The federal government has agreed that the coronavirus bonus of up to €500, to be awarded to employees in sectors or companies which played an important role during the crisis, will take the form of meal cheques.
The list of shops and establishments where the cheques, which are part of a mediation proposal following the failure of negotiations on wage norm, will be expanded. The period of validity is yet to be defined, the office of Employment Minister Pierre-Yves Dermagne said on Thursday.
"At my suggestion, the Belgian government agreed to grant a coronavirus bonus of €500 to workers, to be negotiated by company or by sector," Dermagne said on Twitter.
Op mijn voorstel heeft de #begov afgesproken ✅ een #coronapremie van 500 euro toe te kennen aan werknemers, te negotiëren per bedrijf of per sector ✅ het #minimumloon, dat sinds 2008 ongewijzigd is, geleidelijk te verhogen. #IPA
— Pierre-Yves Dermagne (@PYDermagne) May 6, 2021
These companies or sectors will be able to grant their workers a bonus in the form of meal cheques in 2021, of which the amount will be defined either by the social partners in a joint committee or at the level of the company itself. The bonus itself will be subject to an employer's contribution of 16.5%.
Dermagne added that the government had agreed to "sufficiently" increase the minimum wage, "which has been unchanged since 2008."
The federal government wants the minimum wage to evolve at the same pace as the median wage, which will have increased by 20% between 2008 and 2028.
The Brussels Times
