The Trade Union Federation of Employees in the Ministry of Interior (TUFEMI) will request an amendment to Article 187, para. 1 of the Ministry of Interior Act. It reads:
„Art. 187. (1) (Supplemented, SG No. 60 of 2020) The normal working hours of civil servants in the Ministry of Interior shall be 8 hours per day and 40 hours per week with a 5-day working week. The normal duration of working time at night shall be 8 hours for each 24-hour period. Night work is work performed between 22:00 p.m. and 06:00 a.m.“
The trade union’s reasoning – in Bulgaria, only the Ministry of Interior employees are stipulated to work 8 hours at night, while for everyone else, according to Article 140 in the Labour Code /LC/, it is 7 hours:
„Art. 140. (1) (Amended – SG No. 25 of 2001, in force from 31.03.2001) The normal duration of weekly working hours at night in a 5-day working week is up to 35 hours. The normal duration of working hours at night in a 5-day working week is up to 7 hours.“
„The civil servants of the Ministry of Interior working in shifts are no different from the others doing night work in Bulgaria. Night work has the same adverse impact on the health of all employees and those in the Ministry of Interior are no more resistant than the others,“, Deputy Chairman of the Board of the Union of the Ministry of Interior, Genadi Tenev, told Iskra.bg.
The reason to seek it is an interpretative decision of the Supreme Court of Cassation /SCC/ night work of police officers to be accounted for under the MIAA. In order to gain insight into the problem we need to trace the chronology of its occurrence, Tenev believes. In his words, it all started with talks with the Ministry of Interior in 2018. The trade union has asked for an amendment and supplement to the Ordinance on the procedure for the organization and distribution of working time, its reporting, compensation for work outside regular working hours, the duty regime, rest time and rest breaks of civil servants in the Ministry of Interior, through which for civil servants in the Ministry of Interior working in shifts to introduce the possibility, which is provided for in Art. 9(2) of the Ordinance on the structure and organisation of wages and salaries for night work.
Tenev explained that in the letter No. 94-HH-198 of 29.08.2011 of the Ministry of Labour and Social Policy there is an explanation of the case. „In the case of simulated working time calculation, night hours are converted into day hours by a factor equal to the ratio between the normal duration of day and night working hours established for the day-time working time for the workplace concerned.
The above provision sets out the rule for converting night hours worked into day hours using a coefficient. This is the rule according to which, due to the different normal duration of day and night working hours laid down in Articles 136 and 140 of the Labour Code, 7 hours at night should be paid the same wage as 8 hours during the day.
Namely, the coefficient for the conversion of night hours into daytime hours is 1.143. The purpose of this coefficient is to determine the remuneration of the employee or worker in such a way that when they work 7 hours at night, they receive the weekly remuneration for 8 hours.“
It is clear from the quoted content that this coefficient is derived from the conversion of night hours into day hours, taking into account the normal duration of day working hours, which according to Article 136, paragraph 3 of the KT is 8 hours, and the normal duration of night working hours, which according to Article 140, paragraph 1 of the LC is 7 hours. The normal duration is defined in both texts. Until July 2020, there is a similar provision to Art. 136 para. 3 of the LC and Art. 140 para. 1 of the CC, which specifies the normal duration of working time of civil servants in the Ministry of Interior and this is Art. 187, para. 1 of the Ministry of Interior Act:
After the Ministry of Interior failed to understand the problem, the union decided to initiate legal proceedings to check the court’s opinion on the case. The firefighters from the Regional Directorate of Fire Safety and Population Protection in Varna were the main instigators, where just over 25 cases were initiated. All were won at first instance. Further discussions followed with the ministry, which replied that the decisions were not final and that things could be taken to a second instance. They also argued that police officers were compensated through early retirement. Tenev, however, pointed out a counter-argument – all civil servants in the Ministry of Interior with a status under the Ministry of Interior Act, retire under the same conditions set out in Article 69 of the Social Security Code, but not all do night work.
The Varna firefighters won the court cases at the second instance as well.
While there were still about 200 cases, the union once again met with the leadership of the ministry. Again, they were refused, as an argument for it was the presence of a decision of the Pleven court of first instance in favor of the Ministry of Interior.
At some point, cases reached about 4,000-4,500, he added. And figuratively, he called to calculate – given the 2,500 cases won by the employees, considering the court fees and attorney’s fees for the first and second instance, as well as the expertise and the compensations themselves, how much the ministry lost. According to his calculations, the amount amounts to nearly 3 million BGN.
Meanwhile, in June 2020, the Lukovit Regional Court made a preliminary inquiry to the European Court in Luxembourg for the interpretation of the norms of Directive 2003/88/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of November 4, 2003 regarding certain aspects of the organization of working time of police officers and firefighters and their compliance with national legislation, the subject of which and in relation to the case study of these cases. In this connection, case C 262/20 was opened.
At the same time, in 2020 a group of MPs have proposed that Article 187 of the Ministry of Interior Act be amended to state that „The normal duration of working hours at night shall be 8 hours for each 24-hour period. This was accepted and the amendment came into force in July 2020. Thus, through a special provision in the MIAA, the possibility of new cases has been stopped.
On 15 March this year, the interpretative decision of the General Assembly of the Civil Chamber of the SCC in interpretative case No. 1/2020 became clear, according to which the provisions of the Labour Code and the Regulation on the structure and organisation of wages are not applicable when accounting for and paying for hours worked at night by employees of the Ministry of Interior. The decision is final and shall be applied by all courts in the country.
„After this decision, it is not clear how the pending cases will end. (…) In general, the Supreme Court ruled that 98% of the judicial panels in the country did not judge correctly,“, Tenev pointed out.
On March 13, a Draft Law on Amendment and Supplement to the Ministry of Interior Act was published on the Public Consultation Portal. The TUFEMI will request that the change made in 2020 to Art. 187, para. 1 of the Ministry of Interior.
On the occasion of the payment of the night work of policemen, Tenev pointed out that the amount of payment per hour of night work for the employees of the Ministry of Interior is in the amount of the permissible minimum, which makes it the lowest paid in the country.
„Until 2014, night work, on-call time and work on national holidays were not paid at all to the civil servants in the Ministry of Interior and from the UFSMWR we ended up with a lawsuit in the Commission for Protection against Discrimination and the European Commission. The latter have written to the management of the Ministry of the Interior stating that if this is not regulated in legislation, as it is for other employees in the country, sanctions will follow for Bulgaria. Over the years, with much effort and protests, we have managed to achieve an increase in the rate of pay for an hour of night work from 25 cents to 1 lev. The curiosity is that, according to Article 8 of the Ordinance on the structure and organisation of wages and Article 20 of the Ordinance on wages for civil servants, which are in force from 01.01.2021: ‘For each hour worked at night, or for part of it, between 22:00 and 06:00, additional remuneration for night work shall be paid in an amount not less than 0.15 per cent of the minimum wage established for the country, but not less than one lev. „For 2023, the amount set for Ministry of Interior employees is BGN 1.17 per hour of night work, this is the minimum allowable for this year according to the quoted texts and the Ministry of Interior continues to move at the minimum. I dare say that this minimum rate is more of an exception for the country than a rule in night work pay,“ he clarified.
