CDU on work and social affairs

The CDU wants to mobilize more workers within the state. Better childcare is meant to lower the part-time rate, unemployed people are to be able to gain qualifications, and people with disabilities and refugees are to find work more easily.

Bremen lacks skilled workers. The CDU wants better childcare. Then parents can work more, especially women. People without jobs should be able to earn new qualifications. Refugees should learn German quickly and be able to work.

According to the platform, it is mainly women who leave their jobs after starting a family or work part-time against their wishes; family and gender-equality measures are meant to change that. Unemployed people are to return to work via a so-called support ladder of public training programs aimed at formal qualifications and, where needed, employment programs. Refugees are to get language courses quickly and have their job skills recognized. The employment agency is to align its training goals more closely with regional shortages. In addition, apprenticeships that have been started should be completed, and university dropouts are to get advice on switching to vocational training.

The CDU rejects a mandatory levy on companies for a training fund and would abolish it if it is introduced. In the party's view there are enough apprenticeship places, and a levy would burden firms financially and bureaucratically without creating new places.

The CDU is against a training levy. That is money companies must pay into a fund for training. The CDU says there are enough training places. The levy only costs companies money and time.

The program points out that in the 2021/2022 training year, unfilled places exceeded unplaced applicants for the first time, by more than 300. It says Bremen's training rate and share of firms that train are above the national average and above Berlin and Hamburg. Instead, the CDU wants to approach and advise firms that are licensed to train.

The CDU wants to draw up a strategy against loneliness and link it to efforts against poverty. According to the platform, people of all generations are affected, but so far this has been recognized almost only among older people.

Many people are lonely. The CDU wants to change that. It wants to link help against loneliness with help against poverty. For example, there should be more low-cost lunch offers. Young and old people should help each other.

As a first step, the issue is to be studied for the state together with social science research institutions. Easily accessible projects are to be set up with social service providers and Bremen companies. Programs such as the "Seniorenlotse" (senior guide) are to be expanded and publicized together with the telephone counseling service and seniors' representatives. Neighborhood support structures are to grow, and community centers are to be used more. Tandem programs are to bring younger and older people together.

The CDU wants to replace the state government's 2007 plan for the elderly with a new "Masterplan Seniorenpolitik" (senior policy master plan) and give older people more say. Older people should be able to live self-determined, active, and dignified lives.

The CDU wants a new plan for older people. The old plan is from 2007. Seniors should help write the new plan. There should be a seniors' parliament in Bremen. Older people should be able to reach important places easily.

The master plan is to be drawn up together with seniors and to contain measures that can be checked. The CDU proposes a state law on seniors' participation and supports a seniors' parliament. Its stated priorities include barrier-free housing, relief for family caregivers, mobility, protection from crime, and an adequate pension. Educational and cultural offerings for older people are to be secured and expanded, with free access for people with small pensions. Routes to doctors, shops, and transit stops are to become shorter and easier.

The CDU names full employment as its goal and wants the state's labor market policy to focus more on getting people into jobs. The Beschäftigungspolitisches Aktionsprogramm (BAP, the state's employment action program) is to be reformed and every measure checked for its effect. In the program's view, clear goals and evaluations have been missing so far.

The CDU wants everyone to have a job. People who work should have more money than people who do not. The state has a program to help people find work. The CDU wants to change this program. It wants to check every measure: Does it really get people into work?

The program upholds the Lohnabstandsgebot, the principle that people in work should have more than those not working. It says Bürgergeld (citizen's income) must not become a step toward an unconditional basic income. The principle of support combined with demands is to remain the guiding idea, and individual case management is to be expanded. All support measures are to face strict performance checks from the start and be geared more toward educational potential and the needs of the regional economy. The CDU rejects what it calls mere occupational therapy.

The CDU wants to bring Bremen's poverty rate down from more than 28 percent to at least the national average of 16 percent. To do so, it plans a strategy across all departments focused on education, work and the economy, led by the Senate Chancellery.

Many people in Bremen are poor. The CDU wants to change that. Poverty should be no higher than in the rest of Germany. All departments should work together on this. The Senate Chancellery should lead the work.

Reporting on poverty and wealth is to be improved and supplemented with ongoing "social monitoring." Projects in the state program "Wohnen in Nachbarschaft (WiN)" are to be placed within a systematic concept. All measures will be reviewed, with people affected by poverty actively involved. Money is to be shifted to interventions with proven effects on the causes and consequences of poverty. In the program's view, earlier poverty conferences and reports failed to reverse the trend.

The CDU wants to launch a vocational training push and redirect employment support toward training with a formal qualification, continuing education and retraining. A "skills monitoring" system is to match existing skills with what businesses need.

The CDU wants to do more for job training. People without work should learn a trade or get more training. The state should check: What can people do? And what do companies need? The courses should fit these needs.

The role of the Jugendberufsagentur (youth employment agency) is to be redefined. The monitoring is meant to reveal skill gaps and align training courses with them. Education and further training measures should, where possible, prepare people for specific job openings, or at least for occupations with a lasting staff shortage in Bremen and Bremerhaven. Supply and demand are to be matched with technical support where needed.

The CDU wants to link the social affairs department more closely with other departments and introduce controlling for social measures. Ineffective measures are to be suspended and effective ones given more money. In the program's view, savings in the largest single budget are not antisocial.

The CDU wants to organize the social affairs office differently. It should work more closely with other offices. The state should check closely which kinds of help work. Help that does not work should stop. Good help should get more money.

Youth services and the youth welfare office are to cooperate more closely with the education department. The units for refugees, integration, family and participation are to be included early in planning by the education and economic departments, backed by joint committee meetings. Goals for measures are to be set in advance and evaluated later. Independent providers are to have less paperwork, and what remains is to be funded in an inflation-proof way. Providers are to get incentives to end ineffective projects themselves. Projects the CDU regards as justified only by party politics or ideology are to lose funding.

The CDU wants to support people in need individually and enable them to live self-determined lives. Case managers are to coordinate all state assistance, and support is to continue even after someone has been placed in a job. Open youth work is also to be strengthened.

The CDU wants to support people one by one. One fixed person should organize all help from the state. There should still be advice after someone starts a job. Companies should get benefits if they hire difficult cases. Youth centers should get more support.

The wishes and abilities of those affected are to be matched with the needs of society and business. Alongside case managers, the CDU wants to use technical assistance systems. Companies are to get incentives to take part in integrating more difficult cases into the labor market. On inclusion, the program relies on direct cooperation among administration, companies, schools and those affected to remove barriers. Youth clubs and youth centers are to be strengthened so young people can easily reach help. There are to be no "closed cases."