Podgorica, (MINA-BUSINESS) – Members of the ruling majority in Parliament have failed to adopt the bill on the exercise of the right to financial support for persons who were employed in state/owned companies, i.e. on compensation for former workers of companies that went bankrupt.

The United Reform Action (URA), whose parliamentary group proposed the law, said that by voting that way the ruling MPs once again demonstrated a lack of concern for all workers who were victims of the transition, toward whom the state has a duty to rectify injustice.

URA recalled that its legislative proposal concerned compensation for all former employees who worked in state-owned companies that went bankrupt, except for workers already covered by previous laws in the mining, metal, wood-processing, and forestry industries.

“The bill envisaged compensation for all former employees who have not yet received severance pay, in the amount of €12,000 per employee. The right to compensation would apply to all former employees of state-owned enterprises who lost their jobs due to bankruptcy or were forced into early retirement. In addition, former employees who received compensation in an amount lower than €12,000 are entitled to receive compensation covering the difference up to that amount,” URA explained.

The party added that the bill also stipulated that, in the event a former employee had died, the right to compensation would belong to their legal heirs. 

URA stated that the fight to secure the rights of former workers is not over and that it is their moral and human obligation to persevere so that, after decades of injustice, the state may at least partially repay its debt to all those who helped build it.