Rue Royale 45, 1st floor, 1000 Brussels, Belgium

EFBWW News

Joint EPSU and EFBWW letter to the Bulgarian trade union PODKREPA

27/11/2019
Joint EFBWW and EPSU solidarity letter to the Bulgarian trade union PODKREPA


The European Federation of Building and Woodworkers (EFBWW) and the European Public Service Union (EPSU) strongly support the Confederation of Labor Podkrepa and its affiliates in their a national-wide protest rally on 27th November 2019.
The EFBWW and EPSU jointly support the priority actions to create the necessary prerequisites for a decent life of Bulgarian citizens in the following key directions:

  • We strongly reject the Employers’ proposals to introduce amendments in the Sick Leave Regulation texts, obliging workers to pay for the first day of their absence from work. We consider this proposal as a serious attack on the social and social security rights of Bulgarian citizens! In addition, Bulgaria is the EU country with the lowest pay level in the EU as medical checks and medicines are not covered by the National health insurance Fund, not even for
    children and workers with very low salaries!
  • With regard to the hearings on the State draft budget for 2020, we support the trade union demands for more funds for education, health prevention, social worker’s remunerations, and to combat energy poverty among citizens.
  • We support the trade union proposal for a revision of the fiscal system applied on incomes, which generates inequality and injustice and undermines national efforts to overcome the high and unacceptable levels of poverty in the country.
  • We support the demand for an increase of the Night work payment (that has remained unchanged since 2007, namely at the level of 0,13 Euro cents/hour) and the demand to promote
    a fair balance between the value of work and the value of night work, and to formulate adequate
    proposals for amending and supplementing Bulgarian labor legislation.
  • We support the appeal for the provisions of adequate remuneration for overtime work, restricting the application of the aggregate calculation of working time. The introduction of such aggregated calculation of working time has to be explicitly for production with continuous technological mode of operation.

The EFBWW and EPSU strongly urge the Bulgarian National Assembly and employers to ensure that workers have decent and fair working conditions. We also urgently call upon the Bulgarian government to restore the role of the National Council for Tripartite Cooperation (NCTC).

In solidarity,

Johan Lindholm                   Tom Deleu
President EFBWW              General Secretary EFBWW

Jan-Willem Goudriaan
General Secretary EPSU