Collective Bargaining

One in four employees in Cyprus receives a salary of less than €1,000 while half earn up to €1,500, according to data from the Statistical Service. Since 2010 only a slight shift of employees moving from the lowest wage scales to the highest has taken place. While 24.6% of employees had a salary of up to €1,000 in 2018, this figure stood at 25.5% in 2010.

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Four-day working week soon to be a reality?

January 23, 2020

The Interior Minister has proposed the idea of a four-day working week, which might seem strange in a country with the lowest unemployment rate in Europe and one of the most competitive job markets. However, the four-day working week could serve to attract new talent to the labour market.

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On 1 January 2020, a significant amendment to the rules on calculating the payment of the statutory minimum wage came into force. According to the new rules, employers should no longer include length-of-service allowances, such as “jubilee awards”, overtime allowances, night-time work allowances and retirement severance, in the calculation of the minimum wage.

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Both the trade union Vida and the Chamber of Physicians are demanding a significant increase in wages and allowances for hospital workers, including for work on Sundays and night shifts. Negotiations for the 8,000 employees in religious hospitals started on January 10. The medical doctors agreed with the rest of the employees that staff investments are required.

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Denmark has no statutory minimum wage. Ahead of the ‘OK 2020’ collective bargaining negotiations with industry, trade unions in Denmark mobilised for an increase in the minimum wage. Hundreds of activists from several professional trade unions in the private and public sectors demonstrated at the Copenhagen City Hall Square demanding a higher minimum wage.

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The Nordic countries, including Denmark, are battling plans to introduce an EU-wide minimum wage. Both politicians and unions fear this will undermine their century-old models of collective bargaining, which set minimum pay rates. Denmark’s employment minister said he supported higher wages for the least well-paid in Europe but that “the means to achieve this goal must respect national traditions and well-functioning models”.

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Hauliers have been on strike, blocking the roads in Bratislava and elsewhere. Their demands are a decrease of the road tax by 50% and the suspension of the toll system. The strike, organised by the Union of Slovakia's Road Hauliers (UNAS), continues despite the Ministry’s offer of a 12.5% reduction of the road tax.

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A new job, a salary increase and a job closer to home are the main professional goals of Romanian employees for 2020, according to a study by online recruiting platform eJobs Romania. More than 44% of respondents said they want to change their job this year, 30% hope for a salary increase, 24% want a job closer to home, and 22% put professional development on their wish list for 2020. Many Romanian employees would also like to change their field of activity this year, emigrate or start their own business.

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The national trade union confederation SGB (Schweizerischer Gewerkschaftsbund) aims to revive solidarity in 2020 after a thirty-year period in which it has weakened. Solidarity has increasingly been sacrificed to competitiveness, said SGB, making it understandable why so many people feel left behind. One union president feared that competition leads to a fight in which only the strongest can win.

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A quarter of people aged 25 and over who should be receiving the minimum wage are being underpaid, according to the Resolution Foundation think tank. The number of firms not complying with minimum wage payments has increased since the National Living Wage was introduced in 2016. Before then, about one in five workers aged 25 and over was underpaid, but this figure is now more than one in four. The government said it wanted to ensure that all those eligible were correctly paid.

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The government increased the minimum legal monthly salary requirement (SMIC) to €1,539.42 per month (a rise of 1.2%). The SMIC is the minimum legal salary for all workers in France. It is fixed as an hourly rate, with the monthly rate calculated assuming a 35-hour week.

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