Čabarkapa: Non-working Sunday is one of the main ways of improving the conditions of employees

The non-working Sunday is one of the main ways of improving the conditions of employees, said the representative of Prava Montenegro Herceg Novi, Goran Čabarkapa.

He said that the results of negotiations regarding the re-introduction of the working week were eagerly awaited in the previous days.

"Referring to the Labor Law, which stipulates that the working week lasts 40 hours, whether it is five or six days, it can be seen that the introduction of the working week would significantly increase our average working hours of 44,4 hours per week. The average weekly working time in developed countries is 35 hours. This implies a latent danger of losing the workforce," Čabarkapa said in a statement.

He said that Budva, the metropolis of tourism, currently lacks two thousand workers in the catering and hotel industry, despite the increase in wages. One million workers are currently needed in neighboring Croatia.

"Our employers, primarily large retail chains, with some exceptions, seem to be unaware that they will be left without workers if they not only increase their wages, but also improve their working conditions. The non-working Sunday is one of the main ways of improving the conditions of employees," Čabarkapa added.

He recalled that the negotiations between the main actors, the Union of Employers (UPCG) and the trade union, on the introduction of the working week during the tourist season, were almost finished, and that they failed after the trade union's request that the condition for allowing work on Sundays to be previous changes to the General Collective contract (OKU), which will increase the price of work on Sundays by 100 percent in all sectors.

The employers' answer is that it is more profitable for them not to work on Sundays, but at this moment, by accepting the required conditions through changes in the OKU, impose an obligation on all branches to enable the trade to work for five months.

"We believe that a solution should and had to be found to the mutual satisfaction of employers and employees, guided by the fact that our economy is mostly based on income from tourism, and that these same tourists cannot wait three days for a market to open in order to satisfy their basic needs," explained Čabarkapa.

On the other hand, as he believes, the request of the employees to be adequately paid for that working week had to be met.

"Making decisions in this way creates a suitable ground for the formation of a huge number of 'platform workers', from whom the state does not have any benefits, because they are 'self-employed' and not employed workers," said Čabarkapa.

Such workers are denied the exercise of basic rights in the field of labor and social legislation.

"We note all this as a fact that we are in for a stormy and difficult autumn in the area of ​​economic trends, which will be reflected and create an extremely difficult economic situation in the coming year. Inflation is expected to peak in the last quarter of this year, due to the structure and vulnerability of our overall economy," Čabarkapa announced.

He added that such an increase in inflation has already rendered senseless the great project Europe Now, which was proposed by the Government and which all MPs supported in December last year.

"And now, the very same people who supported the aforementioned program, aware of the fact that inflation is a consequence of the rise in prices on the global market and that, as such, it is 'imported' to us, criticizes and finds flaws in the Europe Now program, in order to justify the demands for a new budget assignment", Čabarkapa concluded.