Aladrovic: Unemployment falling, shorter work week soon

Labour Minister Josip Aladrovic said on Monday that unemployment was down and employment up over the past two weeks and reiterated that a shorter work week would be defined this month.

He said unemployment was rising in March and April but that May saw 11,800 more people hired, he told reporters.

"Business activity trends are turning. It's very good for the Croatian economy that employment is increasing and unemployment decreasing," he said, adding that for now Croatia had retained a serious level of business activity and positive trends on the labour market.

State would co-finance one working day

Aladrovic also described shorter working hours. "The concept is that the state carries the burden of the inefficient part of work. In other words, if an employer works five days a week but needs four, the state would co-finance one working day and the employer would pay wages for four."

He said the measure would be defined in cooperation with unions and employers, and that they were invited to a meeting tomorrow. He added that this measure had good results during previous crises.

We believe that in the coming period, when we can't go horizontally as we did with job-retention measures, that's one of the ways to retain jobs as well as business and economic activity, said Aladrovic.

Asked if citizens using loan repayment moratoriums would be blacklisted given that banks were allowed to exchange information again, he said he was not familiar with the position of commercial banks, but added that a moratorium was contracted between a citizen and a bank, so he hopes banks will not make any black lists.

Text: Hina

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