Grüne on migration and integration

The Greens want people who have fled war and persecution to be able to settle in Berlin for good. Berlin should advocate a migration and asylum policy that the platform calls humanitarian and reasonable. Human rights are to be the benchmark.

Some people flee from war or persecution. The Greens want these people to find a new home in Berlin. Human rights should guide this policy.

The platform declares solidarity with people in Ukraine, the Middle East, Sudan, Syria, and other war zones. Refugees should be given a new home in Berlin. The Greens justify this with responsibility arising from history and Berlin's role as a city of freedom. Berlin should also oppose right-wing extremism, antisemitism, and racism, and fight discrimination in public agencies, education, and the housing and job markets.

The Greens want to recruit international skilled workers and graduates, especially from the tech sector. The party has in mind people looking for jobs elsewhere because of tighter US visa rules. A program is to support them in settling in Berlin.

Berlin needs more skilled workers. The Greens want to bring well-trained people from abroad. Many now find it hard to get a US visa. A program should help them get started in Berlin. Their degrees should be recognized more easily.

The program is also aimed at people returning to Berlin. The party wants an active welcome and integration policy that simplifies recognition of qualifications and speeds up access to the job market. As advantages in the competition for workers it names culture, clubs, universities, affordable housing and workspace, and neighborhood life.

The Greens want to press at the federal level for asylum seekers to be allowed to work from their first day. Family members of skilled workers are to be able to enter without proving language skills beforehand and learn German afterward.

Asylum seekers should be allowed to work right away. The Greens want to push for this at the federal level. Skilled workers should be able to bring their family at once. The family does not have to pass a language test first. They learn German after arrival in free courses.

The platform argues that all immigrants bring abilities, even if language skills or training are still missing. In its view, those allowed to come with their family are more likely to stay and work in the city. Language skills are to be acquired after arrival, with free courses, enough time to learn and accompanying support. This is meant to keep families from being separated.

The Greens want trainees and skilled workers from abroad to be recruited through vetted, fair and safe procedures. The platform intends to take action against questionable practices by private placement agencies and against exploitation and human trafficking.

Berlin recruits skilled workers and trainees from abroad. The Greens want fair rules for this. Private agencies should not take advantage of anyone. Trainees from abroad should get the same pay. They should learn about their rights early and in their own language.

The platform welcomes coordinated projects for training and recruitment abroad, such as the planned training center of the IHK Berlin (chamber of commerce) in the partner city of Windhoek. Trainees are to receive equivalent pay at home and abroad. The platform voices concern over reports of trainees from non-EU countries who drop out and can no longer be reached. Safe placement channels are to be set up together with the federal government, the states, the federal employment agency, unions and chambers. Multilingual information on social media is meant to tell the target group early about regular procedures and their rights.

The Greens want to expand psychological and psychosocial support for refugees and make it easy to access. The platform argues that many of them have lived through war, violence or persecution and that mental health is a precondition for participation, education and integration.

Many refugees have lived through war and violence. The Greens want to give them more mental health support. The support should be easy to get. It should be offered in several languages.

The plan calls for multilingual and culturally sensitive services, especially for children and teenagers. According to the platform, mental health should be considered from the very start. In addition, counseling centers for people with special protection needs are to receive permanent funding, and medical care is to be trauma-informed and free of discrimination. Berlin is also to remain in the "Solidarity Cities" network.

The Greens want to open the way into work, vocational training and qualification for refugees from the start. Work permits are to be issued faster and foreign vocational qualifications recognized more quickly, because the platform sees employment as a precondition for self-determination and social security.

Refugees should be able to work or start training quickly. The Greens want less red tape for this. Degrees from other countries should be accepted faster. Companies should get help when they hire refugees.

A task force called "Anerkennung" (recognition) is to speed up the recognition of foreign vocational qualifications. The plan includes multilingual information, practical language and bridging courses, and qualification programs. Companies that employ or train refugees are to receive targeted support, as is cooperation among businesses, chambers and civil society groups. At the federal level, the Greens want to end the requirement that the Federal Employment Agency approve jobs for people whose asylum cases are still pending.

The Greens reject the payment card for refugees planned by the Berlin Senate because, in the platform's view, it discriminates against them and limits their self-determination. Instead, benefits are to be paid out without red tape, and everyone should be able to get a bank account. At the federal level, the party wants to abolish the Asylbewerberleistungsgesetz (Asylum Seekers' Benefits Act).

The Berlin government plans a payment card for refugees. The Greens are against it. They think the card is unfair. Refugees should simply get their money paid out. Everyone should be able to have a bank account.

A "Basiskonto" (basic bank account) is to be open to everyone, whatever their residence status. The platform treats health and social security as human rights that also apply to people without valid papers, and it rejects cutting benefits as a sanction. Children are to get into school right away, and separate welcome classes are to be only temporary. Refugees are to have access to education, health care, work and participation regardless of status.

The Greens want to house refugees primarily in their own apartments and otherwise in smaller shelters across all districts instead of large facilities. Citing the Tegel site, the platform says such facilities did not meet people's needs. A housing law is to set minimum standards.

Refugees should live in their own apartments if possible. If not, they should live in small shelters. The Greens do not want very large shelters anymore. A new law should set rules for good shelters.

Cooperation between districts and state-owned housing companies, such as the "Wohnen statt MUF" project, is to be strengthened, and specialist offices are to improve access to the housing market. Refugees with long-term residence status or a Duldung (tolerated stay) are to be eligible for a WBS, the certificate needed for subsidized housing. A social housing-placement law is to set minimum standards for shelters for refugees and homeless people. Also planned are specialized shelters for particularly vulnerable groups, an arrival center for initial care, and a Senate commission on housing that coordinates sites and infrastructure such as daycare and school places with the districts. The State Office for Refugee Affairs is to get more staff and better working conditions.

