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Prime Minister Borut Pahor and Minister of Justice Aleš Zalar discuss issue of non-payment of social contributions

The Prime Minister of the Republic of Slovenia Borut Pahor today met with the Minister of Justice Aleš Zalar, with whom he discussed the issue of non-payment of social contributions and the Government's measures to address the issue.  After the meeting, Prime Minister Pahor said that the Government had responded adequately by deciding at the initial stage that workers should not suffer the consequences of non-payment or non-calculation of contributions, while at the second stage the Government would look for appropriate systematic solutions.

 

"This issue is a significant step on the path to the Government's objective to develop a more competitive and social state based on the rule of law, whereby in this case more emphasis is placed on the legal aspect", stressed the Prime Minister.  According to Mr Pahor, the economic crisis revealed to an even higher extent the scale of the problem existing for quite some time. The Minister of Justice Aleš Zalar noted that the data on the number of criminal complaints and charges "give a clear message to those employers who may be tempted to avoid the calculation or payment of social contributions that they take a serious risk in doing so, since their conduct will be penalised in criminal proceedings and they could even be imprisoned." Today, there is no dilemma regarding the question whether the current legislation considers non-payment of social contributions a criminal offence. "In short, these data prove that the Criminal Code appropriately qualifies such offences, that the State Prosecutor’s Office deals with them as a matter of priority and in an appropriate manner and that the Ministry may expect with regard to the number of the charged legal and natural persons the first court decisions on these matters in a relatively short period of time," pointed out the Minister.