Unified Pay Law, Promised by 31 October 2026, in the New Government's Programme

Designated Prime Minister Siegfried Mureșan has submitted to Parliament a governance programme that sets a new deadline for the unified pay legislation: 31 October 2026. The document states that the reform will eliminate inequalities within the public sector pay system without reducing employees' incomes; however, the section dedicated to this topic does not detail the specific mechanisms by which this objective will be achieved.

What the governance programme sets out

According to the text, the reform must be carried out "without pay inequalities, without income reductions, without new court proceedings, and with appeal to young professionals." However, what the new pay scales will look like and what impact they will have on each category of public sector employee has yet to be determined.

Trade unions are calling on a fully empowered government to resume negotiations and to analyse data separately for each occupational group before the draft legislation is finalised. Employee representatives are insisting that the new calculation formula must not lead to income reductions, including in sectors that rejected previously discussed versions of the reform.

The PNRR deadline missed

The adoption of this legislation was, in fact, a milestone committed to under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (PNRR), with an original deadline of 31 August 2026. The reform was tied to a sum of approximately 770 million euros, but political parties and trade unions failed to reach an agreement before the deadline expired. The European Commission indicated that it remains open to continuing dialogue with the Romanian authorities on meeting the reform's objectives.

According to government sources cited by Realitatea PLUS, adopting the law by the end of October could allow Romania to recover a portion of the funds associated with the reform, following discussions with the European Commission.

How much the reform could cost

Budgetary headroom remains one of the principal difficulties in the negotiations. Interim Labour Minister Dragoș Pîslaru stated in August that, after examining several options, the additional cost of the reform should be closer to 10 billion RON than to 12 billion RON. He attributed primary responsibility for the failure of negotiations to date to PSD — an accusation that represents his political position rather than a conclusion contained within the governance programme.

It remains to be seen whether the incoming Executive will secure Parliament's support and manage to resume consultations in time to meet the 31 October deadline. Until a concrete draft and the calculations for each public sector area are presented, the promise of eliminating inequalities without income reductions cannot be verified for every category of public sector employee.