UNION LEADER BLAMES GOVT FOR FAILING TO TACKLE REAL PROBLEMS

CRKVENICA, Oct 21 (Hina) - The head of the Association of Workers' Unions of Croatia (URSH) on Saturday asserted that negative trends in Croatia's economy and social aspects were continuing, although already nine months had passed since the change of authorities. "The Government occupies itself with party and individual positions instead of tackling the real problems," the URSH leader, Boris Kunst, told a news conference he held in the coastal town of Crkvenica. "Bankruptcy procedures are going on and a jobless rate is rising, while new acts bring about just cosmetic rather than real changes. Costs of living are increasing faster than salaries," Kunst complained adding that the country still had no economic strategy. In his mind it is strange that the Government bases its economic policy on the three-percent growth of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The URSH has launched several initiatives such as the assistance in the payment of instalments for loans which persons, who were in the meantime laid off from jobs, cannot now pay back and are facing threats to have their mortgaged real estate confiscated. The URSH has, for instance, suggested the issuance of social identity cards and limits on the number of offices and functions which state officials can assume or perform simultaneously. We are aspiring to the merger of the trade unions' scene, as the unions are currently the only real corrective to the authority, Kunst told reporters. He voiced dissatisfaction with newly-proposed tax rates on the income, as, according to him, they would widen the gap between social differences. (hina) ms