Eneko Leunda (ELA) and Xabier Izagirre (LAB) are the workers' representatives, responsible for the workshops in Tolosa and Donostia: “Working with workers with intellectual disabilities is not easy,” says Leunda. Izagirre, meanwhile, “in the last fifteen years the number of people with mental illness has increased. For example, despite higher education, people who have fallen into the drug suffer from depression.”

“We defend the same rights as all workers, but each of these workers has a particularity, we have to listen to each person’s problems, so they are not only labor problems, we also have to listen to the problems they have outside. That is, we have to become ‘psychologist’,” the two say.

“Our employment center at first was occupational, special, they were sheltered workshops. But still 1,000 of the 5,500 workers have no contract. Growth has been brutal. A new model should be managed to improve the situation. The medical cabinet would not be bad at improving the workers’ product, if there is an auxiliary of people, but it needs to be improved,” adds Izagirre.

As companies and administration fail to comply with the Social Integration of Persons with Disabilities Act (LISMI), disabled workers resort to special centres: “These centers are getting bigger and bigger, transit or transit is not enough. Ordinary companies do not hire these disabled people, they employ them through a subcontract. And at what price do we work? So, what they do, as low as possible. That is the real problem. If CAPV companies were to comply with the law, Gureak would be the first occupational center and education with them, perhaps, would develop differently,” both say.

In the words of the representatives of ELA and LAB “companies should comply with the law, but to do so the LISMI should be updated. Gureak has resources and does a very good job, a very qualified job, increasingly, and you hear the excuse of always: ‘The market is very bad’. Ours are dedicated to powerful companies, in automotive, increasingly sophisticated processes work, but the benefits remain for other companies. “These workers are happy with the work, but they all want to earn more. That tells us. They know what is gained in the area, and those who have contracts know ‘how much they earn in others’. Their aspiration is normal, we have it.”

“As we are, it’s a bargain for administration. Because if at the time Atzegi had not created Gureak, the administration should have created, and if not, the cost would surely have been much higher: we two would be officials, employees of public work.”

In Gipuzkoa, a beneficial path has been made, but both believe that “a well-established public system should improve the situation of these companies if the institutions had assumed them, the situation of these people would be different”.

“We, more than Gureaki, criticise the Basque Government, have to guarantee conditions and rights. The Basque Government would be obliged to fine the company that does not comply with the law if it did so. It's a nuisance. Indeed, regardless of salary, the rest of the conditions are good, such as holidays and treatment. But they, like us, want to earn more, live with the partner on a floor, and they can’t.”