The Greens want to develop Berlin's Landesamt für Einwanderung (State Office for Immigration, LEA) into a service-oriented agency. Applications are to be filed digitally and processed quickly, because the platform says delays can cost people their job or their home.

The State Office for Immigration decides on residence papers. The Greens want the office to work faster and be friendlier. People should be able to apply online. It should be easier to get an appointment.

A digital application system is to cover every type of residence permit and its renewal. Appointment booking is to become more reliable, and the office is to be strengthened so that it works lawfully and transparently. The ombuds office at the LEA is to return and be given participation rights. Counseling is to be independent and available in several languages. The platform notes that the office is responsible for about 700,000 people in Berlin.

The Greens want to apply the new rules of the Common European Asylum System (CEAS) in Berlin in a way that upholds human rights. Independent monitoring is to prevent refugee protection from being weakened further during implementation.

The EU has agreed on new rules for asylum. The Greens want to apply these rules humanely in Berlin. An independent body should check this. The police should not stop people because of how they look.

In the screening procedure, qualified specialists who are not part of the security agencies are to assess whether someone is especially vulnerable. According to the platform, checks by Berlin police inside the country must not result in racial profiling. The monitoring is to involve civil society closely and cover both the screening procedures in Tegel and the border procedures at BER airport. The Greens commit to fair, individual asylum procedures and reject models such as the Rwanda model.

The Greens want to allow deportations only in exceptional cases and to end deportations to crisis and conflict regions. They reject detention pending deportation, the separation of families, and the concept of safe third countries and safe countries of origin. Anyone found to have no right to stay should leave promptly, preferably voluntarily.

The Greens want to deport people only rarely. Nobody should be sent to war zones. Nobody should be locked up for this. Families should stay together. People with no right to stay should leave, ideally by choice.

As examples of regions to which deportations should stop, the platform names Afghanistan, Syria and Iran. The Greens oppose detention pending deportation, especially for children. During pre-training programs, vocational training or university studies, the whole family is to be protected from deportation, and an insecure status should not block training, studies or a job contract. Berlin's authorities are to respect church asylum. At the same time, the platform states that people with no right of residence and no obstacles to deportation must leave quickly once all legal remedies are exhausted.

The Greens want unaccompanied minor refugees to have an independent representative from the day they arrive. The child's best interests are to take priority at all times, and the young people are to live in facilities with trained educational staff.

Some children and teenagers flee without their parents. The Greens want them to get a representative right away. This person helps them with legal matters. The children should live in youth welfare homes.

Each representative is to look after no more than 30 minors, represent them legally and support them in daily life. The minors are to be placed in youth welfare or clearing facilities staffed by people with educational training. To that end, the specialist offices of the Berlin network for particularly vulnerable refugees are to be reinforced and given secure funding.

The Greens want to restart Berlin's state admission program for refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan and expand the federal humanitarian admission programs. Family reunification is to become possible again; the platform calls it a humanitarian minimum.

Berlin should again take in refugees from Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan. Germany as a whole should also take in more people in need. Families of refugees should be allowed to join them again. The Greens also want to take in people fleeing climate disasters.

The federal programs are to be expanded, for example for people from Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq and Gaza. Berlin is to use its own leeway and take in people from UN programs. A new admission route is to be created for people affected by climate disasters or humanitarian emergencies. Together with other states and municipalities willing to take people in, the Greens want to strengthen a solidarity-based European asylum policy and oppose tightening at the federal level.

The Greens want to give financial support to civilian sea rescue organizations in the Mediterranean. The platform argues that thousands of people drown there every year while fleeing and that the federal government has stopped its funding.

Many people drown in the Mediterranean Sea while fleeing. Private groups rescue people from the sea. The Greens want to give these groups money. In the Bundesrat they want to vote to protect the rescuers.

In the Bundesrat, the chamber of the German states, the Greens intend to use their votes to protect civilian sea rescue and the basic rights of people who are fleeing. The platform accuses the coastal states and the EU border agency Frontex of human rights violations. It criticizes what it describes as the criminalization and obstruction of sea rescue.

The Greens want refugee children and teens to get stable housing quickly and be admitted to daycare and school. Where possible, they should not live in shared shelters. Volunteer guardianships for unaccompanied minors would receive funding.

Refugee children should get a safe home quickly. They should not live in large shelters if possible. They should start daycare and school soon. Some children arrive without parents. The party wants more volunteer guardians for them. A guardian looks after the child's rights.

According to the platform, refugee children and teens need security in order to settle in. That includes stable housing and a quick place in daycare and school. Volunteer guardians for unaccompanied minors would receive financial support. A campaign is meant to recruit more volunteers for this role.

The Greens want to hire research staff with expert knowledge of countries of origin at the administrative court. The platform argues that wrong asylum decisions can have severe and irreversible consequences for those affected. The party regards the right to asylum and the protection of human rights as inviolable.

Courts decide whether a person gets asylum. The Greens want to hire experts at the court for this. These experts know the situation in the home countries well. They help the judges. This should lead to fewer wrong decisions.

The new staff would contribute knowledge about the politics, society and culture of the countries of origin. They would systematically prepare the country information sources for the judges. According to the platform, wrong decisions can mean renewed persecution, violence or danger to life for those affected. Independent and diverse expertise is therefore needed as a basis.