Labour, Pension System, Family Affairs and Social Policy Minister Josip Aladrovic said on Monday that government officials would propose at a meeting to be held with trade unions later in the day that most Sundays be non-working Sundays while some would be working days.

The meeting to be held with trade unions is aimed at determining unions’ expectations, the minister said.

“Our general view is that Sunday should be a non-working day but aside from that worldview… parameter, we must also take account of economic parameters and be aware of the situation we are in and try to make a compromise,” Aladrovic said after the signing of an agreement on the establishment of a national council for pensioners and elderly persons.

The minister noted that if the government and unions managed to bring their views closer, he expected “a reasonable solution to be reached by the end of the year.”

He said it was possible to find a solution also in the context of previous Constitutional Court rulings which abolished bans on Sunday trading.

Asked about doctors and nurses who have not been paid for overtime work, he said that the matter was not within his remit and therefore he could not comment on it but that “considering the government’s latest decisions, there should be no problems with payment”.

Asked about the problem of Brodotrogir dock workers who have not received their wages for two months, he said that the matter was being dealt with by the Economy Ministry and that he expected a more concrete solution to be found.

“There is the Agency for the Settlement of Workers’ Claims, and we will turn to it if necessary,” he said.

He described as tendentious President Zoran Milanovic’s statement that it was not clear to him why JANAF oil pipeline operator CEO Dragan Kovacevic and businessman Kreso Petek had not been arrested at the moment when Petek gave a HRK 1.96 million bribe to Kovacevic, when police had recordings of the event.

“That’s probably his own position. We believe in state institutions and believe they know what they are doing and that what they did made sense,” Aladrovic said.