Does it have money? Hundreds of employees of the Electric Company in training in Lapland Israel today

At the taxpayer's expense:

hundreds of employees of the Electric Company are currently undergoing training in Lapland, Israel Hayom has learned.

The purpose of the trip is defined as training, but it is a vacation for about 5 days, with the participation of thousands of company employees - an "air train" to Lapland.

This, after just six months ago the company's employees participated in a training course in Dubai.

The "training programs" have been criticized for years for turning into vacations that the taxpayers co-finance, at least in a small part.

Lapland, photo: GettyImages

It should be noted that the phenomenon of company trips abroad in the public sector is not new and even relatively common, when the payment is usually made through various professional associations, and the employees pay for part or most of the trip from their own money and receive days off for this - when the distribution of funding between the employee and the company changes from place to place.

The electrical company's training courses that used to take place in Eilat and other places in Israel have been moved to Dubai and Lapland in recent years.

According to various sources, this is a training program that is financed from the funds of the workers' committee and the workers themselves, as well as participation from the company's management budget - this means that the vacation is partially financed at the expense of the taxpayers.

Hotels in Israel are expensive

In the past, when the vacations took place in Israel, an explanation was given that suggests that it is professional training and that staying in hotels in Israel contributes to the local economy.

Later, the members of the committee came to the conclusion that hotels in Israel are too expensive and that there is difficulty in finding enough rooms for a large number of company employees, and therefore an alternative model of training abroad was built.

One of the company's senior vice presidents previously objected to moving the training courses to Dubai and Finland, but finally gave in to the pressure and thus the training courses abroad were born in the electric company as well.

The cost to the company is apparently negligible, and yet, the question arises as to why the Electric Company, which is a government company, needs to hold training courses abroad.

Is there a connection to the rate increase?

No.

The cumulative increase of the electricity tariff by about 20% since January 2022 is explained by the spike in the price of coal last year that followed the war between Russia and Ukraine.

We note that the electricity tariff is expected to decrease in March by about 5% due to the tens of percent drop in the price of coal since the beginning of this year.

At the same time, the electricity tariff is determined according to the cost principle, so if the costs increase there is a possibility that they could eventually be rolled into a tariff.

That is, if the company becomes more efficient in management and salary expenses, this ultimately results in a tariff, and vice versa.

The big question is what is the participation rate of the management in these trips, this is of course alongside the question of the value of these trips, since it is a government company whose service rate has become more expensive.

It has nothing to do with the rate

The electricity company responded: "This is not about the use of public funds. Therefore, it has nothing to do with the electricity tariff either, and the explanation: First of all, it will be emphasized in a way that is not implied in two ways, the financing of the activities of the employees abroad, including seminars, is not related at all and mainly to the electricity tariff.

In accordance with collective labor agreements that have been used for decades, approved by all regulators, including the salary commissioner at the Ministry of Finance, many public sector employees are entitled to symbolic participation of their workplace, paying membership fees in professional associations, the activity, also in organizing conferences and seminars, within the Histadrut of the Workers, authorities Local, government companies and more.

As mentioned, they are not part of the electricity company but are legally incorporated separately and independently.

As a result, the association's activities, including conferences and trips abroad (for example, the trip to Lapland) are organized independently and separated from the electricity company, and indeed it comes entirely at the expense of the vacation days of the participating employees, and most of its cost is financed from the association's funds."

were we wrong

We will fix it!

If you found an error in the article, we would appreciate it if you shared it with us