SaS: Government Shouldn't Interfere with Second Pillar and Open It

Bratislava, May 14 (TASR) - The government shouldn't interfere with the second pension pillar and open it up, and the second pillar shouldn't be a source of money needed for consolidation, said opposition MPs from the Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) party Marian Viskupic and Martina Bajo Holeckova in response to a statement by Labour, Social Affairs and the Family Minister Erik Tomas (Voice-SD), who admitted to discussing opening the second pillar. According to the minister, there's a group of people in this pillar who, if they remain in it, will have lower pensions than if they were only in the first pillar. "Three times in the past year I've pointed out that the government will look for money for consolidation in the second pillar, and Labour Minister Tomas claimed that I was scaring people. Unfortunately, it turns out today that I was right, and the minister has admitted to opening the second pillar. I'm pointing out that in this parliamentary term, Labour Minister Erik Tomas has already reduced contributions to the second pillar once, depriving working people of tens of thousands of euros and harming young people the most," said Bajo Holeckova. Viskupic pointed out that the governments of current Premier Robert Fico (Smer-SD) have opened the second pillar four times and have harmed almost two million savers who save in pension accounts for their own retirement. By repeatedly opening this pillar and convincing people of its disadvantages, the Smer-SD party has, according to him, gained more than €1 billion for the state budget and deprived working people who save in it of thousands of euros. Tomas has stated that the Labour Ministry doesn't want to touch people's savings, but to offer them the opportunity to freely decide whether they want to stay in the second pillar. "In 2015, the system started to produce the first seniors who receive a combined pension from both the first and second pillars. To date, we have 58,000 such seniors, which is already a decent sample of people to assess the effectiveness of the second pillar," he said, adding that 95 percent of them have had an average monthly pension of almost €50 less than if they had simply stayed in the first pillar. At the same time, 5 percent have had a higher combined pension from the first and second pillars, by an average of €14 a month. am/df