Since Prime Minister Robert Golob (The Freedom Movement – Gibanje Svoboda) announced at the extraordinary general meeting of the Slovenian Association of Judges (Slovensko sodniško društvo) that he would provide a 600-euros-gross monthly allowance to each judge and prosecutor as early as January, I asked the government what this allowance would be and where the legal basis for the payment can be found, which has been announced by the Prime Minister. The Ministry of Justice responded by writing that “the government is still working on the normative basis” and that the allowance will be given to 1093 prosecutors and judges. On an annual basis, they estimated, the total cost will amount to 9.1 million euros. However, if you multiply 600 euros by 1093 judges and prosecutors for 12 months, the number is much lower: 7,860,600 euros. However, it is possible that the difference is due to the obligations of the employers, i. e. the courts and prosecutors, to pay salaries.
The answer that the normative basis is still being drafted seems to imply that they are still searching for a law which would allow for this increase to be paid. If the legislation has to be amended in the National Assembly, it will not be possible to do so quickly enough to make it effective for January.
The Ministry of Justice gave the following answer to the question of what the supplement is and where the legal basis for it is: “As the Prime Minister told the assembled judges at yesterday’s extraordinary general meeting of the Slovenian Association of Judges, from the 1st of January this year, judges and prosecutors will be paid a gross monthly supplement of 600 euros per month. This is a temporary measure, which is also a way for the government to implement one of the coalition’s commitments and show a serious intention to put an end to the salary anomalies in the judicial salary system after many years and thus to ensure greater material independence for judges. The allowance, for which the government is still preparing the normative basis, will be paid until the reform of the pay system regulates their salaries in a systemic way. According to the latest known data from the online information system, we estimate that 1,093 judges and prosecutors will receive this supplement, and the financial impact of the temporary measure is thus estimated at 9.1 million euros per year.”
In the state budget for this year, which was revised by the MPs of the government parties in the National Assembly at the end of November last year, no additional money seems to have been allocated for this purpose, even though the coalition’s commitment, which is referred to in the reply from the Ministry of Justice, was known beforehand.
