The Members of the Bulgarian Parliament passed at first reading Thursday amendments to the State Servants Act.

Yanaki Stoilov, from the opposition left-wing Bulgarian Socialist Party, BSP, stressed the Bill had been submitted in November and entered plenary hall at this precise moment only due to the public pressure generated by revelations about huge bonuses distributed to senior officials.

The opposition further declared themselves against eliminating years of service as a factor for pay raise and accused the labor unions of being passive and silent on the issue.

The other major opposition party, the ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms, DPS, declared they would not endorse the amendments because the texts were unclear.

DPS MP, Hassan Ademov, noted that the changes would not affect political cabinets and the Ministries of Defense and Interior.

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Simeon Djankov, is in plenary hall Thursday to take part in the debates.

The amendments aim at stopping the practice of distributing large amounts of money as incentive for employees from the State administration i.e. the so-called bonuses.

There will be a new way to form State servants pay – they will have a constant wage and will get additional money based on performance and/or overtime work, up to 30% of the constant wage.

There will be also a constant amount up to 5% from the expenses for salaries for attracting and keeping professionals whose qualifications are deemed extremely important for the administration.

Performance assessment will be done on a scale from 1 to 4. Performance-based bonuses will be given up to 4 times a year. Those who fail to fulfill their job duties will not receive anything above the constant wage for the respective period.

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