The President of the Autonomous Community of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, inaugurates the new technology center of the multinational Glovo in October 2021. COMMUNITY OF MADRID
The Autonomous Community of Madrid, chaired by Isabel Díaz Ayuso, strikes an agreement to distribute food to vulnerable people with Glovo, a company that has been fined more than €205 million for violating workers’ rights. The agreement, which will not involve any economic compensation in favor of the company, is part of a strategy, according to the two parties involved, to improve the image of a company in the eye of the hurricane due to its constant problems with the Labor Inspectorate’s use of bogus self-employed or workers without work permits or by the Decision to lay off 6.5% of its employees (250). A course that the regional administration apparently does not consider reprehensible. But on the contrary. After Ayuso’s visit to the delivery company’s headquarters in 2021, the Minister of Family, Youth and Social Policy, Concepción Dancausa, is the best defender of Glovo’s image and interests this Thursday, who would be in charge of distributing the food “Both available in the dining room as well as a take-away bag, the weight of which makes transport difficult on many occasions.”
“These delivery men are precarious workers who could perfectly end up going to the soup kitchens where they will be working [para recoger la comida que repartan]. This is Ayuso’s liberal dystopia,” laments Más Madrid MP Emilio Delgado. “We do not share this low-cost model and we are committed to Madrid companies and entities that respect current laws and labor rights,” he continues. And he complains: “The Autonomous Community of Madrid believes that Glovo is the ideal company to manage soup kitchens and provide food to people without resources, which has made its fortune literally destroying the rights of its workers, and which is an example of The most crass capitalism, the flagship of job insecurity in Spain”.
In all, Glovo was penalized for improper conduct with 37,348 bogus self-employed or foreign workers without a work permit. This has resulted in 205.3 million euros in penalties, 125.3 million penalties and 80 million contribution statement slips. Glovo defends itself by pointing out that the control period resulting from these fines predates the entry into force of the Equestrian Act. In parallel, and faced with violations in a sector largely based on bogus self-employment, the state government is trying to escalate crimes against workers’ rights with prison terms provided for in the Criminal Code.
However, there is hardly a company representative who defends his interests more eloquently than the one used by consultant Dancausa at this Thursday’s meeting. Díaz Ayuso’s government representative acted as the company’s spokesman.
“The first is a clarification: Any sanctions Glovo has precede the Riders Act,” Dancausa said during the regional government’s control plenary session, referring to the norm that requires hiring delivery drivers working for platforms digitally as false freelancers. “We would have been pleased if Glovo’s offer had been made by Correos, a public company where Mr. Sánchez appointed his former chief of staff as president,” he continued.
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“Glovo is making its technology available to social organizations to facilitate the distribution of food baskets to people in vulnerable situations,” the consultant continued. “Since 2020, thanks to the collaboration of more than 80 companies, more than 700 tons of food have been recovered and more than 200,000 food baskets have been delivered,” he added. “NGOs like Cáritas or the Down Syndrome Foundation and many others are working with Glovo on this initiative… but they are only interested in talking about the problems a company might have with the Labor Inspectorate.”
Some of these arguments are traced word for word to the company’s argument, as this newspaper has confirmed while collecting its version. The test period mentioned in the file is before the so-called rider law came into force,” added a spokesman for the company about the fine recently received. “Not only is the proposed sanction not a consequence of the Equestrian Law because it dates back to an earlier period, but it also refers to an operating model that no longer exists in Spain,” he continued. There is no Labor Inspectorate report or any kind of judicial opinion on the new unreleased model currently available in Spain. Glovo will appeal this sanction proposal.
The concurring versions and willingness to reach an agreement is an example of the unprecedented coordination between the Ayuso government and private companies on food. Thus, during the worst period of the pandemic, the regional president repeatedly defended the sending of Telepizza, Rodilla or Viena Capellanes menus to families eligible for a meal stipend because they are recipients of the Minimum Insertion Income (RMI). Now it’s the turn of the delivery company Glovo, as the details of an agreement that will soon be signed and published in the regional bulletin are not yet known.
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