RSS
Minister Costea has resigned
Ana Costea, Minister of Labour, Family, Social Protection and Elderly has resigned on Thursday.
"I have accepted today the resignation of minister Claudia-Ana Costea, submitted today. In the very near future I will submit to President Klaus Iohannis a nomination for the Minister of Labour, Family, Social Protection and Elderly," Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos announced.
Ana Costea is the first minister who leaves former European Commissioner Dacian Ciolos’ technocrat cabinet, which started its mandate in November 2015.
The labor minister resigned after controversies on the new law on wages in the public sector. The Government should have discussed an emergency ordinance draft on public workers’ salaries, on Wednesday.
However, the draft was withdrawn from the agenda, after the Labor Ministry and the union leaders failed to reach an agreement on the proposed changes. Labor minister Ana Costea told the union leaders that she would resign if the Government decided to discuss the current draft.
She went on with her decision and resigned, although the Government decided to withdraw the project.
The Government promised that it would come up with a new ordinance proposal that would take into consideration the unions’ requests as well as the budgetary constraints for 2016 and 2017.
Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos said Thursday that next week he will start talks with trade unions on public pay with the intent of finding a solution they can accept that would also be feasible in budget and legal terms.
"Our intention is to find a solution accepted by the trade unions as well and that would also be feasible in budget and legal terms. We have analysed what we could do for some years; we even studied this possibility of an emergency ordinance for one year henceforth where we can commit ourselves with the budget we have and pledge to secure it first of all in order to rectify some dysfunctions in the public pay system; that is our objective and we will continue talks," said Ciolos.
He added that talks with the trade unions on this issue will start next week.
"As early as next week, I will invite the trade unions (...) to continue talks and find a solution together," Ciolos said.