Pension systems as we know them today originate from the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century and are a direct result of the pressure and struggle of the organised labour movement.

All pension systems in Europe are fundamentally public and, with rare exceptions, are mostly based on intergenerational solidarity. Regardless of the various details of their functioning, no society can ensure the subsistence of the inactive population except on the basis of the labour of those who are of working age.

In Croatia, the low employment rate and the unfavourable workers-to-pensioners ratio represent a serious problem in achieving an appropriate level of pension. However, Croatia is a society that, in global terms, is at an intermediate level of development and income, and, as such, it must be able to ensure a decent life for its senior citizens.

The pension system reforms undertaken since 1999 to achieve long-term sustainability have been aimed at weakening the public part of the pension system (the first pillar) and strengthening the private part (the second pillar).

The privatisation of a part of the public pension system resulted in large costs to public finances, created by diverting five per cent of contributions from the public pension system to private funds. With the existing system, we will all be paying these costs for decades through general taxes, while a part of these costs has been transferred to today’s pensioners, in the sense of the reduction in the level of their pensions and their pension rights.

The UATUC advocates a pension system based on public pension insurance which must be able to provide all pensioners with social security in old age. We oppose the existing model of the second pension pillar.

The model of the second pillar that Croatia has does not exist in old EU member states while it has, in the meantime, been abolished or significantly reduced in some of the new member states which, like Croatia, introduced it 20 years ago under pressure from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

Individual capitalised savings can only be a voluntary addition to the public pension system and must not be managed by private banks but by workers and employers together.

We stand for the separation of all pensions acquired under special regulations from the pension insurance system and their transparent financing out of general taxation.

We support encouraging workers to stay longer in work but only on a voluntary basis; that is, for those who want it and who are able to do so. We will continue to defend strongly the right to retire at the age of 65. We cannot talk about raising this age threshold until the expected duration of life, in particular healthy life after the age of 65, is significantly closer to that of the more developed EU member states.

Based on these stated principles and aims, we advocate the comprehensive regulation of the pension system (instead of a series of partial reforms) which must be based on a broad professional and public debate as well as on dialogue with the social partners.