The associations that represent the interests of civil servants are calling for a salary increase of between 3 and 5%, the different groups have told the media.
The call comes after comments made by the Chief Executive (CE), Ho Iat Seng, who announced late last week that a proposal for the increase of the salary of the government workers for the next year is already being evaluated.
For Pang Kung Hou, from the Macau Civil Servants Federation (MCSF), the raise should be between 3 and 5%, he said, noting that particularly for the workers who have lower paid jobs, a rise of three to five patacas on the 100 points index that is at the moment 91 patacas per point would only represent a few hundred patacas more on their monthly pay. He considers that this would be “a help” but not enough to deal with the increased inflation and interest rates on housing mortgages, among other rising costs.
Noting that most of the civil servants are in the medium pay range, Pang said that even so, the increase will not be an effective increase of the workers’ purchasing power but will merely offset the recent increase in living costs.
For this reason, the MCSF is also calling on the government to raise the subsidy related to the housing allowance of the workers, which would help them a little more.
The president of the Macau Public Servants Association (ATFPM), José Pereira Coutinho, also set the bar of the increase to be “at least 94 patacas per point,” which is an increase of a minimum of three patacas (3%) for all civil servants.
In a phone interview with Portuguese channel TDM, Pereira Coutinho said he was pleased with the answers of the Chief Executive, Ho Iat Seng, at the Legislative Assembly last Friday on this matter.
According to the same official, the decision of the local government is only subjected to criticism for coming late, he said, noting that the local government should have addressed the matter when the Hong Kong government did.
In early June, the Hong Kong government announced civil servants’ wages would be increased this year by 2.87% and 4.65%, according to different levels with the highest rate to affect the salaries of those in the middle and lower salary bands.
Several analysts have said the increase of the salary of government workers has set an important historical example to be taken into account by the private sector in also raising the wages of their workers.
