Europol trade unionists from the National Archives across the entire Romania were on a two-hour warning strike on Monday, and threaten all-out strike starting November 14 if no consensus is reached with the decision-makers, vice-president of the Europol National Archives branch Livia Ardelean told AGERPRES.
"We resorted to this form of protest out of desperation. Our patience has worn off and we are trying all legal means to make ourselves heard. Today's protest was an interesting experience, we hope to make ourselves heard, we hope to be listened to," said Ardelean, although she admitted that no reaction was yet received from the decision-makers.
"Besides the nationwide participation and the fact that all our colleagues offered interviews, we got no feedback from the political and decision-making factors, but we stay hopeful. In case we don't find common ground, the next step will be the initiation of an all-out strike on November 14, for an indefinite period," Ardelean said.
The strikers' main grievances refer to wages, work conditions and document storage conditions.
"The most important demands refer to the conclusion of the collective bargaining agreement, whereby the union requested 5% of the institution's budget to be earmarked for addressing working conditions issues. It would be a petty amount. Another main dissatisfaction and grievance of ours is the settlement of wage inequities, of the pay discrimination we are subjected to compared to our colleagues working at the central office, because there is a wide gap of several thousand lei between the center and local office pay. The third grievance has to do with the implementation of certain investment projects in the national archival system in order to bring the working conditions, but especially the storage conditions for documents in compliance with law requirements," the union leader added.
According to Europol, this was the first strike in the history of Romania's National Archives and implicitly in the history of the Ministry of the Interior.
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