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Total employee downtime has logged more than 5,000. companies. This can be seen in the public list published by the State Labor Inspectorate.
To help companies save jobs, the state reimburses part of the reduced workers’ wages.
However, it is not just private companies that are on the list.
According to Tuesday’s data, it also includes the Republican psychiatric hospitals Klaipėda, Visaginas, Pakruojis and Rokiškis. The day before there were six such hospitals.
J. Andriejauskaitė / 15 min photo / Klaipeda Republican Hospital
In the heat of the COVID-19 pandemic, hospital staff downtime can seem unusual, so we asked these treatment facilities what happened.
Reorganization of departments
The reasons for this across all hospitals allowing worker downtime were quite similar.
Kastytis Matulevičius, Director of the Visaginas Hospital 15 minutes said downtime for several employees was announced after the midwifery unit was transformed into a room for treating COVID-19 patients.
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“We have a large maternity ward with access to oxygen, so we temporarily close it and treat COVID-19 patients there,” said K. Matulevičius.
“Some of the people from the Delivery Department stayed to work on it fight but maybe four or five employees have been declared inactive, “he added. There was not enough work for these employees, according to the director.
The hospital director said that during the first quarantine in the spring, some workers were also released during downtime due to prohibited scheduled services and shift work.
Director of Pakruojis Vygantas Sudaris Hospital 15 minutes said your treatment center fighting The department was created after the downsizing of the children’s department, so some of the employees in this department also found themselves in downtime.
“All the media staff left, the pediatrician refused to work with COVID-19, and the secondary staff, who used to come only on duty at night, couldn’t help us much,” he said.
Three employees of the Skuodas branch of the Klaipėda Republican Hospital were fired and did not find any more work.
To protect them from the risk of infection, we offered them downtime after a few weeks.
“In Skuodas, where both patients and our own employees were infected, we redistributed work, suspended ward activities and declared downtime for three anesthesiologists, because we could no longer provide them with activities, but they refused to come to work in Klaipeda “. 15 minutes said Jurga Daujotienė, personnel manager of this medical institution.
According to her, several more employees of the hospital’s Department of Economics were put into inactivity due to the reduction in workload.
“To protect them from the risk of infection, we offered them some downtime after a few weeks for some people to come to work first in shifts, then others,” said a hospital spokeswoman.
Can receive state support
The Ministry of Social Security and Labor has reported that hospitals can declare downtime and request state subsidies for being public institutions, even if the state or municipality is a shareholder.
Of all the organizations that have declared downtime, public institutions account for about 3 to 4 percent. Among them are not only hospitals, but also some municipal cultural or sports centers, and another part – private public institutions.
Ministry spokesperson Edita Banienė 15 minutes He said that many public institutions that have reported downtime to employees operate in social, educational, scientific, cultural or other similar fields.
“It is very important to allow them to keep their jobs in these areas and to ensure the smooth delivery of services to the population during the ongoing pandemic,” he said.
Budget institutions cannot claim employee downtime allowances to offset state allowances.
We also found several dozen budget institutions on the public list of institutions that allow employees to do downtime. However, they claim that although the workers have been inactive, they do not receive state wage subsidies.
One of them is Gabrielius Sužiedėlis, director of the Kaunas City Museum 15 minutes assured that the state subsidy agency does not receive.
Vitalijus Jocys, director of the Rokiškis basin, says that his institution is in an unenviable situation, as it cannot receive subsidies despite the fact that a significant part of its income comes from commercial activities.
“In this situation, we find ourselves between two mills”, 15 minutes said the pool manager.
“I don’t want to believe that is the case”
Businesses disagree on whether it is normal for the state to subsidize the salaries of its public employees through downtime.
“It just came to our attention then. We will definitely raise those issues.” 15 minutes said Danas Arlauskas, president of the Lithuanian Employers’ Confederation.
Hospitals and polyclinics are not closed. For me, this is something unexpected and inexplicable.
“How can you get paid for downtime when you get budget funds? I don’t want to believe this is the case. “
D. Arlauskas also suspects that in the conditions of the pandemic, the State, as an employer, has improved its position vis-à-vis private companies.
Furthermore, he argued that the downtime of hospital staff seemed to run counter to the very idea of a subsidy mechanism.
“The logic of subsidizing downtime was based on the fact that compensation can be expected when your business is suspended due to quarantine restrictions,” said the employer representative.
Photo by Julius Kalinskas / 15min / Dan Arlauskas
“Hospitals and polyclinics are not closed. For me, this is something unexpected and inexplicable,” he added.
Another representative of the businessmen, Andrius Romanovskis, is not too surprised by this practice.
“Formally, hospitals are not subsidized by the budget, but they receive funds for the services they provide. In that sense, the general principle is not infringed ”. 15 minutes said the president of the Lithuanian Business Confederation.
Photo by Luke April / 15 minutes / Andrius Romanovskis
According to him, in this case it would be necessary to delve deeper into whether there is indeed a reason for hospital staff to be discharged during downtime, when the workload of medical institutions due to COVID-19 has increased significantly. .
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