Before the federal-state meeting on migration policy, the municipal umbrella organizations are demanding more support from the federal government. It’s not just about more money – access to the labor market must also be simplified, the city council demands.
How can the integration of migrants succeed? There are also discussions about this four days before the so-called refugee summit by Chancellor Olaf Scholz and the heads of government of the federal states. Now the President of the Association of German Cities, Markus Lewe, has spoken out in favor of faster access to the labor market for refugees.
“I am in favor of refugees who are assigned to the municipalities being allowed to work immediately – regardless of their residence status,” said the mayor of Münster to the newspapers of the Funke media group. For this, the integration law must be changed.
recognition of professional qualifications
Lewe also sees a need for improvements when it comes to professional qualifications. The CDU politician demanded that the qualifications of refugees should be recognized in a much less bureaucratic manner. This is a “win-win situation for all sides, even if it is not a panacea for the shortage of skilled workers in Germany”.
As a rule, asylum seekers are only allowed to work in Germany after three months. War refugees from Ukraine do not have to go through an asylum procedure and receive a work permit directly with their residence permit.
Funding as an issue
At the refugee summit on May 10 in the Chancellery, the federal and state governments should not part “empty-handed,” warned the local politician from Münster. “We need reliable funding commitments and concrete results that noticeably relieve us when taking in refugees.” The admission of refugees and their integration must “finally be permanently financed”. The federal government must also get more involved, for example with its own real estate in which the refugees can be accommodated, Lewe demanded.
The German District Association is also appealing to the federal government to make more money available. “The counties urgently need a reliable perspective to limit the number of refugees, to intensify the repatriation efforts and for financing,” said the president of the district assembly, Reinhard Sager, the “Rheinische Post”.
County Council for Limiting Immigration
Sager criticized that too little is happening at the federal level in the open refugee issue. “We expect the federal government to do everything it can to significantly reduce the influx of refugees,” he said. In addition to limiting the number of immigrants, Sager demanded that people who have fled should be returned to their countries of origin.
The meeting on Wednesday should primarily deal with the division of tasks and burdens in the care of refugees between the federal and state governments. The number of refugees has risen significantly since the beginning of the year. Around 100,000 people have applied for asylum for the first time since the beginning of January. As reported by the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF), the authority counted 19,629 initial applications in April. According to the BAMF, 80,978 formal requests for protection were made between January and March. In 2022 as a whole, the Federal Office received 217,774 first-time asylum applications.