Slovenian Prime Minister Borut Pahor told students on Friday that he could not live on his salary of 3,000 euros a month and had to dip into his savings to make ends meet.

Pahor was speaking at a conference on students' rights, at which students protested against government plans to limit their right to work and more than double the tax on their earnings to 29.5 percent from 14 percent.

"I'm a prime minister and I earn 3,002 euros (net) per month ... I cannot survive on that and I live from what I earned before," Pahor said.

"So you should know that you are not the only ones who are struggling from month to month -- so is the prime minister," he added.

Students held a mass demonstration against the plans in the centre of the capital Ljubljana last month.

Slovenia's average net wage was 967 euros ($1,164) per month in March, unemployment was 10.6 percent and the economy is struggling after a 7.8 percent fall in GDP last year, badly hit by the global crisis because of its dependency on exports.

"How does he think that 30,000 students whose parents are unemployed or on the brink of poverty make it through the month?" Katja Soba, president of the Slovenian Students' Association, said in a statement in response to Pahor's remarks. ($1=.8307 Euro)

Reuters