Prime Minister Ilie Bolojan on Thursday stated that the bill on the magistrates’ pension is like a „bridgehead” for the government, meaning that if the government fails to correct things in this system, it has no legitimacy to do so in other areas.

„This proposal is very important because it has effects in other systems as well, and I have said it before and I do not hide it that a government that fails to pass this measure, in the context in which what happened in this area is really outrageous, with the cascading salary increases – and I think that there were over 20,000 lawsuits that magistrates generated against the Romanian state, and as a result of these lawsuits, salary rights of over 2 billion euros were won, of which at least one billion euros were paid. But in terms of salary differences, the value of 2 billion euros means the Arad-Oradea expressway, which should be built and costs about that much,” Ilie Bolojan told Antena 3 CNN private television broadcaster.

He said that this has never happened in any other system and that a salary law is needed that „stabilises things in this area.”

„This is the truth, because we can no longer go further like this. And then this project is like a bridgehead for us, because – like I said when we were talking about legitimacy – if we don’t correct this, we have no legitimacy as a government to go to other areas. Let’s consider, for example, the Ministry of the Interior, where we have more than 100,000 people and retirements happen around the age of 50, while we have some people who only do guards. It is one thing to be in the brigade that restores order and you risk having your head broken in one action or another, and you do need to benefit from an accelerated retirement, because you can’t wear the uniform, you are no longer competitive, and it is another thing to stay on guard from morning to night, since you can do that until 65 years old. So what government, if it doesn’t correct this area, will it be able to correct the larger systems to increase the retirement age, to correct the level of pensions there as well?” Bolojan also said.

He added that this is a problem of minimum social trust, of doing things that are healthy for the economy and of doing a minimum of social justice. AGERPRES