The Dark Ages!

A complete flip-over of the collective contractual agreements is the aim of Louka Katselis' bill approved by the Ministerial council on Thursday.

The Minister of Employment, after tough negotiations with the Troika until the last minute and with the Prime Minister's intervention, won over the point of contractual agreements across the board within corporations, even those that have no unions to represent them.

The Greek employees, though, once more suffer from these negotiations on the points of protection from severance, reduction of pay but also severance pay.

The special business agreement is the new condition being introduced within the Hellenic employee's bill of Rights. Said agreements will be signed by both the business union and the employer, and will entail reduced pay without an upper limit for an additional year.

The reduction in pay might exceed 30 or even 35% in total, in comparison with the pay of across-the-board contractual agreements, while the basic salary of 740 euro, which is agreed upon by the National contractual agreement, will be a minimum "secure" pay limit.

The special business agreements will be signed in companies that employ up to 50 people. In the case of a lack of a representing union, the negotiations will be undertaken by syndicates.

Wherever the special business agreements do not apply, as the Minister of Employment Louka Katseli specified, the across-the-board agreements will be in effect.

Mrs. Katseli mentioned that through these agreements, employees are protected from the threat of single agreements that employers might abuse. On the other hand, she noted that the negotiations with the Troika have been wrapped up, but there are still some matters to reach a common decision on.

In this newly-passed bill, there is a preface on a tougher law passed on severance pay. A worker that has been employed from 1 to 2 years will have the right to one month's severance pay instead of two.