Germany: Employment Minister wants to introduce sectoral minimum wage in the temporary sector

“Sprinkler rule.” Already named “Schlecker Lex,” the bill aims to avoid a new “Schlecker case.” In January, the public opinion learned that Schlecker, European leader in hardware stores, fired some of its permanent employees to later re-hire them as agency workers with wages about 50% lower (see our dispatch No. 100027). To prevent such abuses, the text wants to introduce the “sprinkler rule” (Drehtür-Regelung): businesses could keep re-hiring former employees (who worked for them for at least six months) as agency workers but only with equal pay. This rule would also cover apprentices hired at the end of their apprenticeship. The liberal party (FDP), allied with the Christian-democrats in power, said that this bill was a “good answer to the Schlecker issue.” However, there is another problem. Unlike the FDP, the conservative Minister also wants to introduce sectoral minimum wage, which the social partners have been requesting for a long time. According to the Tagesspiegel, the Employment Minister thinks that it is “necessary” because of the total opening of the labor market in 2011 to eastern European service providers and the resulting wage dumping risks. In concrete terms, the bill provides that the “tariff committee” (Tarifaufschuss) equally made up of employers and union representatives, should agree on minimum wage based on the existing collective agreements in the sector (see our dispatch No. 100216). This wage would then be subject to a “general obligation of declaration” (Allgemeinverbindlicherklärung). According to the Ministry’s experts, the time is right because the collective agreements signed by the key rival union confederations, DGB and CGB, almost provide for the same minimum wages.