The Minister of State for Entrepreneurship and Business Climate, Delina Ibrahimaj, stated on Saturday that the government is considering a gradual increase of pensions, to approve a sustainable scheme.

"An imprudent increase could lead to the collapse of public finances in 5-6 years. It led not only to the deterioration of the lives of pensioners but of all the conditions of the country's economy, which we have tried to consolidate with a lot of effort and solid steps, to come today and discuss pension increases," she said, ATA reported.

While the government is calculating in detail the new scheme regarding the pension increase, the opposition has made its position clear.

The Democratic Party has proposed that every elderly person, including those who have never paid insurance, will have a basic pension of at least Euro 200 and, on this basis, all other pensioners will have a pension increase of 20%.

But, Minister Ibrahimaj said that this is an electoral promise, which threatens and endangers the pension scheme. "It is very easy to make promises when you are in the opposition because you have no responsibility for keeping the promises. To increase the minimum pension to Euro 200 and then increase it by 20% every year, especially the second one is a very difficult promise to keep. 20% is too much," said Ibrahimaj.

She said that the pension scheme is not sustainable. "The budget is not mathematics, but the increase should be calculated, the indexation should be calculated, and here the pension scheme starts to explode from these reckless promises. So, a 20% annual increase in pensions and an increase in the base as well, would lead to a narrowing of the pension measures and I think it would lead to an explosion of the pension scheme,” she said.

The Minister of State for Entrepreneurship and Business Climate also spoke about the year-end bonus, which she assured will be higher and annual.

"The bonus is being considered to increase and be a policy for all the following years, and not as a bonus that is given one year and not the next," said the minister.