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Government is not keeping its word

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"Heritage" faction views the government's ad-hoc suspension of the draft law on increasing the salaries of administrative bodies of legislative, executive and judicial powers as normal. Head of the faction Stepan Safaryan finds that "increasing the salaries of legislative, executive and judicial powers is inacceptable as long as there is poverty, salaries are lower than the consumer's basket, pensions are not enough to get along and unemployment is reaching great heights."

Safaryan believes that the parliament will have the moral right to address the issue only when it solves the issue concerning citizens' living conditions.

One of the creators of the draft law on increasing the salaries of administrative bodies of legislative, executive and judicial powers, secretary of the "Bargavach Hayastan" party Aram Safaryan says "the country will overcome the crisis and then address the draft law".

ARF MP Artsvik Minasyan finds that the government is not leading an effective policy on salaries. The ARF had reached an agreement on increasing salaries in all spheres when it was part of the coalition. "We had to raise the salaries of not only high-ranking officials, but all professionals of public spheres, starting from teachers."

The issue of whether Armenia met its obligations when joining the revised European Social Charter had to be at the core of the policy.

"According to that, the lowest salary cannot be lower than 40 percent of the average salary," said Artsvik Minasyan.

However, according to Minasyan, the government is not keeping its word and is trying to continue its line of conduct by confirming the interim plan from 2011 to 2013.
"The government has not foreseen any increase, except for the increase of civil servants' salaries in 2013 and a 2,500 dram increase of pensions in the same year. "These two actions are part of the upcoming elections. The government doesn't want to present concrete programs for overcoming the social-economic challenges facing the country and simply wants to serve the interests of this or that political group and the oligarchs," Artsvik Minasyan told "A1+".