New gap between the public workers of the Alhambra and the management of the monument. The works council denounces that a new visiting area has been opened with external personnel, which has been done without communicating it to the works council and that it has been carried out by displacing public employees. A fact that, added to the lack of expansion of the workforce they are demanding (despite the fact that the creation of 187 new jobs has been approved) means that the committee does not rule out mobilizations because they understand that a “covert privatization” of the Alhambra.
Specifically, the Board of Trustees of the Alhambra and the Generalife has opened, for the first time for visits, Torres Bermejasa building close to the palatine city and which was part of the old Muslim wall of Granada. The fortification was acquired by the board in 1962, but to date it was not visitable. However, the Alhambra will open the space every weekend for free. The problem, from which the conflict with the workers arises, is that it is done with external personnel and not with public employees of the monument, which makes them feel “displaced.”
The Alhambra, which is the most visited Spanish monument along with the Sagrada Familia, receives an average of 7,000 visits every day, who will now be able to visit Torres Bermejas on weekends completely free of charge, as is already the case with the Palace of Charles V or the Moor’s Chair. This is the argument offered by the monument’s management to justify the fact that there are no public employees in this new visiting area. They affirm that neither in Carlos V nor in the Silla del Moro are there any, but that they are external watchers and informants.
However, the works council denounces that the management of the Alhambra is making it a “common practice” not to have the staff of public employees because it has opened the walled space without communicating it to the works committee and has done so with external personnel, hired with private companies. This practice is not illegal, since the Board of Trustees can count on external workers for buildings that are outside the Alhambra itself, but it represents a new clash between the management and the workers, very upset by the decisions that have been adopted in the last years.
“Unilateral” decisions
José Murillo, representative of the works council, assures that for some time now “they have been introducing external companies to monitor and control public spaces,” which ends up displacing employees from the workforce. In this case, he states that “the works council has not been taken into account because they have not counted on us at all.” Murillo regrets that it is becoming “common” for management to make decisions “unilaterally” without involving worker representatives.
A situation that they consider “anomalous” and that moves towards the “privatization” of the monument. Such is the degree of indignation that they have that they do not rule out “mobilizations or even a general strike” because, according to the complaint, “they have not even invited us to see Torres Bermejas.” In his case, who works as a gardener at the Alhambra, he says that many employees are unaware of areas of the monument because the management “ignores them.”
On the other hand, the committee affirms that the management of the Alhambra promised to take public employees into account when opening new spaces, something that has not happened in the case of Torres Bermejas. However, sources from the Board of Trustees deny that “nothing has been promised to anyone” and that the criteria applied to have external workers is “similar” to that of spaces such as the Palace of Charles V, while Culture understands that the priority is open new spaces to the public, regardless of the personnel with whom it is done. However, the committee remembers that within Carlos V there is a museum that is operated by public staff.
Insufficient staff
In any case, this new dispute adds to the “historical” problem that the Alhambra workers denounce due to the lack of personnel. For years, the committee has been demanding more staff and regrets that the expansion of the RPT (list of jobs) with 187 new jobs, announced in September, to cover the positions that are becoming vacant due to retirements or sick leave, is not being fulfilled. . Without going any further, José Murillo, representative of the committee, denounces that, as a gardener, he suffers daily from the lack of personnel to cover the needs of the entire monument.
Although the expansion of the RPT has been announced from the Alhambra, the committee has doubts because with the opening of new spaces such as Torres Bermejas, external staff continue to be used. “They have not even negotiated the RPT with us because they do everything without consulting us and we found out from the press,” Murillo denounces.
Right now there is another open dispute with the workers who were permanently permanent. Some workers claim that the labor merits accumulated in recent years are being measured arbitrarily in some cases, endangering the jobs of people who have been employed at the Alhambra for a long time. For all these reasons, they insist that they are not going to give in on their demands and do not rule out going on strike.
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