“For the authorities, the most important thing is to raise the salaries of police officers and officials than the Armed Forces of Ukraine, this is extremely unfair”: Andriy Pavlovsky

Injustice in the distribution of salaries among Ukrainians is causing increasing indignation in society. In the conditions of the war, when thousands of Ukrainians are barely making ends meet due to rising prices and tariffs, the government decides to raise the salaries of officials. This calls into question the priorities of the state, because at a time when military personnel are risking their lives at the front, employees of state institutions receive higher salaries. Ukrainians who live on the minimum wage or pension ask: where is social justice?

The Verkhovna Rada adopted draft law No. 8222, which provides for the introduction of uniform approaches to the remuneration of civil servants based on the classification of positions. According to this document, it is planned to increase the salaries of officials. In particular, people’s deputies supported the amendment, which provides for a salary increase for the State Audit Service of Ukraine. The Council also voted to increase the salaries of police officers.

Expert on social issues, People’s Deputy of Ukraine of the 6th and 7th convocations Andriy Pavlovskyi believes, that the most important thing for the authorities is to raise the salaries of officials and policemen, not the military. This, in his opinion, is an extremely unfair approach, because it is the defenders on the front lines who risk their lives for the sake of the country. At the same time, officials who work in comfortable conditions receive excessive salaries. Pavlovsky emphasizes that the average salary in the ministries has already reached 50-60 thousand hryvnias, and it is planned to increase it further. The question arises: how justified is this growth, if many Ukrainians cannot afford even basic needs?

Separately, the expert drew attention to the fact that many officials receive exorbitant sums. He cited examples when members of supervisory boards of state-owned companies receive hundreds of thousands of hryvnias per month. Among them is Serhii Leshchenko, who works in the supervisory board of “Ukrzaliznytsia” and receives a salary of over 300,000 hryvnias. However, it is not clear what exactly he receives such funds for. The situation is similar with the managers of “Ukrposhta”, “Naftogaz”, “Ukrenergo” – their salaries reach millions of hryvnias, and at the same time, Ukrainians are forced to save on the most necessary.

Pavlovsky also believes that Volodymyr Zelenskyi could legislate this law, but probably won’t do it. After all, despite the president’s previous statements about capping officials’ salaries at the level of 10 minimum salaries, this decision is actually ignored. Instead, the government continues to increase payments to its officials and security forces.

At the same time, utility tariffs for the population increased by almost 20% over the year, while minimum wages and pensions remain frozen. This leads to a catastrophic drop in the purchasing power of Ukrainians. This is especially noticeable on food products, the prices of which have almost doubled. Pavlovsky emphasized that in such conditions, raising salaries for officials looks not only unfair, but also demotivates citizens, in particular military personnel, whose families are forced to live on frozen salaries.

Another group that remains without adequate funding is educators. Pavlovsky emphasizes that teachers’ wages are twice as low as those in industry. Because of this, there is a catastrophic shortage of personnel in schools – at the beginning of the year, 25,000 vacancies were not filled. Young specialists do not want to work for meager pay, and the majority of current teachers are people of retirement or pre-retirement age. If the situation does not change, soon there will simply be no one to teach the children.

At the same time, the Ministry of Social Policy states that Ukrainians should save money for old age. However, Pavlovsky notes that this is impossible in the current conditions. Most citizens spend all their income on basic needs, and pensioners do not even have enough funds until the end of the month. The government also plans to make compulsory deductions from the salaries of citizens into the accumulative pension system, but without any guarantees of the preservation of these funds. With high inflation, which reached 13% last year, people can lose all their savings.

Thus, the current government policy prioritizes the loyalty of officials and law enforcement officers, rather than social protection of the population. While some receive extremely high salaries, others are forced to survive. If such trends continue, it will lead to an increase in social tension, another wave of emigration and further decline in the standard of living in the country.