EU pay dispute

Tens of thousands of employees and contract workers of the European Union are set for a pay raise next year, but it may not be as much as they had hoped.

A planned 3.7 percent salary raise was chopped into a 1.85 percent increase in compromise negotiations, but the Commission is unhappy with the deal.

The original plan to give civil servants a 3.7 percent increase drew angry reactions from citizens and governments of the 27 member states of the bloc. Such a raise would come out of the EU's central budget, which is ultimately funded by taxpayers in member countries.

Headed for court

The countries say an economic crisis is no time to hand out fatter checks.

After around 2,500 EU civil servants went on strike last week, the member states proposed the 1.85 percent pay rasie compromise, essentially cutting the raise in half. The reduced raise was approved by representatives of the member states at a Council meeting on Tuesday.

But the Commission, the body that proposes and enforces EU laws, has said they will take the case to the European Court of Justice, saying even the compromise raise is a clear violation of EU rules.

Pay raises for the civil servants are calculated in a complex and legally binding mathematical formula that incorporates average pay in Brussels and eight of the EU's richest and oldest member states.

Legal precedent may support Commission's claim

A spokesman said Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso made the decision to take the weakened raise to the courts, which reconvene on January 6. He also said a similar 1973 court decision supported the Commission's case.

If the case is ultimately launched, it could take as long as 16 months to make its way through the European courts. In the meantime, the 1.85 percent raise would take effect. It is unclear if the two sides can reach an agreement that would prevent the case from going to trial.

Currently, a secretary for the Commission has a gross monthly income of about 2,550 euros ($3,800). A department head makes about 17,700 euros ($25,375) a month.

Commission employees have said the pay raise is necessary because their real income has fallen amid cuts in benefits, tax and pension hikes and inflation.

acb/hf/AFP/dpa
Editor: Jennifer Abramsohn