The Government has held an extraordinary Council of Ministers this 8M. It has done so with the participation of several ministers to approve a battery of measures that affect several departments. The Minister of Equality, Ana Redondo, has announced the approval of the draft law on trafficking, which will address everything from trafficking for sexual exploitation to labor trafficking but also forced marriages. It will offer victims a provisional authorization with a residence and work permit while the definitive status of victim is certified. A complaint will not be necessary to access this authorization or the rights that victims have, but a provisional accreditation will be necessary.
The text that the Government approves this Friday is the same one that was already on the table in the previous legislature. “It is not a punitive law, it is focused on protection and awareness and to act against all forms of trafficking,” said the Minister of Equality, Ana Redondo. “For them to take the step of reporting, they are guaranteed not to be expelled from the country if they do so and to be able to access the entire range of aid. The complaint is disconnected from all the rights that can be accessed,” she added. These rights are, for example, access to the Minimum Living Income, being a priority group when accessing public housing, access to legal assistance or the right to collect compensation from assets confiscated from mafias and groups. of trafficking.
Redondo has announced that, in parallel with the start of the legislative process, there will be a working group with associations and groups that work around trafficking. The Government will also collect the mandatory reports from organizations such as the Judiciary or the Fiscal Council.
The minister has also announced the renewal of the protocol against harassment in the General State Administration. From now on, more groups will be able to access it, that is, intern workers and those who work in auxiliary companies. It will also include a list of specific attitudes that constitute sexual harassment.
The Council of Ministers has also developed one of the articles of the yes is yes law that were pending to be executed: the implementation of financial aid to victims of sexual violence with incomes below the interprofessional minimum wage. They will be able to receive unemployment benefits for six months.
The Minister of Social Security, Elma Saiz, has also announced a change that affects women who suffer sexist violence. Situations of temporary disability, that is, sick leave due to sexist violence, will be treated with professional and non-common contingencies, as until now. In practice, this means equating their sick leave to that of work accidents, something that improves the amount: they will receive 75% of the regulatory base from the first day and no waiting period will be necessary.
Changes in VioGén
The Government has also promoted a change in the VioGén system, which is intended for the monitoring and protection of victims of gender violence. As explained by the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, this same 8M the Secretary of State for Security has issued a new instruction that modifies the criteria by which a case in the system is declared inactive, the minister explained about the change, whose objective is to “prolong protection over time and prevent people from suffering a situation of premature helplessness in cases where there may be risk.”
The issue has been worrying the Interior for some time, which already announced at the end of last year that it would review this procedure. And in some of the cases of fatal victims due to gender violence, the case was inactive in the system. Specifically, of the 55 murders that were recorded until December 7, eight were inactive in VioGén, according to the latest data.
The modifications announced by Marlaska limit the assumptions for declaring an inactive case: from now on, those considered by the Police to be of medium-high or extreme risk can only be classified as inactive “if circumstances such as death or imprisonment of the aggressor occur.” and other similar ones that “make aggression impossible.”
On the other hand, those of low or unappreciated risk may only be inactivated when there are no judicial measures in force or there are no “circumstances related to the vulnerability of the victim or dangerousness of the aggressor” that recommend otherwise. The agents will also have to meet “at least once and in person” to reevaluate the situation. In the event that there are no judicial measures or there is a request from the woman to leave the system, the agents will use the Zero Protocol, which allows “activating protection” when the woman is reluctant to report, Marlaska explained.
The minister has also announced a “new modality” outside of the ordinary inactivation of a case: supervised inactivation, which will be applied in “highly complex” cases for a minimum period of six months with the possibility of two quarterly extensions. In these cases, it is expected that agents will carry out periodic risk assessments with personal interviews with the victim “until they have at least two consecutive ones that conclude that there is no risk for the woman.”
Source: www.eldiario.es
