The government filed a request asking the Supreme Court to overturn a ruling by a lower court that declared the labor reform included in President Javier Milei’s mega-decree issued in December unconstitutional.

The legal process regarding this section of the decree began when the General Confederation of Labor — CGT in Spanish, Argentina’s biggest union federation — filed a protective writ against it in December. In the first days of January, a labor court issued a temporary suspension of the labor reform. 

On January 30, the Federal Labor Chamber issued a new ruling declaring the labor chapter of the decree unconstitutional. That section included reforms that aimed to undermine workers’ right to strike and have union meetings, extend trial periods, reduce severance pay, and eliminate penalties for companies that fail to register their employees.

The government’s presentation, filed by Treasury General Prosecutor Rodolfo Barra, says the judiciary’s decision does not state how the decree restricts or undermines the CGT’s rights in union matters.

“They also do not explain how the decree affects the rights of the workers that [the CGT] claims to be representing,” the document added.

The Federal Labor Chamber’s main reason for declaring the reform unconstitutional was due to the fact that the government used the wrong legislation. The “decree of necessity and urgency” (DNU in Spanish) Milei used is typically reserved to legislate on matters considered to be so urgent that there is no time to go through Congress first. The judiciary considered that this was not the case.

That ruling handed down by the Federal Labor Court is the first to issue a comment regarding the fundamentals of the mega-decree’s labor reforms. Although some sections of the DNU have been halted due to judiciary injuctions, most of the articles are still in force, including the overturning of the Rental Law, regulations that protected consumers, and a law that limited the amount of land foreigners can buy.

Herald/Télam