Outsourcing should be discussed sensibly, Rousseff says

President Dilma Rousseff said on Monday (Apr 27) that the government acknowledges the importance of the bill regulating outsourcing, but argued that the proposal should be discussed sensibly and not bring about the end of labor rights and tax collection. The bill is currently under consideration in Congress and stipulates that a company is allowed to contract workforce from another firm—which can be a one-person company—without taking these workers in as their own employees.

In the president's view, outsourcing as it takes place today is a “hazy area that should be regulated.”

Rousseff argued that outsourcing should be based on two foundations: tax collection on one hand, and the protection of labor rights on the other. “[Brazil] can't turn into a country where no one pays taxes, because you'd be tolerating […] turning every member of a company into a legal person [company]. There'd be no social security,” she explained, adding that this would lead to “the loss of major labor rights won over time.”

Rousseff also mentioned a controversial excerpt of the text which concerns outsourcing labor force to carry out a company's main activity. As it is today, only support tasks may be performed by outsourced employees.

According to the president, the government believes the discussion should be balanced, and that it acknowledges the importance of specific laws on the matter.  Balance, she says, means, above all, clarifying the difference between firms' primary and secondary activities in all sectors in the economy of a country.

Translated by Fabrício Ferreira