Labour Minister: Well Paid Workers Are Motivated Workers
Well paid workers are motivated workers, Labour, the Family and Social Affairs Minister Marjeta Cotman said on Wednesday. "Productivity can not be based on low wages, just the opposite," she said at the sidelines of a two-day working visit to Brussels. She reiterated that workers' demands expressed at the 17 November protest were legitimate.
Cotman explained that in the 2007-2009 social agreement signed in October, the social partners (government, employers, trade unions) agreed to raise wages in line with inflation and productivity, with the employers pledging to raise wages also in line with performance.
Cotman thinks that the sectors and companies which are doing well could easily increase wages. It is important that the employers and trade unions had already started talks after the Saturday demonstration, said Cotman, who believes talks are the right thing.
The minister thinks that wage policy needs to be re-examined, so as to make sure that basic wages (the lowest wage for a certain sector) are not lower than the minimum wage (the lowest wage a worker can get).
The minister met in Brussels today European social partners, the secretary general of the European Trade Union Confederation John Monks and the secretary general of BusinessEurope Philippe de Bruck.
They discussed a new cycle of employment guidelines for 2008-2010 in the framework of the Lisbon Strategy, which the EU is to debate in March, when Slovenia will be presiding the EU.
Cotman is glad that both shared her view with changes to the guidelines should not be fundamental. She added that no analysis of the implementation of the guidelines in national laws has been made so far, which is something Slovenia would like to focus on.
More articles from this issue:
Archive
|