Romanian Central Bank (BNR) chief-economist Valentin Lazea says he does not agree to cut salaries by 25%. He proposes that public sector staff is given one week unpaid holiday every month, Romanian news agency Mediafax informs.

"As a solution, I can't see the reduction of all public sector salaries by 25%. I believe there must be a combination of redundancy, salary cuts and unpaid holidays", the BNR official says. He believes that this could avoid legal problems that might arise if the Government applies the announced measures.

He stresses that a compromise should be made not only for the salaries, but also for the child care support for mothers.

"Romania is a country that lives on debt. And by that I mean both the foreign debt, which grows from year to year by approximately 10 billions, and the public debt, which has gone up by 7% last year alone", Lazea says.

As for the way the authorities that managed the pensions, Lazea believes that "there are many who should return to the 4th grade".

"The problem with the pensioners is that they have been sold illusions during the electoral years of 2007-2008, meaning the 4th grade arithmetics law have been suspended. When you've got 4.5 million contributors to the pensions system, one mathematic rule will tell you that the pensioners cannot get more than 30% of the average salary. As such, when the Parliament decided for the pension point to be 45% of the average salary, it suspended the laws of arithmetics", Lazea declared.