Status: 04.03.2022 08:07
Works council elections started nationwide this week. What can these do? A look at the working conditions and wages at Amazon or Lieferando shows this.
During the Corona period, they benefited from the changed habits: delivery services for goods or food. While mail order companies like Amazon have been in business for some time, new delivery services for supermarket products such as Gorillas or Flink are also entering the market in other sectors. The number of employees at Lieferando, the industry leader for food orders in Germany, has grown significantly: According to the company, the number of drivers doubled last year from 5,000 to 10,000.
One of them is Michael Jokusch, who works for Lieferando in Stuttgart. “My office is the street and my company is the app,” says Jokusch, who likes to ride his bike and finds it “liberating”, despite possible control by the company’s algorithm on his smartphone app. He started at Foodora five years ago, wearing a pink outfit back then. Since the takeover by Lieferando, the large thermal backpack for food delivery has been orange.
Demanding work as a works councillor
Jokusch was one of the first works council members at the delivery service. The fact that it exists at all depends on committed employees. Because as soon as three of them get together, they can set up a works council if there are at least five employees who are entitled to vote.
Works council members are only released from a certain company size. At Jokusch, there are individual shifts that he can use for works council work. According to his own statements, during a normal eight-hour shift he usually covers 60 kilometers by bike and around 700 meters in altitude – a special feature in hilly Stuttgart. Demanding a surcharge for this brought him to the union at the time.
As a works council, they have already had successes, such as better planning of “work on call” through a say in the shift schedules, which now have to be set several days in advance. Jokusch and the other members of the works council are currently organizing the elections, which is not so easy in such a company with high fluctuation: in Stuttgart alone, 20 to 30 colleagues change jobs out of the approximately 250 drivers in the city every month.
Lieferando must provide work equipment
Jokusch’s employer Lieferando also recognizes that co-determination is important and contributes to good working conditions. In contrast to other delivery services, all drivers are now directly employed, since last year also for an unlimited period, as a Lieferando spokesman explains. In the spring, employees are to be provided with smartphones. In addition, the supply of bicycles is to be expanded. Lieferando is obliged to do this according to a judgment of the Federal Labor Court. Two drivers complained.
“A lot has happened there,” says Jürgen Reisig, who works as a union secretary for the Food, Enjoyment and Restaurants Union (NGG) in Stuttgart. The fact that bicycles and mobile phones now have to be provided is no comparison to the early days of the “riders”, who initially often had to use their own bikes and equipment. Especially in the winter months, they need warm and sometimes sporty clothing. “If you want to do something for better working conditions, you can’t do that without unions,” according to Reisig, the NGG made it clear to the Lieferando employees. Conversely, the members would receive support in the upcoming works council elections.
The NGG has also formed a collective bargaining commission. She approaches the delivery service with a demand for an hourly wage of 15 euros. Currently, drivers typically earn £11 an hour, plus tips. But the Lieferando spokesman does not want to say anything about a possible collective agreement. He points out that co-determination through works councils works and that the company has improved wages and equipment for drivers.
Amazon: No collective agreements in sight
At Amazon in Pforzheim there has been a works council for almost a decade, but no collective agreement either. There was a strike once, although not as intense as at other locations such as Bad Hersfeld or Leipzig. The union will generally “continue to fight and strike for a collective agreement,” says the union secretary in the ver.di district of Mittelbaden-Nordschwarzwald, Thomas Schark. The election lists for the works council elections are being prepared there. This is the only way to change something, says Schark, who is dissatisfied with the “to-the-minute monitoring” of employees, but definitely sees wage improvements.
Bernhard Franke, head of the trade department at ver.di in Baden-Württemberg, also attributes this to the works councils and the strikes at other locations. From his point of view, Amazon in Pforzheim is a retail company – but even if the company persists in treating its centers like logistics companies with worse working conditions, a collective agreement is necessary to regulate the pay of the employees.
The employees keep fighting
Amazon still doesn’t think this is necessary. “We prove every day that you can be a fair and responsible employer even without a collective agreement,” explains a spokesman. At Amazon, “all colleagues earned upwards of twelve euros from the first day”. In addition, it was announced that the “calculated starting wage” would be increased to at least 12.50 euros per hour. The company sees works councils positively, they have existed at some locations for more than 20 years. Amazon encourages “all employees to participate in works council elections”.
This is an important first step for works councils and trade unionists. But they actually want generally binding collective agreements for all employees – whether in logistics, delivery or delivery services. Will it ever come to that? To do this, people would have to organize themselves much more strongly in unions, says ver.di department head Franke. Lieferando driver and works council member Jokusch is also sticking to his goal of “getting a collective agreement in place. We would be the first in the industry, that would be an important signal.”