ZAGREB, September 5, 2019 – The unions of primary and secondary school teachers will not call a strike for now, after agreeing to pursue dialogue with the government on their demands for higher wages, the leader of the Secondary School Teachers’ Union, Branimir Mihalinec, said in Zagreb on Thursday after meeting with the prime minister and relevant ministers.
About 1,500 primary and secondary school teachers rallied outside the government headquarters on Thursday demanding a six percent rise in their wages. After the protest, Mihalinec and the leader of the Primary School Teachers’ Union, Sanja Šprem, met with Prime Minister Andrej Plenković and relevant ministers.
“The conclusion of the meeting is that dialogue will continue. All our proposals will be studied by working groups at the ministries and there will be concrete solutions,” Mihalinec said.
Šprem said that the unions had thus given the government a chance to make the calculations and show that education in Croatia was important.
The union leaders said that the government would present its opinion on their demands at a meeting which is expected to take place in about ten days’ time.
Mihalinec said that this meant that there would be no strike on September 9, the first day of the new school year. He, however, added that a strike would be called if the unions were dissatisfied with the outcome of the next meeting with the prime minister.
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