Czech senators leaving office get over CZK 8 million in severance

Senators whose terms are expiring will receive more than eight million crowns in severance pay between them. “The outgoing senators will receive the amount due on the day January 2027 salaries are paid, three months after their mandate ends,” said Senate spokeswoman Andrea Kubová.

The payment is calculated as five times the monthly salary if the politician has served at least four years in the upper house of parliament. A senator’s term lasts six years. The biggest sum goes to Jitka Seitlová of KDU-ČSL, a former Senate deputy chair: her monthly salary was 219,300 crowns, so her severance is 1,096,500 crowns. Miroslava Němcová (ODS), who headed the parliamentary delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, is also leaving the Senate and is entitled to 809,000 crowns. The largest group, eight senators, will each receive 692,000 crowns.

The severance is paid only if the politician does not take up another office covered by the law on pay for constitutional officials within three months. Ondřej Preuss, a constitutional law expert at Charles University’s Faculty of Law in Prague, explains the purpose of the payments: “The pay of representatives should lead them to act independently and be guided by their knowledge and conscience. They should not have to think that the moment their mandate ends they will need financial support. Among other things, severance pay is meant to guarantee exactly that.”

For comparison, after last October’s elections to the Chamber of Deputies, when almost half of the chamber was replaced, the outgoing deputies received a total of 57.5 million crowns. The money was shared among 92 former deputies who did not continue in office. The largest sum, almost 1.5 million crowns, went to Chamber of Deputies Speaker Markéta Pekarová Adamová (TOP 09), who did not run in the elections for health reasons.

Around Prague, based on reporting by novinky.cz