Warning strike, triggered by health trade unionists “against the Government’s refusal to negotiate and grant the legitimate rights of employees”

Unions affiliated to the Federation “Solidarity Sanitară” organize, on Wednesday, a warning strike in health units, according to News.ro. The health workers demand an increase in real salary income, indexation with the level of inflation and the elimination of salary inequities. Unionists from Solidarity Health continued the protests and threatened a general strike, although Sanitas, the other major union federation in the health system, was satisfied with the salary increases offered by the Government and gave up the protests since the end of January.

The warning strike will take place, between 12:00 and 13:00, in the public health units, and will be attended by union members and other employees who have signed for the strike on the “Health Solidarity” trade union lists, the protest also benefiting by the manifestations of solidarity on the part of other employees.

According to the trade unionists, the protest action expresses the support of the participants for the demands of the Health employees, including the increase of real salary incomes, the indexing of salary incomes with the level of inflation, the fair reward for participating in ensuring the continuity of medical services and carrying out the activity in different working conditions, the elimination of serious inequities wages, emphasized by the latest normative act in the field of wages (OG no. 19/2024).

“The warning strike is part of the strike directed against the economic and social policies of the Government, this being triggered by the “Health Solidarity” Federation against the background of the Government’s refusal to negotiate and grant the legitimate rights of health workers”, they claim.

The organization and conduct of the warning strike is done in compliance with the legal provisions regarding ensuring at least one third of the normal activity and the normal functioning of all emergency services.

“We specify that in addition to the measures provided by the law, in order to protect both the proper functioning of the health units under the specific conditions of the protest, as well as the possibility of the effective exercise of the right to strike for health workers, the “Health Solidarity” Federation previously requested the Government to conclude an Agreement regarding the procedure for carrying out the strike in the health system, it refusing this additional protection procedure. In the conditions of the indifference shown by the governors towards the safety of the patients and the good functioning of the health units during the strike, in order to ensure that all health workers are correctly and fully informed about the actions that must be carried out, the “Health Solidarity” Federation developed and published a public information document called the Decalogue of the warning strike, which contains public instructions regarding the behavior of employees during the warning strike, its specific information being transmitted on all the organization’s information channels”, the trade unionists added.

The salary fund of health and social assistance employees increased, starting last month, in two installments – one in March and one in June – in total, by a percentage of 20%, according to an Emergency Ordinance adopted by the Government on 7 March.

The promise of a 20% salary increase had been made by the Government as early as January, in the context in which Sanitas and Solidaritatea Sanităra, the largest trade union federations in the healthcare system, threatened to launch a general strike if salaries did not increase.

The Government’s emergency ordinance also increases the basic salaries of health personnel, as well as those of TESA health personnel, with the increase to be done in stages.

235,611 doctors, pharmacists, biologists, chemists, physicists, medical registrars, medical statisticians and auxiliary health personnel, TESA personnel will also benefit from increases.

Although Sanitas has given up its protests following these wage increases, Sanitary Solidarity is still threatening a general strike.