Faced with chaos at its airports, Germany wants to hire foreign workers


The faster-than-expected restart of air traffic, after two years of Covid, has not been accompanied by the hiring of new agents. This lack of staff leads to delays and cancellations.

Germany will bring in foreign workers to end the chaos at its airports, which face understaffing and string of cancellations ahead of the holidays, ministers announced on Sunday. “Government plans to allow entry of urgently needed foreign personnel for temporary work in Germany“, explained the Minister of Labor, Hubertus Heil, in the Sunday edition of the daily Picture.

Employers must pay a conventional wage and provide decent accommodation for the temporary period“, continued the Social Democratic Minister, assuring that it was not a question of”social dumping“. The government did not specify how many foreigners would be invited to go and reinforce airport employees but, according to Picture, their number could reachfour digits“, that is to say at least a thousand.

Rapid recovery from the pandemic

As in many other European airports, the resumption of air traffic after two years of disruption linked to the Covid pandemic has not yet been accompanied by the hiring of new agents. Added to this situation are absences linked to the resumption of Covid-19 contamination. German airports currently lack around 7,200 professionals, according to a study by the Institute for German Economics. This lack leads to cascading flight cancellations, in particular by the German company Lufthansa, and long queues at security checks.

The Minister of the Interior, Nancy Faisait, for her part assured in Picture that there would beno concessions” in terms of security, specifying that these “auxiliaries from abroad (would be) hired, for example for baggage handling“. This situation leads to aviolent nuisancefor travellers, lamented Consumer Protection Minister Steffi Lemke (Greens), who said “expect airlines to fulfill their legal obligations and satisfy legitimate passenger requests quickly and without bureaucracy“. It thus recalls that airlines have an obligation to inform travelers of their rights and that passengers are entitled to compensation in the event of cancellation or last-minute delay.

Detlef Kayser, a member of the executive board of Lufthansa, however showered hopes in the daily Worldwarning that “unfortunately it will hardly be possible to achieve a short-term improvement now, i.e. in the summer“. “We expect the situation to normalize again in 2023“Said this Lufthansa official, who has canceled more than 2,000 flights in recent weeks.


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