Deputies Changed Their Minds: Extra Pay for Working on Holidays Will Remain as Before 0 9

Earlier, the commission approved other changes: a 50% extra pay for overtime work and 75% for overtime on holidays. After that, a representative of the Latvian Free Trade Union stated that the deputies had essentially overlooked the problem: the wording suggested that there would be no extra pay for work on a holiday if it was not considered overtime. The deputies promised to correct this by the second reading — and now the commission has made a clarification.

At the same time, unions continue to criticize plans to reduce overtime pay. According to calculations by LBAS, a worker with an average salary will earn approximately 7.55 euros gross less for each overtime hour after the reduction of the allowance. Unions also note that a German worker earns, on average, 261 euros more for eight regular hours and one overtime hour than a Latvian worker.

Against the reduction of overtime pay, 18,593 signatures were collected on the Manabalss.lv portal in three days.

The amendments proposed by the Ministry of Welfare and supported by the government in August 2025 also provide for the possibility of a four-day work week, the establishment in collective agreements of half the pay for overtime, as well as the right of a worker to terminate the contract if the salary is delayed for more than two weeks.

The main dispute between employer organizations and unions concerns the amount of pay for overtime work: employers want to reduce it from 100% to 50%, while unions oppose this. Although the Saeima of Latvia has already conceptually supported the changes, discussions on this issue continue.