It is a “stocktaking” meeting for the ministry and an opportunity to make new demands for the unions. In a context of sustained inflation, wage discussions are being held this Thursday at the Ministry of Transformation and the Public Service. For Minister Stanislas Guerini, it is a question of drawing an initial assessment of the salary measures unveiled at the end of June, in the forefront of which is the general increase of 3.5% in the salary of the 5.7 million public officials. The general increase, unprecedented since 2017, had long been demanded by the unions.
At the very beginning of the summer, the Minister for the Civil Service had also announced better management by the State employer of collective catering, an additional salary gesture for the lowest paid agents of category B and an extension of the sustainable mobility package.
“Get a new upgrade”
The unions are nevertheless concerned about the persistent inflation of 5.8% over one year in August according to INSEE (the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies) and are therefore calling for new measures rather than a return on those already made. “It’s not a useless meeting, but we’re getting close. We are old enough to take stock of the measures on our own! exclaims Christian Grolier, the boss of the General Federation of FO civil servants.
On the side of the UFSE-CGT, “we are going to bring the requirement to obtain a new revaluation”, assures its general secretary, Céline Verzeletti, and ask “that we work on an indexation mechanism” of the salaries on the ‘inflation. The story is the same at the CFDT Public functions, yet rarely aligned with the CGT. “We cannot be satisfied with these 3.5%, the file must not be closed”, judges its secretary general Mylène Jacquot. The government intends to open exploratory discussions on remuneration and career development this fall before more formal negotiations in 2023.
Apart from these demands, the unions believe that the 3.5% increase promised from July 1 to public officials generally arrived smoothly on their payroll. Mylène Jacquot just underlines the “difficulties” for contract workers who are not paid with reference to the index point, “a minority” by her own admission.