Fury increases over government’s proposed State Budget
Public sector workers are threatening strikes and protests unless the government rethinks salaries as outlined in this yearâs State Budget.
Finance minister Fernando Medina has already insisted he wonât be increasing public sector pay packets beyond the 0.9% envisaged, albeit inflation is currently running at 5.3% – and the State Budget has forecast 4%.
As all critics have pointed out, public sector workersâ âpurchasing powerâ has been steadily dropping for more than a decade.
Syndicates have been pushing for a âŹ90 increase across the board since last year, thus this âre-jigged budgetâ to address the context of rising fuel prices and the war in Ukraine has come as a slap-in-the-face.
SebastiĂŁo Santana, coordinator of the Frente Comum – affiliated with the CGTP, general confederation of Portuguese workers, has said âPublic sector workers will not accept this budget which does not answer the (request for) a general increase of âŹ90, particularly in the face of galloping inflation which will absorb all the increases outlined by the governmentâ.
Minister for the Presidency Mariana Vieira da Silva is due to meet with syndicate leaders next Wednesday – the same day Frente Comum has called for a demonstration outside the prime ministerâs official residence in SĂŁo Bento as the syndicate presents its âcaderno reivindicativoâ (set of requirements).
According to Santana, workers are ready for strike action, and protests.
Other syndicate leaders have âlamentedâ the fact that the government did not sit down with them before drawing up this revised budget.
Helena Rodrigues of STE (the technical staff union) stressed that the last government âguaranteed that if inflation increased, salaries would be safeguarded so as not to lose purchasing powerâ.
