Banjaluka – The Republika Srpska Cabinet today in urgent procedure adopted five bills which will meet the obligation to restore the wages of civil servants to the level prior to their reduction, Prime Minister Zeljka Cvijanovic said on Sunday.
After a special Cabinet session, at which five bills on wages of employees in the Ministry of Internal Affairs, education and culture, Republic administration, judicial bodies and public services were adopted, Cvijanovic said that there are five categories in the Ministry of Internal Affairs that will receive the 5% increase, and they are the Special Police, Support Unit, the personal documents sector and two more categories.
Regarding education, Cvijanovic said that a mild increase of the coefficient from 21 to 22 was approved for 384 regular university professors.
Cvijanovic said that the Cabinet did its part of the job regarding the additional 5% increase, and that now it remains for the union to accept this.
“If the union fails to support these bills, the Cabinet can intervene in another way, not by amending the laws, but through increasing the price of labour,” Cvijanovic said.
She said that this process started last year with the first 5% increase of wages for civil servants, after which another increase of 5%, 10% or 15% has been made since the beginning of the year for 14,000 employees with secondary education.
Cvijanovic said that this is the third, crucial step in increasing wages, which pertains to determining the content of the said laws.
“The Cabinet’s objective was to introduce a little more justice in these laws, meaning that people who have the same level of education and do the same jobs shall have the same wages. Another objective is to reduce a gap between those with secondary education who have lower wages and those with higher education who have higher wages,” Cvijanovic said.
She said that these bills, if the union accepts them, will be sent to Parliament on Monday in urgent procedure, so that Parliament could vote on them at a session scheduled for Tuesday, April 8. (SRNA)
