BRATISLAVA, December 15, (WEBNOVINY) — Although the government fulfilled all their demands, the Medical Trade Unions Association (LOZ) has not yet canceled strike alert of hospital doctors who recently ended their massive protest. On the threat that their demands might not be fulfilled, LOZ has announced they will be on strike alert last Saturday. „Bills that passed in parliament yesterday have not come into effect yet, and therefore it is premature to speak about ending strike alert for now,” said LOZ Peter Visolajsky. Trade unions want to wait until the adopted bills are published in the Collection of Laws. However, they do not fear that it might happen that President Ivan Gasparovic will not seal the bills in question. “Maybe we drew lessons from the past and it would be really responsible of us to wait with it for a few days, maybe a week, stated the head of the association Marian Kollar.
Medical trade unionists have renewed their demand for the Health Minister Ivan Uhliarik (KDH) to be sacked. “Now it is the right time to repeat our previous suggestion for the minister to quit,” said Visolajsky. The departure of the minister would be a start of fulfilling the ethical code for the medical profession in real life, he announced. “The request for his dismissal is the first point of meeting the ethical code in health care,“ specified Kollar. Trade unions think that the minister’s statements full of nonsense over recent days have disqualified him from serious political competition. Kollar opines that the time is ripe to recall the minister of health.
Medical trade unions accuse the government of cheating them. “We thought that signing the joint memorandum on December 3 equals its realization and that its fulfillment will be a smooth process, complained Visolajsky. Instead, trade unions gradually learned that the memorandum signed by Prime Minister Iveta Radicova does not have support even in her party. “By signing the memorandum and her failure to get it into a legislative process the prime minister cheated doctors and the public as well, added Visolajsky.
Radicova argued that the fate of the memorandum is in the hands of lawmakers of whom mainly coalition parties were reluctant to initiate bills meeting doctors‘ demands anchored in the memorandum. However, on Wednesday afternoon, the Slovak Parliament adopted the opposition SMER-SD MP Richard Rasi’s proposal to amend the debated draft bill so as to cancel transformation of the legal form of state-run hospitals to joint stock companies as the trade unions demanded. Seventy deputies supported the draft: opposition SMER-SD and SNS MPs, four Ordinary People and ex-SNS deputies Anna Belousovova and Rudolf Pucik; 29 opposed it and 23 did not vote. SaS MPs did not participate at the vote, reducing the quorum and thus de facto enabling the adoption of the opposition proposal, in line with demands of protesting hospital doctors. Parliament also passed the bill drafted by the parliamentary health committee giving two pay rises to doctors next year. The bill however does not count with the third pay rise promised to take place in 2013. LOZ said that they will discuss the issue with the new government after elections in March 2012.
SITA