We Demand Justice, Not Just a Pay Rise!

WE DEMAND JUSTICE, NOT JUST A PAY RISE!

To the Public

We respond with great anger and deep disappointment to the across-the-board pay rise proposal of up to 30,000 TL for senior managers, auditors and specialists — submitted to the Turkish Grand National Assembly Budget and Planning Committee by AKP and MHP deputies and duly adopted.

This proposal is a regulation that deepens injustice and inequality among public workers, reinforces the division of society into "losers" and "winners," and has no ethical or moral foundation.

The Institutionalisation of Inequality and Class Division

The greatest contradiction of this regulation is that it grants an additional payment — inconceivable to the vast majority of workers — to an already high-earning bureaucratic and managerial class whose average salary, with this raise, is expected to approach 130,000 TL.

While Directors General, Presidents, Provincial Police Chiefs and even staff serving in official vehicles are included in the scope of this astronomical raise, thousands of workers who toil in the fields of culture and art have once again been ignored.

This regulation is not merely a financial decision; it is also the declaration of a political choice as to "whose labour has value and whose does not." At a time when cultural workers are struggling at or just above the poverty line in orchestras, on stages, in museums, in libraries and in technical workshops, granting senior managers an additional 30,000 TL is neither ethical nor conscientious.

As Kültür Emek-Sen, in accordance with our principle of fully independent democratic class-based unionism, we stand against the economic policies and tax injustices that capital and management impose on the backs of working people. This pay rise is the most concrete proof that state resources are being channelled exclusively to the privileged circles the state itself has designated.

The Situation for Artists:

While artists and technical personnel — opera, ballet, choir and theatre artists employed under the Ministry of Culture and Tourism — have been fighting for years over supplementary indicators, personal rights and pay injustice, managers have chosen the path of granting themselves a raise.

As artists, technical staff and administrative personnel, we carry out the public cultural service under the most difficult conditions — sometimes with understaffed rosters, sometimes subject to flexible, precarious and arbitrary performance assessments. While many of our members await the fulfilment of basic demands such as improving the personal rights of contracted artists and the 6,400 supplementary indicator, this news of a "sweeping luxury raise" from the ruling circles has reopened our wounds.

This situation clearly reveals how little the political establishment values culture and the arts: art is seen either as a prop for display or as the first line-item expenditure to be sacrificed in the budget. While the artist struggles for survival below the poverty line, the state official will live in comfort on a 130,000 TL salary atop our cultural wealth.

Kültür Emek-Sen's Clear Position: We Will Not Step Back

As Kültür Emekçileri Sendikası, in contrast to party-aligned cronyist unionism, we embrace independent and combative trade unionism. We once again declare that we will not remain silent in the face of such unilateral decisions by the government that disregard workers.

We believe that this 30,000 TL raise must be distributed equally and across the board to all public workers, without any discrimination. If the aim is to protect civil servants who are being crushed by inflation, that protection must be extended not only to senior bureaucrats but to all public employees.

Demands:

• —The 30,000 TL Across-the-Board Additional Payment Must Be Extended to All Public Workers Without Discrimination! The scope of this unjust raise must be broadened so that artists, technical staff and administrative workers — the essential elements of cultural services — are immediately included in this entitlement.

• —The Personal Rights of Cultural and Arts Workers Must Be Improved! The discrimination against contracted personnel must end, beginning with our artists' demand for the 6,400 supplementary indicator, and a fair wage policy must be implemented.

• —Tax Injustice Must End! Our salaries, already eroded by inflation and then clawed back through high tax brackets, must be protected by the immediate reform of tax policies that favour managers and capital.

This raise is an indicator not only of how money is distributed, but also of how power and authority are allocated. As cultural workers, we will continue our struggle through legitimate and active means until we achieve a dignified life and receive fair compensation for our labour.

Long Live Our Organised Struggle! Long Live Kültür Emek-Sen!