ZAGREB, July 2 (Hina) - The purpose of a draft act on ensuring workers' claims in cases when their employers go bankrupt is to improve the position of workers by protecting their claims in the case of their companies' bankruptcy,
through institutions that can give guarantees, Labour and Social Welfare Minister Davorko Vidovic said in the Croatian parliament on Wednesday.
ZAGREB, July 2 (Hina) - The purpose of a draft act on ensuring
workers' claims in cases when their employers go bankrupt is to
improve the position of workers by protecting their claims in the
case of their companies' bankruptcy, through institutions that can
give guarantees, Labour and Social Welfare Minister Davorko
Vidovic said in the Croatian parliament on Wednesday. #L#
Presenting the goverment-sponsored final bill on the matter, the
minister warned that numerous companies which filed for bankruptcy
did not have enough funds to pay salaries to workers.
In the past three years, the bankruptcy procedure was initiated for
5,358 companies, while 929 unsolved cases in this field were
'inherited'. In that period, 32,754 person registered themselves
with the Employment Office after they lost their jobs because their
employers had gone out of business.
A Fund for Development and Employment, as a guarantee fund, would
define kinds and volume of workers' claims in the case of
bankruptcy, and pay overdue salaries and other claims.
Under the government's proposal, at least 160 million kuna (some
21.3 mln euros) should be ensured for the enforcement of this bill
which should have gone into force as of 1 July this year.
The said bill was supported by all the party benches in the Croatian
parliament. Some benches voiced regret that it had not been adopted
earlier. The Democratic Centre proposed that the rights, envisaged
by this law, could be given to workers whose companies had gone
bankrupt before its adoption.
(hina) ms sb