The chief negotiator for IG Metall in the north-west German steel industry, Knut Giesler, wants to go into the next bargaining round with the demand for the introduction of a four-day week with full wage compensation.
“We want to achieve real relief for the employees without them earning less as a result,” Giesler told the “Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung”. According to him, such a step would be a great advance for the quality of life and the health of the employees. In the north-west German steel industry with the states of North Rhine-Westphalia, Lower Saxony, Hesse and Bremen, the pilot agreement is usually achieved for the entire branch.
The details of the claim
The feedback from the steel workforce so far has been extremely positive, said Giesler. At the same time, he believes that the four-day week would make the steel industry more attractive to young people, who will be urgently needed in the coming years when the coal-based heavy industry is converted to green steel. At the same time, the four-day week is also a way of preventing the job losses that are to be expected as part of the green transformation of the steel industry.
According to the report, Giesler specifically envisages reducing the weekly working time from 35 to 32 hours with full wage compensation for the introduction of the four-day week in the steel industry. However, this is much easier to implement in administration and in two-shift operation than in three-shift operation.
According to the newspaper, IG Metall assumes that this reduction will take a long time, possibly several years – also so that employers are not overwhelmed when changing service and shift plans. “We need longer creep-in times here,” said Giesler.
