Hubertus Heil causes irritation

Today, Heil’s party friend Olaf Scholz is the head of the Chancellery. And the Minister of Labor sees an opportunity for a new attempt at his project: “I am in favor of the fact that we draw fundamental consequences for the world of work from the corona-related, unplanned large-scale attempt to work from home,” Heil told the German Press Agency. The traffic light coalition will create “modern rules for mobile working in Germany” and a legal right to work from home.

Accordingly, employers should in future have to enable their employees to work from home if there are no operational reasons against it. “But if the employer cannot give any operational reasons, then the legal right to be able to use home office applies,” emphasized Heil. This contributes to a better work-life balance.

There is only one problem: Even the coalition agreement between the SPD, Greens and FDP does not contain any legal right to work from home. It only says: “Employees in suitable jobs are given the right to discuss mobile work and home office.” If employees express the wish to work from home, then employers have to talk to them about it.

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They can only contradict the wishes of the employees if operational issues conflict. “That means that a rejection must not be irrelevant or arbitrary,” it says in the coalition agreement.

Employers are already doing text exegesis

After Heil’s utterance, the dispute about the interpretation of the text begins. In parts of the coalition there is obviously “a mess between the party program and the coalition agreement,” said the chief executive of the Confederation of German Employers’ Associations (BDA), Steffen Kampeter. “Because the coalition agreement of the traffic light parties does not provide for the creation of a legal claim, but a right to be discussed when working from home.”

In its election manifesto, however, the SPD had promised a right to work from home. “Basically, employees should be able to work a five-day week on the move or in the home office for at least 24 days a year, if the activity allows,” it says. That is exactly the passage that Heil had already written in the autumn of 2020 in its draft law, which was then stopped by the then coalition partner Union.

It is unclear whether such a regulation would have a majority in the governing coalition. “The traffic light parties have agreed that everyone has the opportunity to request home office,” said the labor market spokesman for the Green parliamentary group and former Verdi boss Frank Bsirske the Handelsblatt.

Employers should only be able to object to the wishes of the employees if home office is not possible for operational reasons. “We Greens will work to ensure that this right is introduced quickly. We are thus strengthening the compatibility of family and work, reducing traffic and enabling more free time through less commuting, ”said Bsirske.

FDP insists on implementation of the coalition agreement

The liberal coalition partner is more cautious: According to the coalition agreement, the traffic light will create a modern framework for mobile working, said the First Parliamentary Managing Director of the FDP parliamentary group, Johannes Vogel, who had negotiated the labor and social affairs chapter.

The government will introduce a pragmatic right to debate, as it has been successfully implemented in the Netherlands for years. “So we leave the old discussion about unilateral legal claims behind us,” said Vogel. “We welcome the fact that Labor Minister Hubertus Heil is setting out on this important topic and that we are finally making progress after years of the GroKo standstill,” said the FDP politician. We will work with him to ensure that the agreed goals of the coalition agreement are achieved.

The chairman of the SME and Economic Union (MIT) and CDU member of the Bundestag Gitta Connemann urges the liberals to pay attention to compliance with the coalition agreement and not to go beyond it: “A legal claim à la Heil would be an economic stimulus program for labor courts,” Connemann told the Handelsblatt.

The plan for a legal right to work from home shows: “Minister Heil does not know everyday business life or he mistrusts the labor and collective bargaining parties.” Anyone who really wants to promote mobile working must provide the necessary framework. “To do this, the Minister of Labor must finally give up his resistance to a reform of the Working Hours Act,” demanded Connemann. Employees should be able to determine the times for their work themselves.

Due to the corona, employees are currently still required to work from home. According to a survey by the Ifo Institute, 27.9 percent of employees worked at least temporarily from home in December. In August it was 23.8 percent, a high was reached in March 2021 with 31.7 percent.

More: Corona test positive: do I have to work if I have no symptoms?

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