WILLEMSTAD - On July 1st of this year, ministers and parliamentarians of Curaçao will return to their pre-COVID salaries. Since July 2020, these officials have been sacrificing a quarter of their income as a Dutch demand to show solidarity with public employees who also gave up their income.
As a result, ministers had a primary income of almost thirteen thousand guilders per month. The representation costs of around 2,700 guilders gross per month were also eliminated, as was the six percent vacation pay.
The monthly salary of a minister is based on the highest scale and the highest step in the legal regulation on the remuneration of civil servants, increased by 25 percent of that amount and the representation costs, as mentioned above.
The same applies to members of parliament. However, the salary of a Member of Parliament does not have the 25 percent increase that applies to ministers. Both fall under the highest scale and the highest step of civil service salaries. As a result, a Member of Parliament earned slightly more than eleven thousand guilders during the Corona crisis.
Of course, ministers and Members of Parliament are entitled to a child allowance, thirty vacation days with full pay, a phone, and a service car with a driver.
Civil servants
During the pandemic, civil servants and other public employees had to sacrifice 12.5 percent. That regulation expired on July 1st last year. The ABVO civil servants' union is still negotiating with other unions to restore their compensation.
This includes their periodic increase, the indexing of the years 2018 and 2019, one and a half days of vacation in 2022 to which they are entitled, and the payment of the vacation pay that still needs to be paid out this year.