Bavaria wants to campaign for more flexible working hours and enable daily working hours of more than ten hours. “We finally have to adapt the working time laws to the reality of people’s living environments,” said the Bavarian Minister of Labor and Social Affairs, Ulrike Scharf (CSU). Rheinische Post.
You need more flexibility to be able to reconcile family and work – that also increases the employment rate, she said. “A first important step is to allow working times of more than ten hours for individual working days of the week on a voluntary basis and in compliance with employee protection.”
From this Wednesday onwards, the labor and social affairs ministers of the federal states will be meeting in Perl in Saarland. For years there have been repeated calls from companies, but also from parties such as the FDP, to relax the Working Hours Act. According to the report, Bavaria justifies its demand with the lack of skilled workers in tourism, gastronomy and construction. Companies would have to be able to deploy staff more flexibly in order to be able to maintain offers.
So far, a maximum of ten hours of work per day is allowed – but only in exceptional cases. In addition, the statutory working time of eight hours a day on average may not be exceeded over a period of six months. This serves to protect employees.
The Bavarian left reacted immediately to Scharf’s initiative: “In the future, the state government should let Ms. Scharf head the Ministry for Employers,” said Left Party spokeswoman Adelheid Rupp. It is incomprehensible that at a time when employees are affected by great financial burdens and in some areas of activity, such as nursing, employees regularly go beyond their limits, such a proposal is made. Ms. Scharf does not appear to have any knowledge of the meaning and purpose of the Working Hours Act.