PS launches economic platform to counter Montenegro's labour approach, Carneiro says no invite to reform talks

A gathering to shape an alternative economic vision

The Socialist Party (PS) convened more than two dozen economists, tax specialists, labour experts and former government members at the Nova School of Business and Economics in Carcavelos on Tuesday, 16 June 2026. The meeting was the first step in building a platform called "Solução para um Futuro Melhor" (Solution for a Better Future), which the party intends to present as a counterweight to the economic strategy of Prime Minister Luís Montenegro. Among the participants were former ministers Mário Centeno, Fernando Medina, Pedro Siza Vieira, António Costa Silva, Ana Mendes Godinho, António Mendonça, Manuel Caldeira Cabral, Nelson de Souza and Basílio Horta, alongside academics Aurora Teixeira and Carla Guapo Costa.

“Our calendar is to build a proposal that is solid and an alternative to the government's economic policy. We should not rush; we should take very firm steps.”

Core pillars: productivity, qualifications and wage convergence

The draft document argues that Portugal needs to "grow more, produce better and pay better" by linking investment, internationalisation, skills, innovation, productivity and salaries. Carneiro stressed that raising wages to attract and retain qualified generations requires a more productive and competitive economy. The PS blueprint calls for strengthening research and development, incorporating national technology, overhauling the export model, and creating a lifelong training and retraining system to handle the digital transition, artificial intelligence and the climate-energy shift.

“To pay better wages, capable of keeping and drawing the most qualified generations, Portugal needs a more productive and more competitive economy.”

One headline target is convergence with the average European salary. The party proposes that the average wage in Portugal should match the ratio of GDP per capita at purchasing power parity vis-à-vis the European Union, implying a structural transformation that embeds more added value, innovation and technological depth into the fabric of the economy.

The labour reform rift and missing invitation

The event took place on the same day that Chega leader André Ventura returned to the prime minister’s official residence to discuss the government’s labour law overhaul. Ventura later announced that the meeting ended without agreement but that both sides would keep working. Carneiro, however, made a point of stating that the PS had not been invited to any negotiations on either the labour reform or the Single Social Benefit (PSU).

“For labour matters, there was no invitation whatsoever. Nor for dealing with the PSU.”

The socialists accuse the government of trying to make the economy competitive "by devaluing work, by youth precarity and by leaving the most fragile unprotected." The PS alternative rejects what it labels a "counter-reform" and instead promotes a pact built on productivity, qualifications, innovation and higher salaries.

Roadmap: from validation to social dialogue

Carneiro explained that the immediate outcome of the Carcavelos meeting would be validation of a base structure that will then be discussed with employers, unions and the social concertation partners. He underlined that the party wants to avoid the government's habit of "promising miraculous solutions" that then go undelivered. With no fixed deadline for the final plan, the PS leadership intends to tour different economic sectors before calling on social partners to join the initiative, aiming to offer a credible programme whenever the country next goes to the polls.