The CNSM Confederal Committee had a meeting with the Prime Minister of the Republic of Moldova

Today, January 16, within the Moldovan Government, a meeting of members of the CNSM Confederal Committee was held with Pavel Filip, Prime Minister of the Republic of Moldova, attended by Chiril Gaburici, Minister of Economy and Infrastructure, Octavian Armasu, Minister of Finance, Svetlana Cebotari, Minister of Health, Labour and Social Protection, other heads of ministries and officials from the Moldovan Government.

Even at the beginning of his speech, Oleg Budza, president of the CNSM, assured that Moldova’s unions unswervingly support the European development vector of our country, because it is the only way that the high standard of living of people can be ensured. As for the Government, mentioned CNSM president, the most important issue of the trade unions is the creation of jobs, the maintenance, motivation and quality of the labour force. In this context, Oleg Budza assured Pavel Filip that the CNSM supported the Moldovan Government’s decision to subsidize jobs from the state budget. At the same time, he proposed to increase the number of enterprises, companies benefiting from state subsidies for job creation. In this sense, it was proposed that budget subsidies should receive not only the economic units that create 100 jobs, but also the enterprises that create 20 jobs.

In order to improve the standard of living and increase of employees’ incomes, trade union members, the CNSM president advocated for raising the country’s minimum wage, which currently amounts to 1,000 lei per month, and has not been increased since October 2014. But in meantime, the consumer price index increased by almost 30 percent. Oleg Budza said that the minimum wage in our country is the lowest in the region, the reason why the massive exodus of the country’s labour force is taking place. He proposed that the minimum wage should be raised to the minimum subsistence level, ie 1980.9 lei. Also in this chapter, it was insisted on speeding up the elaboration and approval of the draft law on the unitary pay system in the budgetary sector.

The president of the CNSM has pleaded to strengthen occupational safety and health at the workplaces of the employees. He urged that at least once a year, at a meeting of the Government of Moldova, the issue on the situation in this field to be debated and the institutions that were empowered to do so should start their activity as soon as possible, to ensure the investigation of work accidents together with trade unions and to carry out joint controls in this area.

According to this topic, the leader of the trade unions of Moldova called to fight against the informal economy, paying salaries “in the envelope”. Oleg Budza called for a strategy at national level to combat the informal economy and work and to create a council on this issue at the level of the head of the Moldovan Government.

The care for the fate of the employee, for the living and security at his work place, was also found in the CNSM president’s approach to improving the balneo-sanatorium treatment of employees and their families. In this context, he urged the initiation and the most urgent opening of the auctions for the purchase of balneo-sanatorial treatment tickets, for organizing the summer rest of children. He proposed that the 13 million lei, which were not used last year due to the delay of the respective auctions to buy balneo-sanatorial treatment tickets, should be allocated in addition for 2018.

Naturally, none of the issues concerning the standard of living, income, safety and health at work of workers, trade union members, cannot be successfully handled only in the effective, harmonious social dialogue at Government level, employers’ and trade unions. In this respect, the president of the CNSM came up with the idea of strengthening the dialogue and the social partnership. In particular, Oleg Budza called for the nomination of members of the National Commission for consultations and collective bargaining by the Government, ensuring the functioning of the commissions for consultations and collective bargaining at branch level, joint training of the members of the respective committees in the field of social partnership.

Oleg Budza called for the Government to support the promotion of collective labour agreements, acts governing the relationship between the employer and the employees. His approach to this is argued by the fact that after the latest amendments to the Labour Code of the Republic of Moldova, employers enjoy increased freedom in the sphere of labour relations, which requires the increase of the role of collective labour agreements, which ensure the guarantees and rights of employees.

Pavel Filip, Prime Minister of the Republic of Moldova, stressed that this meeting with the members of the Confederal Committee of the CNSM is as good as possible at the beginning of the year to get to know the concerns, which also concern the Government and the trade unions. He mentioned that the executive has a total openness, an effective availability to solve the problems addressed by the CNSM and in this way to make life of the people in our country more prosperous.

Department of mass media and international relations of CNSM