o
se corresponde el pulso electoral de la calle con la campaña que
sale en el telediario. La campaña se hace cada vez más para la
televisión. Un lector nos ha dado la clave. Fue el otro día a un
mitin de un partido que no hace al caso. Una de las llamadas
reuniones sectoriales, en las que un partido explica su programa
sobre ciertos asuntos a simpatizantes interesados en ellos. El
lector llegó al lugar de la reunión y le sorprendió de momento
la cantidad de coches oficiales que había en la puerta. Cuestión
no menor, por lo que debe parecer la mujer del César, pero que
nadie se plantea. Los candidatos, ¿van a los mítines en los
coches oficiales o en sus vehículos particulares? ¿Alquilan en
Tavares un coche con conductor que paga el partido, o van en el
vehículo comprado con dinero público, que gasta gasolina que
pagamos nosotros y que conduce un funcionario cuyo sueldo sale
de nuestros impuestos? Eso en los desplazamientos cortos, que
nada digo de los largos. Cuando cogen un avión o el Ave, ¿quién
paga el billete? ¿Se lo paga el partido con cargo a los gastos
de campaña, o usan el talonario de gratis total que tienen como
diputados en Cortes? Sin despejar estas cuestiones, el lector de
marras se encontró en el local donde daban el mitin sectorial
con toda una flota de coches oficiales, con los conductores
allí, mano sobre mano, esperando que sus señoritos terminasen la
reunión. Y de equipos de protección, ni te digo. Y de cámaras de
TV y fotógrafos de periódicos y agencias, incontables. Entre
chóferes de los coches oficiales, guardaespaldas, camarógrafos y
fotógrafos, ¿sabe usted cuántos había?
-- Tropecientos mil...
-- No, peor: más que público.
Porque el público no llegaba a las cincuenta
personas. De sillas vacías había tantas que no te quiero ni
contar. Nuestro hombre estuvo allí, escuchó con atención los
discursos, saludó a algunos compañeros de profesión también
convocados a la reunión y se marchó a su casa. En su vida había
estado en mitin tan chuchurrío. Pero hete aquí que puso la
televisión y vio por Canal Sur lo que casi lo tiró de espaldas.
Daban una información auténticamente triunfal de aquella birria
de acto. El salón, con tomas inteligentemente montadas, aparecía
rebosante de público. Los aplausos, en primer plano, sonaban
ensordecedores. Presentaban como un clamor de masas lo que había
sido una reunioncita de nada. Era lo que interesaba a los que
daban el mitin. No lo que dijeran a los presentes, sino lo que
luego iban a poner en el telediario.
Leo que al mitin de Zapatero en Dos Hermanas
fueron cuatrocientos autobuses de partidarios de su cuestión,
que llenaron el Velódromo. Cuatrocientos autobuses son muchos
autobuses. ¿Quién ha pagado esos autobuses? Y luego, cuando
venga Rajoy y vayan otros cuatrocientos autobuses, ¿quién pagará
esos cuatrocientos autobuses? A mí me da igual que los pague la
Junta o el Gobierno central. Lo que no quiero es que paguen con
mi dinero autobuses para llenar de público no el escenario del
mitin, que es lo de menos, sino la información del telediario,
que es lo único que les interesa. Los mítines se han convertido
en unos programas de televisión más, con público alquilón en el
plató. Polideportivo o plató, para el caso es lo mismo. Porque
el público de acarreo sí que es el mismo. Hay agencias que
llenan de público joven o maduro, a medida, los platós de
televisión. Cada partido tiene su agencia de llevar público a
estos platós improvisados de los polideportivos, donde al
candidato los asistentes les importan un rábano, lo que quiere
es largar la frase del día para que salga en el telediario. Y
con unas tomas que parezca que aquello está a reventar. Con
cuatrocientos autobuses lleno yo el Bernabeu si hace falta...
TEXTO DEL "FINANCIAL TIMES" 24/2/2004
EUROPE: Swedish job formula finds
favour in Spain
By Leslie Crawford
Financial Times; Feb 24, 2004
Wanted: single mothers, students, people with disabilities and
long-term unemployed, to work for prestigious Swedish
multinational. No previous experience required. Generous
benefits.
