Czech Republic may renew practice of topping up pensions for Czechs who worked for Slovak firms

The Czech Republic may once again start topping up the pensions of Czechs who worked for Slovak firms prior to the split of Czechoslovakia and now have lower pensions. The Czech Republic started topping-up the pensions of approximately 10,000 citizens who fall into this category in 2008 but then stopped the practice in 2011 in reaction to an EU Court of Justice verdict which said it was discriminatory to people in other EU member states. The Czech Constitutional Court has since ruled that the EU court failed to take into account the specific conditions relating to the Czechoslovak divorce in 1993. An amendment to the law which would restore the practice of topping up pensions was approved by the Senate on Thursday and has yet to be signed by the president.