Weimar (dpa/th) – According to IG Metall, there is progress in Thuringia in aligning working hours to West German levels. So far, agreements have been concluded in 20 companies that provide for the gradual introduction of the 35-hour week, the union announced on Tuesday at a district conference in Weimar. Such agreements exist, among others, at Carl Zeiss companies in Jena, at BMW Fahrzeugtechnik GmbH in Eisenach or companies of the Samag Group (Saalfeld).
Further examples are the companies Musashi in Leinefelde or Gestamp Griwe in Haynrode. At the optics and electronics company Zeiss in Jena, the collectively agreed weekly working time is to be reduced to 35 hours by October 2024. According to the information, around 2,700 employees would benefit from this.
There has been a rethinking of working conditions in Thuringia since 2021, explained IG Metall district manager Jörg Köhlinger. The debate about the 35-hour week, which employers used to be rather ideological in the past, seems to be over.
“Many of the practitioners in the companies have obviously recognized that they can only recruit skilled workers for their company with good collective agreements and working conditions,” said the trade unionist. A weekly working time of 38 hours – as previously practiced in Thuringia – compared to 35 hours in the western federal states represents a competitive disadvantage when recruiting skilled workers, said Köhlinger.
The gradual introduction of the 35-hour week is the goal of a collective agreement concluded in Thuringia in January 2022. In West Germany, employees in the metal and electrical industry have been working 35 hours a week for decades.
According to its own statements, IG Metall has more than 41,000 members in Thuringia. Around 20,000 employees work in companies that are subject to the collective agreement for the metal and electrical industry.
