The Union of State Technical Staff (STE) said today that the government will review the payment of overtime in public administration and expressed hope that the proposal for salary increases will be improved during the negotiation.
“Overtime will be reviewed in order to improve conditions. We are still paying overtime under the conditions of the ‘troika’,” Helena Rodrigues, president of the STE, told reporters after a meeting with the Minister of the Presidency, Mariana Vieira da Silva, and the Secretary of State for Public Administration, Inês Ramires, in Lisbon.
Asked whether the idea is to apply the rule laid down since May in the Labor Code, to increase the value of overtime from the 100th hour onwards, Helena Rodrigues said she didn’t yet know what the government’s intention was.
“We know that this update is going to happen, that we’ve asked for it and that we’ve been told that yes, it will happen. Let’s see what form the proposal takes,” said the union leader, indicating that at the next meeting, scheduled for October 4, “matters with budgetary implications” will be discussed.
Regarding the government’s proposal for a pay rise of around 52 euros with a minimum of 2%, Helena Rodrigues said she was “hopeful” that the executive could go further than what was in the agreement signed in October, since the ETS is proposing a pay rise of at least 5% next year.
“The government reiterated the idea of fulfilling the agreement and we said that we have a negotiating process to go through and we didn’t expect that at the first meeting the government would come out and say that it already agreed with our proposals. We’re in a negotiating process, we’re going to go down that road,” he stressed.
“What we are saying is that other steps should be taken,” said Helena Rodrigues, noting that in 2024 the minimum wage will be updated as well as “the salaries of the lower categories”, so if there is no update for the higher categories “one day we will all be earning less”.
On the subject of updating the food allowance, which the STE wants to see increased from six to 7.5 euros, Helena Rodrigues said that the government intends to update it to the amount that will be set in the administrative working conditions ordinance.
The government has proposed a salary increase of around 52 euros or 2% in 2024 for public administration workers, thus maintaining the figures that were provided for in the agreement signed a year ago, according to the unions.
Wage negotiations for 2024 for public administration workers kicked off today, but the unions are demanding higher increases than those provided for in the agreement signed between the UGT unions, the Federation of Public Administration Unions (Fesap) and the Union of State Technical Staff (STE).
