The Histadrut and the Ministry of Finance produce a principle agreement of wage increase for the public sector workers
The general strike in the public sector that began on Wednesday (July 25) officially ended early Thursday morning (July 26) after all-night negotiations between the Histadrut Labour Federation Chairman Ofer Eini and Finance Minister Roni Bar-On produced a principle agreement of a wage increase for the public sector workers. The Histadrut stresses that the deal is only an interim agreement and that the Treasury was given a week to reach a final settlement.
The Histadrut called on public sector employees to return immediately to work.
Ofer Eini, Histadrut Chairman expressed his satisfaction from the agreement and said that that "I thank the Finance minister; it is a day of a real dramatic change for the public sector workers who have suffered only wage decreases in the last six years and from today they will finally achieve wage increase."
Finance Minster, Roni Bar-On, expressed his satisfaction from the agreement that balanced the will of the employees, the needs of the economy and the budgetary restraints, which will enable the continuation of the growth in the Israeli economy. Bar-On thanked Eini for his patience and responsibility to the economy's needs and for his efforts to avert the strike's damaging effect and burden on the citizens. "Signing the collective agreement will ensure certainty and stability in the economy for the employees and the employers for an extended period".
The agreement between the sides includes the following principals:
• The validity of the agreement-until December 2009 (inclusive);
• Public sector employees will receive a salary increase of five percent; one-and-a-half percent in January 2008, one-and-a-half percent in December 2008 and the remaining two percent in December 2009;
• Peaceful industrial-relations will be kept until December 31, 2009;
• Local authorities-out of the 5% supplementary to the local authorities employees will be allocated to correct the distortion of wage mechanism at the local authority;
• Establishing a joint team in order to find solutions of structure changes in the public sector;
• Conducting further discussions on resolving other problems regarding public sector workers' pensions;
• Providing retirement grade