Statement of the Ministry of Labour to UİD-DER

The Ministry of Labour and Social Security sent a statement to UİD-DER which carried out a campaign against the government plan aiming to transfer the severance entitlements of workers to a fund and eventually abolish the severance payment. In the statement, Ministry says that “our Ministry has not a finished plan on severance payment”.

In its campaign that lasted through months UİD-DER explained the truths about the government plans to eventually abolish severance payment to hundreds of thousands of workers in workplaces, working-class neighbours and city centres and submitted the signatures it collected to the Parliament. Before submitting the signatures to Parliament, representatives of UİD-DER spoke at the press briefing in Parliament and underlined that workers expressed their opposition to the attempt to abolish the right to have severance pay by supporting the campaign of UİD-DER. After the press briefing, the collected signatures was submitted to the Parliament Petition Commision to be given to the Ministry of Labour and Social Security.

The Ministry of Labour and Social Security sent a statement to UİD-DER at recent days. As if there has been no actual plan and preparations ongoing within the Ministry to transfer the severance entitlements of workers to a fund and eventually abolish the right to have severance pay, the Ministry tediously explains the existing laws and under what conditions a worker is entitled to have the severance pay. After these long explanations, at the end of the statement, the Ministry says that “our Ministry has not a finished plan on severance payment”.

As is known, UİD-DER’s campaign had an impact. Upon the reaction of UİD-DER, trade-unions and other labour organisations, AKP government stated that it put this issue over to the new legislation term in Parliament. At that time we said that this was a tactical postponement. Indeed the issue was raised again in July. But seeing the re-emerging uproar, Minister Faruk Çelik said recently that “the fund is not on the agenda and Prime Minister Erdoğan ordered to drop the issue from the agenda”. Of course, these statements too are completely tactical statements. Abolishing the severance payments by transferring it to a fund is still on the government’s agenda. Owing to the coming local elections, Prime Minister Erdoğan’s presidential calculations and the heated Syrian war, AKP government needs an increasing public support and for that reason it temporarily steps back on the question of the fund. The government will put the issue on agenda again as soon as the situation changes. So from the standpoint of the working class there is no guarantee that the issue is dropped forever.

The impact of UİD-DER’s campaign (“We will not let them usurp our severance pay!”) is evident. Workers should support UİD-DER in order to stop the attempt of the government to transfer severance entitlements of workers to the use of bosses. The only guarantee to protect the right to severance pay is the responsiveness and the united struggle of workers.