The Alternative Union trade union calls for consistent enforcement of the principle of equal pay for equal work.
Labour law implies that employees have equal rights for performing the same duties equally. Any discrimination in this matter is unacceptable. The anti-discrimination laws apply also to wages. If work is equally difficult, requires the same amount of effort and skills, the same competences, and the employees hold the same responsibilities – they should be paid equally. This principle is enshrined in the Constitution of the Republic of Poland, the Labour Code, and EU documents. The general constitutional principle of equality is detailed in the Labour Code. In accordance with article 18 (3c) of the Labour Code “employees have the right to equal remuneration for the same work or for work of an identical value” and that remuneration “includes all components of remuneration, regardless of their name or characteristics, as well as other work-related benefits granted to employees in cash or non-cash form”. In addition, “work of an identical value means work that demands from employees not only comparable professional qualifications, certified by documents provided for in separate provisions or by practice and professional experience, but also comparable responsibility and effort”. Any differentiation of remuneration should be justified and related to e.g. better skills, longer working hours or differences in the form of work performed of the concerned employee. Social workers in the same position perform the same work regardless if they are located in Radom or Warsaw. It is also difficult to find differences between the work performed by clerks employed at the same trade network in Iława and Malbork or workers handing out letters at the post office in Gdynia and Wrocław. There is no reason to differentiate between people’s salaries based on their place of residence.
Unfortunately, laws on equal pay for equal work are being violated on a massive scale, even in the public sector. In recent years, the payroll fund in the public sector has been increased, but without systemic valorisation, that would apply to all workers to the same extent. In practice, managers of individual facilities arbitrarily raised the wages of selected workers while the wages of others stagnated. This marked the departure from the principle of equal pay for equal work, which led to the situation characterised by the great disproportion between the remuneration of the people in the same position and with the same seniority employed at judicature or internal revenue service. These kinds of dysfunctions are also present in strategic companies like Polish Post (Poczta Polska). Under the current Polish Post’s collective bargaining agreement, one employee can earn twice as much as other one employed under the same category. This means a tremendous arbitrariness of management when setting salaries for employees, which in practice may, for example, lead to a situation where members of trade unions loyal to the board can expect higher wages than other employees. The same situation may occur in private companies, there are big pay gaps between employees in the same position. For example, the wage difference between cashiers in Biedronka stores can reach up to 500 PLN depending on the region.
It is high time that the Polish state began to respect the labour laws and no longer divide the regions into categories of “better” and “worse”. In order to achieve that the government should consistently enforce the principle of equal pay for employees with the same responsibilities and seniority. In self-government and state institutions, the salaries for employees with the same responsibilities and duties should be set in advance. This should also apply to private companies. It is hard to see the reason why the law would allow huge pay differences between the same positions just because of the employer’s bias.
