Lisbon, June 18, 2026 (Lusa) - Portugal's minister for labour said on Thursday that the labour reform aims to “break with the ideology of impoverishment”, so that “work becomes more productive and businesses more competitive”, blaming the Socialist Party (PS) for the “current state of the country”.

“This is a reform to break with the ideology of impoverishment that has brought us to this point and to get the country back on its feet,” the minister, Rosário Palma Ramalho, said during her opening speech in the general debate on the draft bill to revise labour legislation, which is taking place in parliament on Thursday.

According to the minister, the proposal aims to “strengthen rights”, but “also to ensure that work is more productive and businesses more competitive”, as this is the “only way” to “pay better wages”, she argued, pointing out that the country’s wage level is 35% below the European average.

Palma Ramalho said that the government led by Luís Montenegro “refuses to fall into the traps of the past”, considering it “a mistake to demand greater convergence with wages and living conditions in the rest of Europe, whilst rejecting the lessons that Europe offers us to achieve that goal”.

“And it is a mistake to demonise the business world,” she stressed.

JMF/ADB // ADB.

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