It is high time there was a national agreement on an across-the-board pay freeze, employers’ leader Bernard Wientjes says in a letter in Thursday’s Trouw.

It would show tremendous responsibility if ‘the crippled FNV trade unions’ could join forces with other groups and go for a solidarity agreement in which ‘government salaries, social security benefits and private sector wages would be frozen,’ the VNO-NCW chairman said.
That would not only mean the pain would be shared, but it would also be a major financial benefit. In addition, it would ‘make it possible to move to the necessary reforms and not end up in an unproductive battle of words and short-term savings,’ he said.
The FNV said last September it would target a 2.5% rise in this year’s pay negotiations, largely to offset the effect of inflation.
Federation chairwoman Agnes Jongerius said on Thursday a pay and benefit freeze would damage the economy. ‘If people have less in their pockets, which is what a pay freeze means, then they stop spending money en masse,’ Jongerius said.