concerning the failure of Romania to transpose, and to communicate the transposition measures for, Directive (EU) 2023/970 on pay transparency, the deadline for which expired on 7 June 2026
SINDICATUL POLIȚIȘTILOR DIN ROMÂNIA „DIAMANTUL”
(Police Officers’ Union of Romania „Diamantul”)
CIF 19544011 · Registered office: Str. Corbița nr. 39, Sector 5, București
Correspondence: Str. Ienăchiță Văcărescu nr. 17A, Sector 4, București
Tel. 0213152826 · petitii.sprdiamantul@yahoo.com · www.sprd.ro
No 103/26.06.2026
TO
EUROPEAN COMMISSION
Secretariat-General
1049 Brussels, Belgium
COMPLAINT
concerning the failure of Romania to transpose, and to communicate the transposition measures for, Directive (EU) 2023/970 on pay transparency, the deadline for which expired on 7 June 2026
The reference version of this complaint is the Romanian one — the language in which the union drafts its documents and communicates with its members and with the public it keeps informed. English is fully accessible to us; we have nonetheless chosen Romanian for our readers, attaching an English translation as a courtesy to facilitate reading by the Commission’s services. We would be grateful to receive any correspondence in Romanian.
1. Identity and contact details of the complainant
Sindicatul Polițiștilor din România „Diamantul” (Police Officers’ Union of Romania „Diamantul”), a legal person governed by private law, with its registered office at Str. Corbița nr. 39, Sector 5, București, fiscal identification code 19544011, correspondence address at Str. Ienăchiță Văcărescu nr. 17A, Sector 4, București, telephone 0213152826, e-mail petitii.sprdiamantul@yahoo.com, legally represented by its President, Vitalie Josanu.
2. The complainant’s interest and how it is affected
The union represents approximately 4,000 police officers and is the third-largest trade union in the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Directive (EU) 2023/970 establishes pay-transparency rights for the benefit of workers, including personnel in the defence, public order and national security system. Romania’s failure to transpose the directive deprives this category of the exercise of those rights and maintains a situation in which the criteria, structure and method of calculating remuneration remain, in the case of the personnel of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, withheld from transparency through classification.
3. Member State and authorities concerned
The Member State concerned is Romania. The obligation to transpose lies with the State, through the Government; the ministry coordinating transposition is the Ministry of Labour and Social Solidarity, the directive requiring amendment of labour legislation and of the equal-opportunities framework. The factual context also involves the General Secretariat of the Government and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, as regards the continued classification of the remuneration rules.
4. The European Union law that has been breached
Directive (EU) 2023/970 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 10 May 2023 to strengthen the application of the principle of equal pay for equal work or work of equal value between men and women through pay transparency and enforcement mechanisms. Under Article 34 of the directive, Member States are to bring into force the laws, regulations and administrative provisions necessary to comply with the directive by 7 June 2026, and are to immediately communicate the text of those measures to the Commission.
Under the third paragraph of Article 288 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, a directive is binding, as to the result to be achieved, upon each Member State to which it is addressed, transposition within the deadline being mandatory. Failure to communicate transposition measures itself constitutes a failure to fulfil obligations. The transposition deadline is a maximum time-limit, not a justification for delay; during that period the State is bound by the obligation not to compromise the result prescribed by the directive (the principle of sincere cooperation — Article 4(3) of the Treaty on European Union).
5. Description of the breach
On 7 June 2026 the transposition deadline laid down in Article 34 of the directive expired. As at the date of this complaint, Romania has neither adopted nor communicated to the Commission any transposition measures, and there is no sign of compliance. Moreover, the factual situation is the opposite of the result prescribed by the directive: the mechanism for setting and calculating the salary rights of the personnel of the Ministry of Internal Affairs is kept entirely classified, through Government Decision No 0610/2017 and Orders of the Minister of Internal Affairs No S/2166/2017 and No S/7/2018, none of which is published in the Official Gazette (Monitorul Oficial).
The requests for declassification addressed to the national authorities were rejected, giving rise to an institutional deadlock: the General Secretariat of the Government declined to initiate declassification (asserting that the Government „is not the issuing authority” and that a „mere request” by the union „cannot constitute a legal basis”), while the Ministry of Internal Affairs declined the Government decisions as „exceeding its competence”. The result is the continued opacity of the very remuneration criteria whose transparency the directive requires.
6. Steps taken at national level
The complainant has taken repeated steps at national level: requests for declassification and communication addressed to the Government, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Ministry of National Defence (resulting in the refusals annexed hereto); a request addressed to a Member of Parliament with a view to tabling interpellations to members of the Government; and a referral addressed to the People’s Advocate (Ombudsman) and to the specialised committees of the Chamber of Deputies (the Committee for the Investigation of Abuses, Corruption and for Petitions, and the Committee for Defence, Public Order and National Security).
The obligation to transpose a directive lies, however, by its very nature, exclusively with the State; there is no national remedy by which a private party could make good the State’s legislative omission. For that reason, the intervention of the European Commission, as guardian of the Treaties, is necessary.
7. Requests
1. To register and examine this complaint concerning Romania’s failure to transpose Directive (EU) 2023/970.
2. To open, if it considers the complaint well founded, the infringement procedure provided for in Article 258 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union against Romania, for the failure to transpose and to communicate the transposition measures within the deadline.
3. To inform the complainant of the registration number of the complaint and of the measures taken.
Confidentiality
The complainant does not request that its identity be kept confidential and consents to its disclosure to the national authorities concerned.
Annexes
In support of the complaint, we annex an index and copies of the institutional replies received by the union, originating from seven institutions — six refusals to declassify and six communications under a restricted-access regime — as follows:
Refusals to declassify:
– General Secretariat of the Government — letter No 15C/322,323/rp/2026 of 24.06.2026 (Government Decisions No 0663/1999, 070/2004, 0154/2010, 0292/2011 and 0610/2017);
– General Secretariat of the Government — letter No 15C/401/p/2026 of 12.06.2026 (Government Decision No 0610/2017);
– General Secretariat of the Government — letter No 15C/76/rp/2025 of 21.02.2025 (Government Decision No 0610/2017);
– Ministry of Internal Affairs — General Financial Directorate — letter No 489697 of 26.06.2026 (Rules of organisation and functioning of the General Financial Directorate);
– Ministry of Internal Affairs — General Financial Directorate — letter No 485094/2025 (Government Decisions No 0610/2017 and No 070/2004; Orders of the Minister of Internal Affairs No S/2166/2017, No S/7/2018 and No S/629/2008; Rules of organisation and functioning);
– Special Telecommunications Service — letter No 60299 of 25.06.2026 (Government Decision No 0610/2017);
Communications under a restricted-access regime:
– Ministry of National Defence — letters No 15c and No 16c of 11.03.2025 (in reply to requests No 15 and No 16 of 17.02.2025), concerning Government Decision No 0610/2017;
– General Police Directorate of the Municipality of Bucharest — letter No 47077/CG of 08.10.2019 (Government Decision No 0610/2017);
– Ministry of Internal Affairs — Directorate for Information and Public Relations — letter No 1442495 of 05.08.2019 (Government Decision No 0610/2017);
– Ministry of Internal Affairs — Directorate for Information and Public Relations — letter No 5406673 of 27.11.2018 (Order of the Minister of Internal Affairs No S/7/2018);
– Mehedinți County Police Inspectorate — letter No 79128 of 22.11.2018 (Orders of the Minister of Internal Affairs No S/2166/2017 and No S/7/2018).
SINDICATUL POLIȚIȘTILOR DIN ROMÂNIA „DIAMANTUL”
through its legal representative
President
Vitalie Josanu