into permanent contracts for workers hired to reinforce public services; the creation of special social protection support for workers without access to other support mechanisms, namely for workers with atypical forms of work, such as hourly and daily work; guarantee of social protection for workers in temporary work companies that have been subject to dismissals, allowing their access to unemployment benefits.

Likewise, initiatives aimed at ensuring compliance with the decisions contained in the State Budget for 2020, which, with the proposal of the PCP, ensure that daycare attendance is free of charge for families in the first income bracket and for the second child in the second bracket; and the establishment of a plan to extend free daycare centres or similar solutions for all children by 2023.

There were several proposals presented to respond to the problems of family farming, of micro and small entrepreneurs, along with the creation of an emergency social support fund for the cultural and artistic fabric.

And, finally, there is the adoption of PCP’s proposal aimed at improving the conditions of access to unemployment social benefits, guaranteeing the right to this social benefit to workers who were left without income or whose income has decreased significantly and who currently are not entitled to social protection in unemployment.

The PCP reaffirms that in the context of the epidemic outbreak, the response to the prevention and fight against domestic violence involves the compliance of women's rights, a public, articulated and decentralised response, with reinforcement of the financial, technical and human resources of public services so as to fulfil their role in the detection, signalling, referral, protection and defence of women victims of domestic violence, ensuring adequate psychological, social and legal support. At the same time, it is necessary to give priority to preventing the recurrence of domestic violence.

As regards the issue of prostitution, the epidemic outbreak makes visible the absence of programmes to help female prostitutes who are subjected to extreme violence that fuels a sordid business that yields millions to pimping.

3. It is also worth mentioning that some want the epidemic outbreak to circumvent the fight against exploitation, inequalities, discrimination and violence that affect women. This fight is a matter of justice for women who demand to exercise rights, to participate equally in all sectors of activity and in all areas of life in society. But it is also a necessary condition to build a country anchored in social justice, its economic and social development and its sovereignty.
The women can count on the PCP in the fight to stop the deterioration of their living and working conditions, to combat and prevent inequalities, discrimination and violence and to enforce women's rights in different areas.

However, the strength of their organised action is fundamental at the present time and for the future, because the epidemic outbreak does not suspend the justice that governs the satisfaction of the claims that united many thousands of women who participated in the National Demonstration of Women promoted by the MDM, in the scope of the celebration of the International Women's Day, nor those that were at the root of the initiatives carried out within the scope of this date, namely in the week of equality promoted by CGTP-IN and by trade unions for “Quality employment, live and fight for equality”.

On the contrary, these claims are central at the present time, to give women confidence in their irreplaceable role in the struggle that denounces and gives visibility to the increased problems they are faced with and affirms the justice that presides over their demand for the fulfilment of their rights.