FTTU participates in SSS at Sofia Municipality

On December 4, 2024, a meeting of the Council for Social Cooperation in Transport (CSCT) was held in Sofia Municipality.

Deputy Mayor for Transport, Eng. Iliyan Pavlov, Ivan Nikolov - Director of the "Transport" Directorate, as well as representatives of the Federation of Transport and Trade Unions (FTTU): Vladimir Tsvetanov - Chairman of "Sofia Public Transport", Emilia Ivanova - Chairman of "Sofia Electric Transport", and fellow chairpersons from the FTTU structures attended the meeting.

The main topics of the meeting were:

The ongoing negligence by the state and the lack of payment of compensations for preferential travel cards to Sofia Municipality and a large part of other municipalities across the country, against the backdrop of rising costs and the critical need to stabilize the "Transport" sector, require the state to immediately settle its debts to prevent the risk of cities being left without public transport.

The results of the ongoing campaign for recruiting drivers and service personnel were reported.

Since the beginning of the campaign, there have been over 7 million views of the advertisement, but only 546 applications, which ultimately resulted in 60 job applications, and only in Sofia Electric Transport (tram drivers).

FTTU insists that the development plan for newly hired employees, aiming to ensure long-term employment and career development, including training, qualifications, and motivation-enhancing measures, be set in motion.

In this regard, the federation will prepare and send its proposals to Sofia Municipality.

The activities of the committees on working conditions and the need for companies to provide up-to-date information on their work were reviewed.

FTTU continues to believe that companies do not heed the demands of workers participating in these committees.

Night transport schedules were discussed.

The federation insists on reconsidering the need to provide night transport throughout the entire week, especially under conditions of severely insufficient staffing.

The necessity of expanding the network of bus lanes, installing surveillance cameras, and strengthening controls by the Ministry of Internal Affairs for violators was discussed.

Upcoming public tenders for:

Rolling stock; Spare parts; Work clothing; Improving the material base in depots and garages were discussed.

Unions and Sofia Municipality will start negotiations in January with the aim of preparing a new agreement on social cooperation and a salary increase, for which FTTU will advocate.