Government Abolishes Transportation Allowance for Police Officers

The announcements regarding the revision of the provisions of collective agreements regulating the transportation allowance for commuting to and from work have begun to be implemented by the Government even before this issue became a subject of negotiations between the unions and the employer, writes Novi list.

The congratulatory gesture in the form of a reduction of rights from the collective agreement, as reported by Novi list, according to the data from the Union of State and Local Officials and Employees (SDLSN), was first received by employees in the police who can no longer use the transportation allowance for their place of residence starting this year.

»The first to pay the price were the employees in the Ministry of the Interior (MUP) who use various types of transportation to get to work, namely transportation in their place of residence, intercity transportation, and local transportation at their workplace, who have recently been handed decisions stating that as of January 1, 2010, they will no longer receive the transportation allowance for their place of residence«, states the civil service union.

There are about 27,000 workers in the MUP, and there have been several discussions about how transportation costs in the police represent a significant expense that should be revised. However, the New Year’s greeting to police officers and other police officials could merely be an introduction to broader cuts in the rights of a total of 240,000 employees in state and public services. The Government has long announced that it will discuss material rights with the unions this year, primarily focusing on transportation costs, for which approximately 1.3 billion kuna is allocated annually from the budget, as well as severance pay and Christmas bonuses. 

– If they want to revise transportation allowances, they should invite us for talks – says Siniša Kuhar, secretary of the SDLSN, adding that every worker is entitled to a transportation allowance and cannot be paid only for part of the journey. Due to the decisions received by employees in the MUP, the union will address the Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor.

What employees in the MUP are losing is vividly illustrated by the example of a civil servant who lives in the center of Zagreb and works in Samobor, who has received a decision regarding the reduction of the transportation allowance. »A civil servant of the MUP who lives on Draškovićeva Street in Zagreb and works at the Samobor Police Station, which is three tram stops away from the Bus Station (intercity transport station), according to the new interpretation of the Joint Commission, no longer has the right to a transportation allowance for their place of residence«, states the union. Since the price of a monthly worker’s ticket for city transport in Zagreb is 290 kuna, which the civil servant will now have to pay out of pocket, it turns out that the employer will deprive them of nearly 3,500 kuna annually. (Novi list)