Amendment to the Labour Law in Croatia

Croatian „Maggie“ and Labor Law reform

Croatian Premier Jadranka Kosor and her Cabinet proposed a new amendment to the Labor Law which would do away with the miniumum wage. The amendment states that one of the important factors in the crisis of capitalism in Croatia, contributing to a great number of closed workplaces is the “fact” that employers are obliged to pay a minimum wage their workers! (Just for your information, the minimum salary in Croatia is around 2.814 Croatian kunas BRUTTO, which is something like 390€ a month.)

The real agenda of this ammendment is to cancel all collective agreements, let bosses judge what should be the minimum salary of his/her workers etc. The government even dared to write that the “fact” that employers were obliged to pay salaries is the cause of crisis - which means that government thinks that workers shouldn’t get paid for their work. It’s obvious that this amendment works in the bosses' interests and no one is surprised that the Croatian Employers Association is making rhapsodies in the name of Jadranka Kosor. Mrs. Kosor explained this amendment in her usual way: “everyone should bear their part of crisis”.

This whole situation wouldn’t be anything special in everyday life in Croatia, but suddenly all the great reformist union centrals decided to fight against this law! Usually they don’t do anything but try to make negotiations with the government and pacify, but this time they decided to call for a plebiscite against this law. They also refused negotiations with government. To organize a plebiscite in Croatia, you need the signatures of 10% population that is able to take part in elections. Right now the unions collected more than 50% of the signatures they need. This is great success, and if they succeed in calling a referendum that would be only second one in Croatian history! Of course, many opposition politicians, especially those from the Social Democratic Party (SDP), tried to use this event to promote themselves.

The call for a referendum did not meet with the approval of the governing structure. Mrs. Kosor said that nothing will stand in the way of her government and their “job”.

Juraj Katalenac
MASA