Peggy Hessen Følsvik wants a pay rise for the municipal employees during the spring settlement.
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9. feb. 2023 23:03 – Updated 9 Feb. 2023 23:04
LO leader Peggy Hessen Følsvik believes that the municipal employees have fallen behind on wages. Now she believes that they deserve a boost during the spring salary settlement.
– In the last three years, municipal employees have lost ground to the private sector. It doesn’t work anymore. This year, the employees in the municipalities must be guaranteed a proper pay rise. It cannot be the case that employees in the private sector leave year after year. It increases inequality in society, and undermines the frontline model, which is the Norwegian way of negotiating wages, says Peggy Hessen Følsvik to VG.
In Norway, it is the frontline profession that sets the framework for salary settlements.
The LO leader points out that in 2020, employees in front-line jobs received a wage increase of 2.2 per cent, while municipal employees received 1.7 per cent. In 2021, the front subject received 3.1 per cent, while the municipalities received 2.6 per cent.
The figures for 2022 are not yet clear, but Følsvik points out that recent wage figures from Statistics Norway showed that wage growth for health and social services was 3.6 per cent.
– There are many indications that they are again among the losers, says the LO leader.