Fenprof’s leader, Mario Nogueira said, "An increase of 0.3% is to play with people, is to devalue their work. It's a government that disrespects those who work and their salaries”.

In the last decade, teachers have had their "salaries frozen", which has translated into a "reduction in purchasing power".

In the case of kindergarten teachers and primary and secondary school teachers, there has been a net reduction in purchasing power of 18.2%, according to figures put forward today by Mário Nogueira.

In higher education, teachers in polytechnic institutes lost 17.7% of their purchasing power, while among university teachers the reduction was 14.4%. The most serious case is that of researchers who "lost 32.3% of their purchasing power," he added.

The Finance Ministry explained that salary increases for the civil service next year will be based on "the inflation rate observed until November 2019, of 0.3% for all workers.

However, today, at the end of the last meeting of negotiations with the Civil Service unions, the Secretary of State for Public Administration explained that the Government "went as far as it could go", highlighting the effort of the executive to "return to normality".

"The Government's proposal went as far as it could go, taking into account that the unfreezing of careers, with payment at 100% of the resulting salary increases, has an impact on public accounts in terms of the payroll of 527 million euros," José Couto told journalists.

According to EY, a civil servant with a monthly income of one thousand euros will have, next year, an increase of less than two euros per month (26.25 euros more per year). A worker with a salary of 1,500 euros per month will have a monthly increase of 2.6 euros. Those who receive a salary of two thousand euros can expect a net increase of just over three euros per month.