Fundamental rights related to social partners

Participants described social dialogue as lively; the authorities added that collective bargaining was given full autonomy, while the trade unions suggested that the benefits of collective bargaining deserved to be better promoted. Statistics from 2016 showed that more than 50% of companies (representing some 3/4 of workers) were covered by collective bargaining⁽¹⁾. These figures had been decreasing over the past few years and they were higher in the public sector than in the private sector. Social partners could seek legal protection, and legal requirements were the same across all federal states. They pointed out, however, that although the legal framework was good, in practice problematic issues had been observed, such as the following:

• differences persisted between areas in former East Germany and former West Germany;
• large companies were concentrated in the west;
• small companies did not have strong trade unions;
• the unemployment rate was higher in the east and workers were more reluctant to join trade unions there, as they feared that it might put their jobs at risk;
• 30 years after reunification, workers in the east still earned less than workers in the west, which might be one of the causes of the rising social and political discontent in the east, partly resulting in an increase in extreme right-wing movements;
• gender equality, as reflected in wages, was better in former East Germany;

Overall, trade unions had seen a decrease in their membership since reunification.

Participants discussed the challenges linked to the COVID-19 pandemic. They agreed that cooperation between social partners remained good. Social partners had called for the implementation of measures to mitigate the negative impact of the crisis, namely shorter working hours, thanks to which the pandemic was not affecting the labour market as heavily as it might have. In the public sector, those workers who had to take care of their children or older family members because of the COVID-19 measures were able to be temporarily released from their duties. However, the social partners had not been involved in designing the measures from the outset and the situation differed from one federal state to another. One participant from Saxony noted that the borders with the Czech Republic and Poland had been closed overnight without any prior consultation with the social partners, and employees had not been able to get to work.

During the 2015 – 2016 migration crisis, the social partners had been very vocal and participants praised the cooperation between them in managing this crisis. They pointed out a number of measures put in place following their initiatives, such as language courses and vocational training for refugees, as well as projects facilitating refugees' integration into the labour market. As a result, half of the refugees had been employed, proving that the involvement of the social partners since the beginning of the crisis had borne fruit.

Social partners were open in their opposition to any expression of extremism. Trade unions ran projects aimed at helping people to recognise elements of extremism in order to combat them. During the migration crisis, trade unions were promoting an open society and adopting a clear stance against any kind of discrimination. In this regard, the participants mentioned a Diversity Charter whose objective was to protect the identity of each individual, to which more and more companies were becoming signatories. One participant mentioned that a specific parliamentary committee had been put in place in order to tackle issues such as discrimination against sexual and religious minorities at the workplace.
Social partners were involved in designing the measures, which were supported by the relevant parliamentary committee.

(1) https://ilostat.ilo.org/topics/collective-bargaining/