Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2016, published 106th ILC session (2017)

Labour Statistics Convention, 1985 (No. 160) - Spain (Ratification: 1989)

The Committee notes the observations from the Trade Union Confederation of Workers’ Commissions (CCOO), received on 15 September 2015, and the Government’s reply, received on 11 November 2015.

Articles 1, 7 and 8 of the Convention. Basic labour statistics. Statistics of employment, unemployment and underemployment. Statistics of the structure and distribution of the economically active population. The CCOO is of the opinion that statistical information related to Article 1 of the Convention is not limited to the surveys carried out by the National Institute of Statistics (INE). The Government indicates in its reply that, for each subject, the source having the best international comparability was selected. The Committee notes that the main source of information on the active population is still the active population survey (EPA). The Committee requests the Government to indicate whether any action has been taken to implement the Resolution concerning statistics of work, employment and labour underutilization (Resolution I), adopted by the 19th International Conference of Labour Statisticians (October 2013).

Article 3. Consultation of the social partners. The CCOO states with regard to the annual labour survey (EAL) that the workers’ and employers’ organizations were not consulted. The CCOO adds that the organizations in question were merely invited to attend an information meeting after the EAL had been published. The Committee requests the Government to provide its comments on this matter.

Application of the Convention in practice. The CCOO observes that there are no statistics that could indicate the coverage provided by collective agreements in force and there is no statistical processing of collective agreements registered with the labour authority, except for the partial exploitation of data relating to the non-application of Conventions. The CCOO refers to recommendations relating to national statistical plans which have not yet been implemented, such as: promoting methodological studies which, using existing sources relating to wage costs, enable the creation of a labour price index; creating integrated statistics on dismissals, indicating the type of dismissal and compensation for contract termination; making better use of social security registers to improve statistics on collective labour agreements; including information, in the aforementioned statistics, on the number of enterprises or workers affected by an “opt-out” clause in the collective agreement, the type of “opt-out” (in terms of wages or in another form) and the grounds for it; amending the Act concerning the public statistical service to allow the INE access to tax-related records; incorporating wages in the EPA on an individual basis instead of the current usage of deciles; and publishing job registration and cancellation flows by type of contract and working day, on the basis of the EPA. The Government states in its reply that the observations made by the CCOO regarding the recommendations relating to national statistical plans in the labour sphere are outside the scope of the Convention. The Committee notes the drawing up of the labour price index, which is due to be published by the INE at the end of 2016. The Committee requests the Government to continue to provide information on any new developments relating to the matters covered by the Convention.