After the approval of the federal government, up to 2000 temporary workers are allowed to help at German airports. “Too late,” says Union Tourism spokeswoman Karliczek. Employers and Verdi also complain about the pace. Transport Minister Wissing counters.
In view of the staff shortages at German airports and the consequences for air traffic this summer, criticism of the measures taken by the federal government is growing. The clearance chaos has been apparent for a long time, said the tourism policy spokeswoman for the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, Anja Karliczek. The ministries have looked the other way for too long and even ignored warnings from trade unions and the travel industry. “Then why do the federal government and the ministries involved need more than five weeks to get approval for recruiting the 2,000 employees from Turkey?”
The government’s permission was issued on Thursday, with which ground service providers in particular can now recruit temporary workers from third countries, mainly from Turkey, on the apron. The general manager of the Federal Association of the German Aviation Industry (BDL), Matthias von Randow, said the reliability check for the new employees would take a few weeks.
The BDL boss made it clear that the approval, which is currently limited to three months, is only of limited help to many companies. Due to the long lead time, the ground service managers had already adjusted the demand downwards, so that fewer than the 2000 temporary workers originally planned would be needed.
The day before, the employers’ association of ground handling service providers in aviation (ABL) had announced that the companies had requested fewer than 1,000 helpers. “The situation was simply overslept, and now it’s simply too late to provide short-term relief,” said Özay Tarim, the aviation expert for the Verdi union, to the “Handelsblatt”. Relaxation for the travelers is therefore not in sight. “It turned out to be even worse than we anticipated.”
Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing rejected the criticism. “The government fulfilled the wishes of the economy within days,” he told the “Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung”. “Now it’s the companies’ turn. They have to hire the available foreign workers as soon as possible.” The state cannot force anyone to take up a specific job.
After negotiations with the federal government, no check is made as to whether German workers are available for the jobs. The safety checks by the state authorities remain in place. The federal government is considering making a comparable labor migration possible for other sectors with an acute shortage of workers – for example for the catering trade.
BDL General Manager von Randow focused on long-term solutions – in the recruitment of workers, but also in technology and official inspections. “We need an immigration facilitation law in Germany,” he said. Von Randow also called for faster processing of the official background check that all new employees have to undergo. In addition, in the long term, digitization will also help to make airport processes less complicated for passengers. “In the future, we want to significantly simplify passenger processes at airport locations with biometrics and digitization.” However, there is no short-term remedy for travelers in sight.
