While the Minister for Employment and Social Affairs, Andrea Nahles gets set this autumn for a draft law on a framework for services contracts as well as an amendment to the current legislation covering working time, both employers federations and unions continue to argue over the issues with each party seeking to promote their own proposals. The employers federations would love to do away with the ‘8-hour working day’ as well as promoting flexible retirement, and on their side the IG Metall union has just published a study indicating social dumping practices being carried out by German companies via excessive recourse to service contracts. In recognition of current developments the union is also demanding changes to the laws on co-management in order to better cater for the increased level of individualization in work as well as the defense of the rights of ‘isolated workers’.
l of individualization in work as well as the defense of the rights of ‘isolated workers’.
An explosion in the number of services contracts. In an IG Metall study published at the start of September and carried out from a survey of 4,000 works councils the union highlights a practice widespread among German companies: cost reductions thanks to increased recourse to outsourcing via services contracts and ‘loans’ of salaried employees to subcontracting companies. The study also shows that these pr
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