Surcharge cost

The Supreme Court began to recalculate northern payments for the third time

The Supreme Court has been trying to sort out the payments of so-called northern bonuses for several years now. Last Friday, he postponed the consideration of the case of workers of the Segezha Pulp and Paper Mill (SPPM), who for two years have been trying to prove that they are underpaid, since the company's managers include northern bonuses in the minimum wage (minimum wage). Because of this, trade union activists representing the interests of SPPM workers are confident that plant workers do not receive full compensation. Money for work in northern conditions, according to trade union activists, should be paid above the minimum wage. Not only the financial situation of the Segezha plant workers, but also the interests of regional and federal authorities, who may have to change the payrolls of several million public sector employees at once, depend on the decision of the Supreme Court.

Apparently, precisely because the problem of northern allowances has long since moved from the category of “mathematical” and purely legal to the category of socio-political ones, the Supreme Court cannot in any way make a decision regarding the case of the workers of the Segezha Pulp and Paper Mill. The workers' lawsuits against the plant's management began in 2009. The hired employees were not satisfied that the amounts that were due to them as part of the northern allowances were included in the minimum wage established by the government of the Russian Federation. Since 2007, it has been 4,330 rubles. This amount is the main part of the average earnings at the plant, amounting to 5,830 rubles. According to the employees of the pulp and paper mill, since the increase in the minimum wage, they have received less than two to three thousand rubles a month only because the management of the enterprise included their bonuses for the north in the minimum salary.

The court in Segezha itself (Karelia), where the plant employees filed the first lawsuit, took the side of the workers and ruled that northern bonuses according to the Labor Code should be calculated without reference to the minimum wage, which in turn should not be the sum of “pure” money and bonuses. However, the Supreme Court of Karelia overturned the decision of the lower court and allowed the management of the pulp and paper mill to calculate salaries in its own way. When the case of the plant workers came to the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, the question of what principle was used to calculate the northern allowances was completely confused. Over the course of several months, at different levels, the Supreme Court changed its earlier decisions. For example, summarizing judicial practice in cases similar to those of the SCSC, on March 10, the Supreme Court ruled that the minimum wage should not include compensation payments and allowances for special working conditions. But on June 16, the Presidium of the Supreme Court canceled the previous decision without any explanation.

According to the General Labor Inspector of the FKS Sotsprof, Sergei Khramov, who represents the interests of SPPM workers in court, the Supreme Court’s deliberations are determined by the scale of the consequences that its decision may cause. “The financial situation of several million people in more than twenty regions of the country depends on how the matter turns out regarding the northern allowances,” stated Mr. Khramov in a conversation with a Vremya Novostei correspondent. The interpretation of the Labor Code in favor of enterprise employees, he continued, will force regional and federal authorities to increase wages for northerners, since officials and enterprise managers will no longer be able to save by including allowances in the minimum wage.

And this, according to Mr. Khramov, may not please the federal authorities. “Taking into account the policy of the Ministry of Finance, which is trying its best to reduce the state treasury deficit, one can predict the reaction of government officials to such a verdict of the Supreme Court,” continues the trade boss. That is why, according to him, the Supreme Court reversed its decision of March 10. At the same time, Sergei Khramov is confident that by postponing the consideration of the case on bonuses for the north to July 23, the Supreme Court left itself time to study the problem in more depth. “To further substantiate the position expressed on March 10 (when the Supreme Court took the side of the pulp and paper mill workers. - Ed. ),” hopes the trade union leader.

Vyacheslav KOZLOV