The Government approved the emergency ordinance on reducing structural expenditures, which provides, among other things, for maintaining the value of the pension point at 1,442 lei in 2021 and eliminating the 30 percent COVID bonus granted to Prefecture staff, Prime Minister Florin Citu announced, on Thursday.

"The emergency ordinance on some fiscal-budgetary measures was approved, as well as for the amendment and completion of some normative acts. This is the emergency ordinance we needed to be able to adopt the budget law. This ordinance will be published in the Official Journal and, after that, tomorrow, we will have a Government meeting in which we will approve the 2021 budget law," said Citu, at Victoria Palace of Government.

According to him, the bonus for the Prefect's institutions staff of 30 percent was eliminated, and the value of the pension point will be maintained at 1,442 lei in 2021, achieving saving of almost 9 billion lei in the state budget.

"The entry into force of Law 195/2020 on the status of railway staff is postponed until April 1, 2022. A necessary legal framework is established so that the remaining unspent amounts from the allocations for student transport facilities can also be used by universities in the coming years for the allocation of scholarships for students. The National Education Law is amended in the sense of establishing the right of students to benefit from a 50 percent reduced fare for means of transport and the repeal of the provisions regulating that students benefit from gratuities," specified Florin Citu.AGERPRES(RO - author: Daniel Florea, editor: Claudia Stanescu; EN - author: Simona Iacob, editor: Maria Voican)