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In its decision 61/2012, dated 28 May, the Spanish Labour Court validated a substantial modification of employment conditions affecting remuneration schemes in IBM, thus taking advantage of the more permissive criteria established in the Labour Reform regarding the economic grounds for internal flexibility as an alternative to restructuring through dismissals.

Indeed, Act 3/2012 only requires that the claimed economic reason behind the measure be linked to the company's competitiveness, productivity, or technical or work organisation.

In this particular case, the workers' representatives failed to display constructive conduct during the negotiation process, whereas the court believed that the company has sufficiently evidenced the economic reasoning behind its decision. The modification has therefore been confirmed.

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