More than 30,000 applicants responded to
Ikea's advertisements in Seville, where the Swedish furniture
group last month opened its fifth megastore in Spain. Ikea's
recruitment drive caused a commotion in Andalucia, the region
with the highest unemployment rate - 18.5 per cent - in Spain.
Never before had a big company sought applications from those
traditionally consigned to the bottom of the heap in Spain. At
Ikea's new warehouse in Castilleja de la Cuesta, in the
outskirts of Seville, the air of gratitude was palpable.
In Andalucia, as in the rest of Spain, female
unemployment is double that of men. Women earn 30 per cent less
than men, on average, and are more likely to be trapped in the
revolving door of fixed-term contracts. In defiance of the law,
pregnant employees are often fired. As a result, housewives such
as Maria Angeles Clemete, a 35-year-old mother of three, had
given up on ever getting a job.
"I married young. I don't have a university
degree and I had never worked before. I thought my chances of
being selected at Ikea were nil," Mrs Clemente says.
Yet she put in an application because the
store was just up the road from where she lives. "And here I am,
working in the potted plants department, five days a week."
Four of her neighbours - all women - and a
neighbour's son, have been hired by Ikea. A part-time contract
allows Mrs Clemente to look after her children in the afternoon.
Ikea has hired 350 people to work in its new
store. Juvencio Maeztu, the Andalucian store manager, says
Ikea's employment model in all countries is to target those who
really need the jobs. He was offering part-time jobs where there
were few to be had, and training for those who had never worked
before.
People with disabilities have been taken on in
the customer services, administration and logistics departments.
The selection process lasted six months, Mr Maeztu says. "We
were more interested in finding people with the right motivation
than with the right college degrees."
Ikea's progressive hiring policies may be
standard practice in Sweden, but they are almost unheard of in
Spain. The Seville store attracted nationwide television
coverage, and Ikea, which plans to open 22 new stores in the
Iberian peninsula over the next 10 years, has become something
of a beacon for job seekers desperately hunting for enlightened
employers.
And in a nation of small shopkeepers, Ikea is
sensitive to the impact of megastores and their negative image.
Not long ago, Sánchez Romero, an upmarket
supermarket chain, was shamed when a radio journalist found some
of the company's job interview notes that had been cleared out
and dumped in rubbish bags outside its Madrid head-quarters.
"A fattie. Pig faced, poor make-up," said one
interview note. "South American. Dark, without being black.
Coffee and milk, long on coffee," read another. "No - because
mentally handicapped. Buck teeth, speech impediment." "Foreigner,
dark-skinned, hungry-looking."
A spokesman for Sánchez Romero denied the
company discriminated against foreigners, handicapped or ugly
people, and denied any knowledge of the interview notes. Many
Spaniards suspect, however, that in a country with a jobless
rate of 11 per cent - the highest in Europe - this kind of
discrimination is common.
The ruling Popular party, which is fighting a
general election next month, prefers to accentuate the positive:
more than 3m jobs created during José María Aznar's eight-year
premiership, increases in child benefits for working mothers,
and government subsidies for employers who take on young people
and those over 50. Last year Spain created half of all the new
jobs in the European Union.
A recent European Commission report, while
praising Spain's progress in reducing unemployment, nevertheless
questioned the quality of the jobs being created. Too many were
insecure, fixed-term contracts where pay and productivity were
low, it said. The abuse of fixed-term contracts is so widespread
that Spaniards have coined a phrase for them: "contratos
basura", or rubbish contracts. Companies that provide cleaning
services are some of the worst offenders. Trade unions have
begun to organise against them.
Spain's economy ministry admits that some
employers are making excessive use of fixed-term contracts to
circumvent contractual obligations such as having to provide
pension or unemployment benefits. It says it is trying to close
the loopholes in Spanish employment law.
At Ikea, meanwhile, Mr Maeztu is more
concerned with keeping his employees happy than the ease with
which he can fire them. "We devote a lot of time and effort to
getting the right mix of people," he says. "I don't want them to
leave."
This column appears every Tuesday