The heads of the social aid organizations responsible for administrating day care centers met today (Monday) at the office of the Ministry of Welfare and Social Services in order to try and promote immediate solutions to the severe crisis in their services and to prevent a strike from breaking out in the day care centers from tomorrow.
During the meeting, the heads of the organizations discovered that the Finance Ministry had reneged on previous agreements and decided to maintain a strike as planned from tomorrow for an unlimited period.
However after protracted negotiations involving Haim Katz, Minister of Welfare and Social Services, union leaders and the heads of the day care centers, an agreement was reached regarding the wages of the staff at the centers and the strike was averted.
Minister Katz responded by saying that "I welcome the agreement. The carers put their life and soul into their work and we are obliged to remunerate them accordingly. I intend to continue working to strengthen the system by allocating resources to build more day care centers and by reinforcing the centers with high quality new staff.
In response to claim of organizations that the Finance Ministry had reneged on agreements reached in May this year, officials in the Social Affairs Ministry , which has recently assumed responsibility for the day care centers , said that efforts to prevent the strike would continue and as reported, the efforts bore fruit Monday afternoon.