Paul Magnette: “Let’s make Belgium a country without e-commerce”
While the federal government is preparing to discuss again the relaxation of night work in the e-commerce sector, the president of the PS Paul Magnette recommends, Monday in an interview with the Flemish weekly Humo, to limit this type of work to certain professions such as the police or hospitals. He goes further by stating that, “After nuclear phase-out, it would be better to get out of e-commerce; let’s make Belgium a country without e-commerce, with real shops and lively cities”.
The relaxation of the rules on e-commerce between 8 p.m. and midnight is one of the stumbling blocks in the reform of the labor market, a file in the hands of the Minister of Employment Pierre-Yves Dermagne (PS) on which the De Croo government is expected to return to this week. The Liberals have been asking for it for a long time, they who argue a flight of jobs to neighboring countries like the Netherlands, where the rules are already more flexible. “I think e-commerce is not progress, but social and ecological regression. Why do we agree to employ night workers in fitness centers? Because people want to buy 24 hours a day and receive their package at home within 24 hours. Can’t we really wait two days for a book?”, asks Paul Magnette.
The president of the French-speaking socialists underlines the damage of night work on health. “You need the limiter in sectors where it is really needed, for example the police and hospitals”. Seeing firms set up their hangars on the other side of the border is not a problem for him. Because the big concern in his eyes is not unemployment, but long-term illnesses, they are only getting worse in this sector, underlines Mr. Magnette.