During the press conference, the Chairman of EAPL, Member of the European Parliament Valdemar Tomaševski was focusing on social policy, stressing that one of the most important goals of the state is to guarantee the social justice. V. Tomaševski emphasized the necessity of increasing salaries for people who receive a minimum wage and has presented a number of concrete ways on how to achieve this.

According to the EAPL chairman, the minimum wage should not be subject to income tax, so that people receiving the minimum monthly wage would have about 150 litas extra in their wallets. When speaking about a particular size of a minimum monthly salary, V. Tomaševski thinks that it should be equal to the half of the average monthly wage (about 1,200 litas).
'Social justice can be realized by reducing social exclusion, in other words - wages should be increased not for the high-income officials, but for those getiing the lowest incomes. Only EAPL has voted against the salary increase for the Members of the Seimas,' reminded Tomaševski.

The chairwoman of EAPL faction in the Seimas Rita Tamašunienė presented the main objectives of the faction and the work that was already done. The member of Seimas has recalled that last year members of the Seimas successfully managed to increase funding for local roads by 5 per cent starting this year and by another 5 per cent from 2015.

R. Tamašunienė reminded about the increase of the salaries for employees of culture domain since the middle of this year. 25 million of litas were allocated for this purpose. The chairwoman of the faction has mentioned one more important achievement of EAPL - the increase of an income part paid to farmers by the state.

'We speak for socially fair income increase for citizens. We do not think it was good time to increase the salaries of officials receiving the highest incomes. Our position on this issue is clearly reflected by the fact of how we had voted, however we are glad that justice will reach at least one group of citizens. (...) Starting from this year, mothers who have properly brought up at least five children will receive state salaries,' said Tamašunienė.

The chairwoman of the EAPL faction has also announced that at the end of February a resolution on the compensation of pensions reduced by former conservative-liberal coalition should be adopted.

When asked what time would be the most appropriate for Lithuania to introduce euro, V. Tomaševski stressed that Lithuania should not rush with the introduction of the single European currency. According to the politician, one of the reasons why our country should not rush is the unstable economic situation in the euro zone. The chairman stated that any hasty decision on this issue should not be taken, because it can cause that Lithuanian citizens would become sponsors of southern European countries; the politician has advised to wait for a more stable situation in the euro zone - especially that the rate is attached to the euro exchange rate.

There was also a discussion on the recent situation in the country that occurred in the area of national minorities' rights and the results of the abolition of the Law on National Minorities.

'It is regrettable that in our country, after 23 years of independence, human rights are still being violated, people are persecuted for the use of their mother tongue, even in those places where national minorities make up more than 80 per cent of residents. It is not acceptable, it is outrageous. It is very good that our statesmen i.e. Deputy Speaker of the Seimas Gediminas Kirkilas yesterday (9 Jan) and Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevičius today (10 Jan) have condemned the verdict of the court on bilingual signs in the Šalčininkai district,' said the chairman of EAPL, deploring over the fact that courts are involved in political disputes, what is currently doing the conservative Audrius Skaistys, Government representative in the district of Vilnius by submitting national minorities to court.

L24.lt recalls the judgement of the Vilnius Regional Court of 23rd December 2013, when the Director of the Administration of the Šalčininkai district self-government Boleslav Daškevič was fined 43 400 litas (12 569 euros) or 100 litas (about 30 euros) for each day of delay in the execution of a court judgement on bilingual street names in Šalčininkai district.

According to the EAPL chairman such an unprecedented judgement would have not occurred if the Law on National Minorities had been in force.

Deputy Speaker of the Seimas Jaroslav Narkevič recalled that the novelization of the Law on National Minorities, which cemented the right to use the mother tongue along with the Lithuanian language in public life, was adopted on 29th January 1991 as an unambiguous assessment of the position of Poles in Lithuania expressed in defence of the independence of Lithuania.

Quoting the statement of the EAPL parliamentary faction of 9th January 2014, J. Narkevič has stated that surprising was the fact that the Law on National Minorities - the legal act which regulates functioning of national minorities in the life of the country - was adopted and then abolished by the same political force 20 years later.
'Polish community in Lithuania, striving for the independence of the Republic of Lithuania, expressed solidarity with the entire Lithuanian nation. Aware of the responsibility for the fate of independent Lithuania, it had taken a common front in defence of its independence, hoping that the reborn state would be build on the foundations of the basic principles of democracy, 'said the Deputy Speaker of the Seimas by recalling facts of regaining independence.

At the end of the press conference the chairman of the Electoral Action of Poles declared that EAPL will continue to consistently fulfil its program assumptions and the situation emerged in the area of national minority rights in the country will be resolved quickly, as national minorities in Lithuania are determined to win the battle for their rights.