As Austria celebrates the start of the new year, the country has also seen the arrival of a new government. Following the legislative elections of September last year, and after lengthy negotiations, the country’s conservative and green parties announced on January 1 2020 that they had reached an agreement to form a governing coalition. On the issue of labour, the 326-page government programme does not announce the abolition of the controversial '12-hour' law (see article n°10777), which was introduced by the previous government and has been heavily criticised by unions. Nonetheless a return to greater 'social partnership' is clear; the bulk of measures focus on training and preparing the economy for the digital and ecological transitions.
It was on the very first day of 2020 that Austria’s conservative party (ÖVP) and its green party (Die Grünen) announced that they had reached an agreement to lead the country’s next coalition government in Vienna. Given the result of September’s election, in which the ÖVP earned 37.46% of the vote and Die Grünen got 13.90%, eleven ministers of the new government are from the conservative party while four come from the latter. Christine Aschbacher, of the conservative party, has been named the
…Do you have information to share with us?