Filenews 30 January 2023
ETYK's move to invite the presidential candidates of the Republic to a dialogue with hundreds of bank employees gave employees the opportunity to raise a number of questions and concerns to Averoff Neophytou, Nikos Christodoulides and Andreas Mavrogiannis, to assess how they see the next day and what they intend to do when they come to power.
The challenges in the banking industry are great and especially after the latest development, when more than 1,000 bank employees got a voluntary exit plan but cannot get unemployment benefit due to legal obstacles. "F" gathered the positions expressed by the candidates to the great concerns of bank employees and highlight what are the problems faced by employees, in a profession that is characterized nowadays by great risk.
Mr. Neophytou, who was the first to open the dialogue with the bank employees in the ETYK auditorium, referred to the two important issues that are of great concern to former and current bank employees at this time. As he said, he intends to solve through legislative regulations problems that exist and will not burden the state's finances, stressing that you must not only record the problems but also propose solutions.
The presidential candidate of the Republic Nikos Christodoulides promised solutions for the restoration of the unemployment benefit of banks leaving with voluntary retirement plans, the restoration of the clipped provident funds and the restoration of salaries to pre-memorandum levels.
Andreas Mavrogiannis made promises for the partial restoration of the clipped provident funds, the regulation of the granting of unemployment benefit to workers who are part of voluntary exit schemes and the effort to restore the salaries of bank employees.
Tough negotiations expected
Tough negotiations are expected for the renewal of collective agreements in the banking sector as, after seven years, ETYK will have to face a united front from the banks through the Cyprus Employers' Association of Banks (KEST). For banks, automatic wage increases, such as the horizontal mark-up and the ATA, affect the increase in wage costs. For the trade union side, the annual increase and the ATA are acquired benefits that are supported over time through all collective agreements. To date, the banks have not put on the table the abolition of the ATA, unlike the annual surcharge for which adjustments have already been made under the expired collective agreements.
