Radio România Internațional

Tag: pay scale

  • May 29, 2017 UPDATE

    May 29, 2017 UPDATE

    LEGISLATION – The draft law on a unified pay scale for public sector employees in Romania has reached the specialised committees in the Chamber of Deputies, which is the decision-making parliamentary body in this case. The Labour Minister, Lia Olguţa Vasilescu, is hoping that talks in this Chamber should be quick, so that the bill may be endorsed and take effect on July 1. The draft law, which stipulates substantial pay raises for public sector staff, was passed by the Senate last week. Backed by the parties in the ruling coalition, the Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats in Romania, as well as by the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania, the bill is harshly criticised by the Opposition, on grounds that the impact on the state budget and the sources of funding of these salary increases are unclear.




    STRIKE – Romanian air traffic controllers will be on an open-ended strike as of Tuesday. They are first and foremost disgruntled with the lack of a valid collective bargaining agreement and with the hiring freeze in the company. On Monday, negotiations between the trade union and ROMATSA, the company which has a monopoly over air traffic controlling in Romania, failed to lead to an agreement. Under the law, during the protests controllers are required to monitor one-third of the flights. On May 12, air traffic controllers had organised a two-hour warning strike.




    HEARINGS – A special parliamentary inquiry commission carries on hearings into the organisation of the presidential elections of 2009, won by right-of-centre Traian Băsescu at the expense of the Social Democrat Mircea Geoană. The latter was invited to appear on Monday for the second time, after last week he said there had been a deliberate effort, coordinated by top-level civil servants, to influence the outcome of the election. Former state secretaries with the Interior Ministry were also heard. The former deputy president of the Permanent Electoral Authority, Ana Maria Pătru, once again declined the invitation, after having also missed the hearings last week. The commission was set up following reports by a journalist claiming the 2009 election process had been tampered with by senior civil servants, including heads of intelligence services and the Prosecutor General.




    BREXIT – Brexit negotiations will begin on June 19, 11 days after the British snap parliamentary election, PM Theresa May announced. This is also the date proposed by the EU for the beginning of talks. The European Commission will coordinate negotiations with London on behalf of the governments of the 27 EU member states. PM Theresa May initiated the official procedure for her country to leave the EU on March 19, and negotiations will Brussels will take 2 years at most.




    FRANCE – Frances new president, Emmanuel Macron, warned on Monday that any use of chemical weapon in Syria would trigger reprisals as well as an immediate response from Paris, France Presse reports. He made the statements after a meeting with his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin at Versailles, near Paris. The French president voiced his willingness to strengthen relations with Russia in fighting terrorism in Syria and pleaded for easing out tensions in the separatist regions in east Ukraine. This was the first meeting for Macron and Putin.


    (translated by: Ana-Maria Popescu)

  • April 24, 2017

    April 24, 2017

    SENTENCE — The Supreme Court in Bucharest today will issue a definitive ruling on the two year suspended prison sentence issued against the leader of the Social Democratic Party, Liviu Dragnea. The latter attacked the sentence on technical issues, such as the fact that the decision was not issued within 30 days at the latest from the pronouncement, and that the head justice who presided over the court was no longer a judge at the time, as he had retired. The Social Democratic chair got condemned in April 2016 for rigging the 2012 referendum to impeach then Romanian president Traian Basescu. At the same time, Dragnea said yesterday that he did not rule out setting up a Parliament committee to investigate the 2012 referendum, which was declared null and void for a lack of quorum. A similar committee was set up to investigate the 2009 presidential elections, after claims of fraud appeared in the public space.



    PARIS — The leader of the French center movement En Marche!, Emmanuel Macron, won Sundays first round of presidential elections in France with 23.75% of the ballot. On May 7th, he faces off against the extreme right National Front leader Marine LePen, who gathered 21.5% of votes. The defeated candidates of the traditional right and left announced they support Macron. During the campaign, the latter stood out by running on mostly economic matters, such as corporate tax cuts, flexibility on the duration of the work week, reducing unemployment, investing in vocational conversion, support for renewable energy and modernizing infrastructure. This first round of elections was held under the shadow of increased security measures against fears of terrorism. In spite of that, presence at the polls was almost 80%.



    MOSCOW — The head of European diplomacy Federica Mogherini is today in Moscow for the first time in her term, which began in 2014. She will be talking with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. The visit comes against deteriorating relations between Russia and the EU, after the former annexed Crimea and fomented conflicts in eastern Ukraine in 2014. Brussels slapped tough sanctions on Moscow for its alleged support for pro-Russian rebels in the east of neighboring Ukraine. On Friday, commenting on the visit, Minister Lavrov said that continued sanctions against Russia were the main reason for the difficulties in Russias relationship with the EU. Also mentioned were supposed Russophobia in the EU, as well as what were called unfounded accusations that Russia is trying to destabilize the Union and influence elections in certain member states.



    MCV — In Bucharest, Justice Minister Tudorel Toader, Prosecutor General Augustin Lazar, head of anti-corruption Laura Codruta Kovesi, and European Affairs Minister Ana Birchall, are discussing with European experts the evaluation mission as part of the Mechanism of Cooperation and Verification. The Justice Minister will issue a progress report aggregating data provided by all institutions under monitoring by the Mechanism, in preparation for the evaluation mission of May 2017. The Mechanism has been put in place right after Romania joined the EU alongside Bulgaria in 2007, in order to rectify issues with the judicial system and corruption in both countries. The latest reports in those areas have been largely positive with regard to Romania. EC First Vice President, Frans Timmermans, came to Bucharest last week to talk to PM Sorin Grindeanu and Minister of Justice Tudorel Toader. After the meetings, he said that Brussels would not hesitate to acknowledge any progress made by the country under the requirements of the Mechanism of Cooperation and Verification.



    SALARIES — The unified pay scale bill will be introduced officially in Parliament today. The announcement was made by Social Democratic chair Liviu Dragnea, leading the main ruling coalition party. He said that so far a few dozen amendments have been proposed in the two weeks that the bill has been posted on his partys website. The government promised that the bill, if passed, would come into effect on July 1st, and hopes that it would pass in a speedy manner. The opposition has criticized the bill, accusing the Social Democrats of passing the buck to a future government on raising state employee wages.