Beaches to be left without lifeguards during Thursday strike

Beaches across Cyprus are expected to be left without lifeguard coverage on Thursday as hourly-paid government workers stage a 24-hour nationwide strike, the interior ministry warned on Tuesday. The ministry said lifeguard services in all districts will be affected by the industrial action. It urged members of the public to exercise particular caution when swimming or taking part in sea activities at beaches where no lifeguard coverage will be available. Around 11,000 hourly-paid workers are expected to take part in Thursday’s strike. Some 6,500 are hourly-paid government employees, while a further 5,500 work for state health services organisation Okypy and school boards and are outside the government payroll. The finance ministry on Tuesday urged unions to reconsider the strike and return to negotiations, saying their demands would cost €50 million over the three-year collective agreement. It said the central point of disagreement was a demand for a general eight per cent pay increase. According to the ministry, the unions’ demands would cost €23 million annually from 2027 onwards, of which around €17 million a year would be attributable to the proposed eight per cent general increase. It argued that such an increase could not be considered in isolation, as any increase granted to the 6,500 hourly-paid government workers would in practice have to be extended to other categories of staff across the public and broader public sector. If extended across the public sector, the ministry said the general salary increase alone would cost more than €300 million annually, describing this as beyond the state’s financial capacity. The ministry expressed “regret and disappointment” over the unions’ decision to strike, saying five meetings had already taken place between social partners. It said the government had responded positively to the large majority of union demands, with the exception of requests for salary increases outside the established procedure. Salary increases, it added, are traditionally agreed through framework agreements between the finance minister and all unions rather than separately for one category of workers. The ministry also warned unions against staging a blanket strike without providing emergency staff for essential services. Thursday’s strike is part of an ongoing dispute between the government and unions over the renewal of the collective agreement covering hourly-paid government workers for the 2025-2027 period. Unions Oekdy-Sek, Pasyek-Peo and Dee-Kdokwo-Deok confirmed earlier this month that the strike would go ahead after a meeting of the Joint Labour Committee failed to produce an agreement. Responding to criticism that the government had failed to support workers on lower salaries, the finance ministry said only 68 of approximately 6,500 hourly-paid government employees currently receive the minimum wage. It said the median salary for hourly-paid government staff now stands at €2,113, compared with a median salary of €1,968 across Cyprus, and argued that wages for hourly-paid staff had risen by around 25 per cent in recent years through salary-scale upgrades, increases to starting salaries and public-sector pay increases.