Undeclared economy, Spanish unions have been actively promoting the regularization and inclusion of migrants: exclusionary practices have never been an option, given Spanish borders’ permeability and the large number of small companies. Keeping migrant workers in the regular economy and preventing their exploitation is therefore an Important priority for Spanish unions, but it has predominantly taken the form of political pressure and servicing through regularization campaigns and the extensive network of publicly funded Information Centres for Migrant Workers (CITE) , organized in particular by the CC.OO. (Comisiones Obreras) union , and which are considered as a case of ‘best practice’ across the EU (Martinez- Lucio and Connolly ,2011). Organizing , by contrast, has been arduous, despite more success with Latin Americans (for language and cultural reasons, as well as in some cases for their previous level of organization ) than with Central Eastern Europeans or Moroccans.
Organizing is hampered by the particularly high volatility of work in the Spanish construction sector , and by the less strict controls on employment and qualifications in the Spanish labour market . For instance, Spain has no Worker Registration Scheme, which in the UK imposes fees and bureaucratic duties on Central Eastern Europeans. As a result , Central Eastern European works in Spain are described by employers as individualist and motivated by short-term accumulation, and said to be avoiding Spanish trade unions (interview with Polish employer in Spain). Unionization is also arduous in the case of undocumented immigrants : unions report that foreign workers approach the union, typically ,only after three years the country and after having obtained regularization (Recio et al., 2006). Focus groups have revealed an overwhelming sense of distance between foreign construction workers and Spanish unions (Fundacion Laboral de la Construccion,2005). In the Spanish construction sector , unionization is rather low ,at 8.7% for national workers and 3.6% for immigrants (2008 data from Encuesta de Condiciones de Trabajo y de Vida),but in the Spanish system of representation, membership is not an important indicator given that unions strength depends rather on votes in trade union elections.
In construction, as well as at the national level, union action focuses on the political institutional level. The unions had an important role in negotiating the previously mentioned Law 32/2006 on subcontracting and negotiated the national collective agreement on the Construction Professional Cards; they also collaborate with the Labour Inspectorates and are very active in the bipartite
regulatory body Fundacion Laboral de la Construccion (Construction Work Foundation).