The universities of the Region of Murcia (the public UMU, UPCT and the private UCAM), showed their rejection of the draft Statute for people undergoing practical training in the field of business, known as the Scholarship Statute, since it constitutes “a threat” for the internship model in force in the Spanish university system. The three universities are part of the Conference of Rectors of Spanish Universities (CRUE), which brings together 76 Spanish universities (50 public and 26 private), and which issued a statement last Saturday expressing its disagreement with the project prepared by the Ministry of work.
The reaction came after the announcement by the Second Vice President and Minister of Labor, Yolanda Díaz, that her department and the unions have reached an agreement to deploy the Scholarship Statute, although it has not had the support of the Spanish Confederation of Organizations Business (CEOE). Thus, the Conference expressed its disagreement with the way in which it has been negotiated, since the internships of university students “are a strictly academic matter”, for which reason it does not understand the reason why it is the unions and employers who agree its legal regime.
«There is no question of their ability (and that of the Ministry of Labor) to set the border between what are academic practices and what are not, by configuring a true and proper employment contract. But, once that border has been established, unions and employers have nothing to decide regarding the legal regime of academic practices. This is an exclusively academic matter whose regulatory competence falls on the Ministry of Universities and on the universities themselves, ”says the organization, chaired by Eva Alcón Soler.
Compulsory Compensation
The Conference of Rectors is “radically” opposed to establishing mandatory compensation for the expenses that the student internship may incur. For the CRUE it is an “unprecedented” provision in Spanish Law and maintains that its “immediate” consequence is that the number of companies and “above all” public entities willing to welcome students will decrease “dramatically”.
In addition, it affirms that the valuation of such compensation will generate, “with all certainty”, a great complexity and difficulties added to the ordinary management of the practices. And he insists on the “serious danger” for the continuity of the offer of internships that also suppose both the mandatory compensation and the inclusion of the students in internships to Social Security “without, at least, leaving time for the universities to apply ». The universities warn of the “harm” of the measures for the Spanish student body.
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