MEF confirms fiscal space of S/200 million for collective bargaining

As anticipated The Republicthe Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF) confirmed that it has a fiscal space of S/200 million for collective bargaining, according to the Final Report of the Situational State of the Financial Administration of the Public Sector. While the workers are requesting more than S/843 million, which creates a gap of more than S/600 million.

“The result of the fiscal space evaluation exercise shows that this amounts to S/200 million for the year 2024 in the FF Ordinary Resources, with which the costs of the Collective Bargaining Law in the State Sector could be financed for the aforementioned year,” the document states.

The aforementioned report was a necessary requirement to be able to start with the centralized negotiation, whose term ends on June 30, while the decentralized one – which depends on the previous one – on July 7. This leaves a limited margin to include the resources within the budget for fiscal year 2024, when in 2023 the report was published in April.

Among the main requests of the workers is a salary increase to recover purchasing power, which since 2021 has been lost by 69%, according to José Sandoval, spokesman for the Front of State Workers of Peru. In addition, he stressed that it also seeks to improve the balance of pensions that currently do not reach the current minimum living wage.

For his part, José Miguel Delgado, president of the Unasse confederation and coordinator of the Expanded State Unit, warned that the amount for 2023 was insufficient and that a reduction for next year would only “cause worker dissatisfaction and social conflicts.”