Temporary employment companies signed a total of 3.3 million temporary contracts with user companies for the period from January to November 2023, one million less than those they signed before the approval of the labour reform, reports El Mundo (paywall), citing data from the Ministry of Labour. Temporary employment firms signed 2.2% fewer contracts in the first eleven months of the year than in the previous year. In 2021, the last year before the reform, temporary employment firms signed 4.1 million contracts of this type, while in 2019, the last year before the pandemic, 4.3 million were registered.

The reform, which has been in force for two years, limited temporary hiring and reduced the possibilities for companies to choose this type of service. Of the 3.3 million contracts signed by the temporary employment firms from January to November 2023, 1.78 million were due to production circumstances; 1.27 million were categorized as ‘fixed-discontinuous’; 99,870 were replacements, and 4,964 were training, apprenticeships and internships. The manufacturing industry saw the most use of temporary employment contracts, followed by the agriculture and livestock industry.

The number of workers who signed a temporary employment contract from January to November stands at 665,362 people, 14.1% less than in the same period of 2022. The Ministry noted that due to their short duration, many of the contracts are actually signed by the same person. In 2021, before the reform, 776,757 workers signed contracts of this type.