Power utility PPC’s administration and Genop, the corporation’s main union group, have finalized a deal for a new collective labor agreement, covering a three-year period, which is expected to be signed on March 23.

The new agreement, worth 78 million euros, according to union sources, includes indirect pay rises for personnel through improvements to existing allowances that had remained unchanged for years as a result of the country’s bailout agreement commitments concerning public sector companies.

A daily food allowance for all PPC employees will return to a level of six euros per day, from a reduction to four euros per day by the previous administration. Resulting amounts from this two-euro reduction were injected into a company social security fund for workers.

Also, special allowances for personnel stationed at the company’s production units are being reinstated, retroactively as of January 1, 2019, under the new agreement. Resulting amounts will be offered to employees over three installments.

The revisions agreed to for the new three-year collective labor agreement will not be subject to reappraisal once the new deal has expired.

ETE, a union representing the utility’s technical staff, has reacted against the Genop-PPC deal, describing it as an “unacceptable” agreement of “submission”.

According to ETE, Genop failed to negotiate any payroll increases at a time when PPC is set to announce annual profit increases worth millions and the company’s executives are on extremely handsome remuneration packages.