The exchange of arguments started during a debate on the government-sponsored draft amendments to the Pensioners' Fund Act regulating the right of beneficiaries of the highest pensions and family pensions to be given compensation, in accordance with a 12 May 1998 ruling of the Constitutional Court.
According to some estimates, there are about 443,000 recipients of the said categories of pensions and the government believes that it is necessary to ensure 1.4 billion kuna for that purpose through the Pensioners' Fund.
During the debate, Andrija Hebrang of the HDZ justified the incurrence of the state debt to pensioners with the war circumstances in the 1990s.
"It was Serbia's aggression that caused the debt, and it is the Croatian people and nobody else that will pay the debt," Hebrang said, adding that Croatia would lose eight annual Gross Domestic Products by 2015 due to the consequences of the war.
Nenad Stazic of the SDP responded that the war should not be an excuse for taking money from the pensioners' fund.
Later in the day, Labour Ministry State Secretary Vera Babic presented draft amendments to laws regulating accelerated retirement plans and pension insurance companies.
Croatian People's Party (HNS) deputy Dragutin Lesar asked that the government present figures about the number of citizens with pension insurance and those who are covered by the third pension pillar.