Germany to start temporary foreign workers scheme
Germany plans to launch a temporary foreign workers scheme in order to offset acute staff shortages at the country's airports over the summer months, ministers have said.
The move would allow German airport service providers to recruit several thousand temporary workers from Turkey for several months from July, according to the Bild newspaper on Sunday.
The labour minister, Hubertus Heil, said his government plans to allow entry of urgently needed staff from abroad for temporary work in Germany. He said he wanted to exclude any form of social dumping and exploitation.
Heil said that employers would have to pay workers collectively agreed wages and provide them with accommodation.
Airports across Europe have been struggling to readjust due to demand for international travel to bounce back from a two-year Pandemic hiatus this summer.
According to a study done by the German Economic Institute IW, German airports were short of 7,200 ground staff and flight attendants after many workers left their jobs during the epidemic. Since then they have found work in other sectors, for example in rail companies or online retail.
In spite of Germany's short-time work benefit scheme designed to allow a quicker bounceback after a downturn, the number of people working in airport services dropped by 15% between 2018 -- 19 and 2020 -- 21.
According to government circles, Bild said that ministers were planning to meet a shortage of 2,000 to 3,000 staff with a four-figure number of temporary foreigners. A labour ministry spokeswoman said on Monday that no further details could be announced while talks were ongoing.
A spokesman for the interior ministry said temporary foreign workers would not be recruited to work in airport security screening, which requires longer training times and higher levels of security clearance, but requires more low-skilled roles such as baggage handling.
The interior minister, Nancy Faeser, told Bild that temporary workers from abroad can be used with baggage handling. Her security clearance took about two weeks to complete, and she said on Monday.
Bild used the term gastarbeiter or guest workers for the foreign staff the government was trying to recruit, a reference to the migrant labourers from Italy, Greece, Turkey and other countries who were trying to work in Germany's booming economy from the mid 1950s to early 1970s.
The term is considered old-fashioned because it seems to reject the possibility of migrant workers settling in and contributing to German society.
Over the weekend, long queues at D sseldorf and Cologne airports reported long lines at security gates, while the Hamburg airport was struggling to store luggage stranded on its premises. Major European air travel hubs such as Amsterdam Schiphol and London Heathrow have had to cancel hundreds of flights this year because they struggle to manage the flow of passengers and luggage due to staff shortages.
Germany s Lufthansa is cancelling 2,200 flights at Frankfurt and Munich airports in July and August, and the airline's chief operating officer, Detlef Kayser, told the newspaper Welt that he did not expect current shortages to be filled until 2023.