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The meeting also discussed the president’s initiative to provide a tax incentive for companies that employ large numbers of people or increase wages rapidly. According to S.Krėpšta, this would help to get them out of quarantine faster and improve the situation for employees.
The meeting also focused on the most vulnerable groups: young people, the disabled, older people who work. According to S.Krėpšta, the president made a proposal on how to improve the employment situation of the disabled by providing them with better social guarantees.
Support should be not only now but also after quarantine
Inga Ruginienė, president of the Lithuanian Trade Union Confederation, emphasized that supporting companies and employees is important not only now, but also after the quarantine: “If the quarantine ends today, it does not mean that we will stand firm and secure. morning. . “
According to her, payment for downtime and support for various business areas should continue even after the end of the quarantine. However, those receiving aid must keep their jobs.
“There must be a clear requirement not to apply group layoffs, as was the case last summer.
Requirement to keep 50 percent. subsidized jobs, if supported, did not work at the time. There have been a number of abuses in which people have been fired in groups.
That fuse was easily overlooked, so now it is necessary to take all this into account and provide more serious fuses to keep the jobs going, ”explained I. Ruginienė.
He also mentioned that the deficiencies of the current unemployment benefit were discussed with the President.
“We suggest that during an emergency, people who lacked the required service time should not be left without income, they would not be left overboard.” They need a minimum income to survive, “he said.
According to the union representative, it is not enough to grant unemployment benefits. It is also necessary to find out why the person has not worked before and has not accumulated the required seniority. In his view, it is likely that those people worked illegally and the government should pay attention to this: the black economy is booming.
The government’s decisions did not escape criticism
The president’s fiscal proposals did not go unnoticed by I. Ruginiene either. He said he supported the proposals, but that several changes would be needed.
“Because we are talking about a growing wage bill, we need more safeguards to maintain jobs. It is also important that not only the salaries of administration and managers increase, but also the salaries of ordinary employees,” explained I. Ruginienė .
I.Ruginienė is also concerned that the Government has not yet made up its mind on the use of the European Union (EU) Recovery Plan.
“Today’s current affairs make us talk about one of Lithuania’s most important documents: the EU Recovery Measures Plan, which we will have to present at the end of April.
We are concerned that we have not seen that plan because the government has not yet presented it, and the public consultation that disappointed last week really had nothing to do with the RRF plan.
I think it is very important to find out as soon as possible how the EU aid will be used here in Lithuania: what measures and what funds are provided, if the final beneficiary will really be a normal employee. As we do not see the big picture, and time is running out, it gives the impression that the Government is not prepared for this measure, “he said.
The government has forgotten about women
I.Ruginienė did not forget another vulnerable group in the labor market: women, who, according to her, are ignored.
“Women are one of the social groups most affected by the pandemic. Reconciling work and family concerns is very difficult.
There are many laid off women who have lost their income. Those numbers are scary. I think it’s time to pay attention to that.
Unfortunately, reading the Government’s action plan, it was not possible to find concrete proposals on how to help the affected women ”, criticized I. Ruginienė to the Government.
Kristina Krupavičienė, president of the Solidarumas union, emphasized that currently young people under 29 years of age and women over 55 are supported, but women between 30 and 55 also need support.
“Active labor market measures must be developed so that these women are also attractive to the labor market, can receive certain subsidies from employment support programs and can return to the labor market,” said K. Krupavičienė.
It is necessary to increase the minimum wage
According to K. Krupavičienė, the government should also change its approach to increasing the minimum wage.
“It is important that Lithuania does not block the directive on the minimum wage, which is currently being discussed at the European level. The position of our Government should not be so ‘hard’ that we do not want collective agreements and we do not want to increase the minimum wage. Now we are at the end of the list of European countries in terms of salaries ”, he emphasized.
Kęstutis Juknis, president of the Sandrauga union, also said that the role of the Tripartite Council and collective agreements should be strengthened in Lithuania.
In February, the unemployment rate in the Baltic States was reported to have risen highest in Lithuania in 2020, the year of the COVID-19 pandemic crisis.
According to public employment surveys conducted by national statistical offices, the average unemployment rate in Lithuania last year was 8.5%, in Latvia 8.1%, and in Estonia 6.8%.
Compared with 2019, the unemployment rate in Lithuania increased by 2.2 percentage points, in Latvia – by 1.8 percent, in Estonia – by 2.4 points.
