A sign with glowing letters hangs in a hall in Kassel. “Order Future” is written there in red and white, and someone has dabbed large and small black circles around it. The originators may have meant otherwise, but it doesn’t take much imagination to interpret the circles as dark clouds. The future they are talking about here – for some it is red, bright, full of promise, for others it is dark and threatening.
The IG Bau has invited to the trade union day, it is, because of Corona, the first in five years. There is a busy buzzing and humming in the air, and this sentence is repeated over and over again: “Let’s get on with it.” For the future, that much is clear, the industrial union Bauen-Agrar-Umwelt, as it is called in full, will play a not unimportant role. She represents, among other things, the facade, track and road builders, the bricklayers and insulation workers, the roofers and the building material inspectors. And a number of other construction and craft trades that are so urgently needed at this time.
It is the people who should play a key role in implementing two of the big promises made by the federal government: First, there is the ecological turn towards climate neutrality, which is to be achieved by 2045. And secondly, the declared goal of finally getting the skyrocketing rental and real estate prices under control. A lot, a lot, has to be built and renovated for both: Tracks have to be laid and houses have to be insulated better. In addition, many new apartments are to be built (with the most climate-friendly materials possible) in order to equalize the market – 400,000 per year, the traffic light coalition has set itself the goal, of which 100,000 are social housing.
One might expect a union brimming with self-confidence to meet here. The shortage of skilled workers, which is particularly serious in the construction industry and in the trades, makes employees a rare commodity. Rare goods tend to have high value, but this is not always the case for construction workers. There are many employers – around 40 percent according to the unions – who do not pay according to collective agreements. The employees who do help and do not earn well, often only the minimum wage. And then, of course, there is the great war-related crisis, which has long been threatening even those who have a little more in their wallets.
“I’m afraid of winter,” says someone who actually earns quite a bit
For example the man with the gray ponytail who now stands up and goes to the microphone. For him, the future consists primarily of dark clouds. He works as a construction foreman, he says, as a foreman, he’s one of those with higher wages. But he says: “I’m afraid of winter.”
Robert Feiger, the head of the union who was confirmed in office in Kassel, has decided to do something about the fears of his people. He tries to instill more self-confidence in them. There is, on the one hand, the economic downturn in construction, the material is scarce, interest rates are high again. On the other hand, there is the gigantic gap in skilled workers, almost 200,000 positions were recently vacant, four times as many as twelve years ago. “You’re in demand,” Feiger calls into the hall. “If an employer treats you insidiously, then find another!” In order to keep the economy going, Feiger demands that the federal government should also boost the construction of social housing by reducing VAT to seven percent.
Of course, they know here that self-confidence doesn’t help everyone, even with full order books – perhaps for the skilled workers, but not for the simple workers who earn little. That is why the trade unionists are also relying on a promise by Chancellor Olaf Scholz from the third relief package: Employers are allowed to pay out up to 3,000 euros extra to their employees, free of tax and social security contributions, gross equal to net. IG-Bau board member Carsten Burckhardt, who has a good command of the militant trade union sound, phrases the friendly request to employers to use this instrument as follows: “Our employees have worked hard and they now have a lot of money flushed into their wallets!”
The big collective bargaining round is already over in the construction industry. This means that an important means of pressure is missing
However, it won’t be easy. Unlike IG Metall, for example, which is currently negotiating for the metal and electrical industry and could put pressure on employers with strikes, IG Bau has completed its major collective bargaining round in the main construction trades. Strikes are therefore not easily possible. This means that IG Bau is missing one of the possible levers to enforce the additional payment, at least according to the current status.
In any case, collective bargaining cannot cushion all the consequences of war and crisis. That is why the union is making a few loud demands on politicians that go beyond the relief that has been decided so far. Immediate aid of 500 euros is now needed for all employees, recipients of basic security, pensioners, trainees and students, says Feiger, as required by the German trade union federation. His boss Yasmin Fahimi, who has also come to Kassel, gives the emphasis. “We are also open to other suggestions. But then they have to come now!”
In addition, Feiger calls for better controls to ensure that employers actually pay the minimum wage, which will rise to twelve euros on October 1st. In agriculture, for example, according to a research institute, statistically speaking, an inspector visits a company every 90 years.
Feiger’s loudest demand relates to housing, after all, many of his people are also tenants. The federal government, he says, should get involved with the listed residential groups Vonovia and LEG and – via a blocking minority on the supervisory board – use its influence to lower rents. Whether that could work is controversial, if only because the federal government, as a shareholder in Post or Telekom, is itself striving for returns. Feiger, on the other hand, refers to the example of Volkswagen. There, the state of Lower Saxony is very successful in influencing the corporate strategy with a similar construct.
In the federal government, however, the proposal does not seem to trigger a storm of jubilation. Klara Geywitz (SPD), the federal building minister, also traveled to Kassel and brought along praise for the union, if only because, in addition to the construction, it also has the environment in its name. It’s “very farsighted,” says Geywitz. But she doesn’t say a word about the proposal for housing groups.