Union: Public Service employees lost one million euros from this year's budget for salary increases

Public service employees were left without a million euros from this year's budget for salary increases, the Union of Employees of Radio and Television of Montenegro (RTCG) announced today.

They submitted the statement through the Media Union of Montenegro.

"The postponement of the salary increase process this year costs employees 7.000 euros per day, over 200.000 euros per month, so we lost one million euros from the salary increase fund in the first five months. After exhausting negotiations that led to the adoption of the agreed draft of the Collective Agreement at the Council session at the end of March, the text of this document was sent to the usual procedure, which, thanks to the RTCG management, took an unusually long time. Namely, it took the RTCG management as long as two months to adopt the suggestions of the Ministry of Finance and the Secretariat for Legislation," the statement states.

The RTCG Employees' Union added that the delaying strategies were varied.

"The document was held up in the process of being sent to the relevant institutions, the document was put in a drawer after corrections, and there was a delay in acting on suggestions. The RTCG Employees' Union invested a lot of time and energy checking whether the document had arrived at RTCG and investigating why it had not been forwarded to us for review. In order to slow down the process as much as possible, the management occasionally sent the Collective Agreement by mail, although we have a courier service ready to deliver documents to any address in the country. As many as 5 working days were spent on adopting the corrections of the Secretariat for Legislation, which could have been integrated into the text in a few clicks if only our Legal Service had been given the green light to do so. However, the delay bore fruit," said the RTCG Employees' Union.

They said the calculation is simple.

"60 days at 7.000 euros equals 420.000 euros. Thus, the various strategies of slowing down and complicating routine procedures have paid off and in just the last two months have taken almost half a million euros out of employees' pockets," said the RTCG Employees' Union.

They stated that RTCG employees hoped that the Collective Agreement would be signed before May 21st and that at least a third of the May salary would be increased.

"Instead, we are welcoming the national holidays in a gloomy reality. The reality is that the adoption of a new Collective Agreement takes 17 months. The reality is that most employees are on the minimum wage during that time. The reality is that privileged individuals have been receiving enormously large variables for years (735.000 euros per year in gross amount) that are awarded secretly. The reality is that employees have no insight into who, how often, and based on what merits three- and four-digit variables are awarded. We remind you that due to the non-transparent distribution of variables, an investigation by the ODT was initiated at the end of January this year based on our criminal complaint. On this occasion, we call on the Basic State Prosecutor's Office to apply its jurisdiction and authorities in legal proceedings and urgently take measures to protect us from the daily management pressures to which our members are exposed," said the RTCG Employees' Union.

They said "that after two months of torture, the main goal of which was to redirect 400.000 euros from employees' pockets to other, more important purposes for Director Raonic, we nostalgically remember the two most productive days in the history of these marathon negotiations."

"It was on the eve of the arrival of Marta Kos, the EU Enlargement Commissioner, who was a guest on our Dnevnik on March 26. After the management received the news of her visit, the negotiations on the Collective Agreement were suddenly accelerated, in a few hours the 'unresolvable issues' were resolved, and open topics were closed. It was important to impress the high-ranking European official. However, the expediency lasted two days, and after Marta Kos left, the management decided to drag out the administrative procedure for adopting the already agreed Collective Agreement for two months. In the end, since there are 11 days left in this month, which begins with the celebration of workers' rights and ends with the celebration of the state independence of Montenegro, the management will withdraw another 77.000 euros from the fund for salary increases. We congratulate the leaders of the RTCG management and administrative pyramid, and especially the Assistant General Director for Corporate Affairs, Goran Rakočević, for his extraordinary efforts to make the administrative process of adopting the new Collective Agreement last as long as two months despite our "to the daily pressures and promptness and professionalism of employees in the Ministry of Finance, the Secretariat for Legislation and the Ministry of Culture and Media," said the RTCG Employees' Union.

According to them, "at the same time, we hereby ask the management of the Public Service Broadcasting whether the RTCG building, which has been under permanent renovation for the last 5 years and in which a record 1,7 million euros will be invested this year, will also swallow one million euros from this year's budget for salaries."