Prague, March 29 (CTK) – The Czech government supported an increase in the salaries of the police, firefighters, customs officers and prison wardens by 10 percent as of this July yesterday, Interior Minister Milan Chovanec (Social Democrats, CSSD) has tweeted.
In early March, Chovanec agreed on the pay rise with Finance Minister Andrej Babis (ANO).
In all, almost 1.5 billion crowns are to be spent on the pay rise this year.
The police corps has roughly 40,000 employees and the fire corps over 9,700.
The average monthly salary is about 35,000 crowns in both services.
The pay rise will also cover the customs and prison authorities as well as secret services.
Chovanec repeated yesterday that he was dealing with the problem of lowering salaries that had occurred under the centre-right government of Petr Necas (Civic Democratic Party, ODS).
Due to the government austerity measures, the salaries fell by 10 percent in 2011. A year before, the police lost their risk bonuses.
“This is a step in the right direction, removing the damage caused by previous governments,” Chovanec said in a press report.
Since this center-left coalition government took up office in 2013, the salaries in the security forces have increased by 15 percent.
The average monthly gross salary is 29,320 crowns in the Czech Republic at present.
($1 = 24.883 crowns)
