SPD on work and social affairs

The SPD wants a new Tariftreue- und Vergabegesetz (law on wage compliance in public procurement) for Schleswig-Holstein. Public contracts and subsidies should go only to companies that treat and pay their workers properly. The party says this will prevent wage dumping.

The state gives contracts to companies. The SPD wants a new law for this. Only companies that pay fair wages should get contracts. A special minimum wage should apply to these contracts.

The minimum wage for public contracts is to be based on the lowest pay grade in the collective agreement for state employees (TV-L) and must not fall below it. The law is to include binding criteria for sustainable and social procurement as well as social standards. The SPD also wants to expand collective bargaining coverage and help the state's businesses implement the Supply Chain Act. The platform presents this as building on the federal minimum wage of 12 euros.

The SPD wants to manage industry's shift to climate neutrality so that workers do not end up unemployed. It relies on further training, retraining and transfer companies. It also backs unions and employers in reducing working hours.

Industry is supposed to become climate neutral. Jobs can be lost along the way. The SPD wants people to find new work. For this there should be training and retraining. The SPD also supports shorter working hours.

The state is to help workers and companies use existing legal options, such as the Qualifizierungschancengesetz (Skills Opportunities Act) and lifelong career counseling from the Federal Employment Agency. The SPD wants to support transfer companies as long as they enable a move into new jobs without weakening collectively agreed terms. The platform lists shorter working hours as part of good working conditions; it says these have mainly been achieved by unions and employers, whom the SPD pledges to support.

The SPD supports a right to work from home and to work remotely. Employers should provide suitable equipment, and occupational safety rules should apply fully at home.

The SPD wants a right to work from home. The employer should provide the needed equipment. Safety rules apply at home too. And people at home also get to stop working in the evening.

The platform points to the experience of the COVID-19 pandemic: simply sending employees home is not enough. Employers should provide the work environment and the tools. A clear end to the workday matters, especially when employees are also looking after children. Where companies have to maintain both an office desk and a home workplace, the SPD wants to avoid this double burden or offset it through tax relief.

The SPD wants to strengthen occupational safety and give the state's workplace safety agency more resources. The party wants Schleswig-Holstein to become the German state with the best working conditions.

An agency checks whether work is safe. The SPD wants to give this agency more resources. Nobody should be exploited at work. The state should have the best working conditions.

The platform says exploitative working conditions will not be tolerated. As a tool, it names more resources for the state's workplace safety agency. The aim is to rank first among the German states on working conditions.

The SPD wants to gradually bring outsourced units of the university hospital and other state services back under the collective agreement for state employees (TV-L). The aim is to reduce competitive pressure and improve working conditions.

Some state tasks are done by outsourced companies today. For example cleaning or security. Pay there is often different. The SPD wants to bring these areas back. Then the state's pay agreement applies again.

At the University Medical Center Schleswig-Holstein (UKSH), the return is to happen step by step and together with the unions. For the rest of the state service, the platform names service, cleaning and security as examples. The stated reasons are to upgrade social and health professions, raise wages and secure equal pay for women and men.

The SPD wants to enforce fair pay, regular contracts and effective workplace safety in agriculture, the food industry and retail. It plans to strengthen works councils, advise seasonal workers in their native language and expand inspections.

The SPD wants good jobs on farms and in food companies. Workers should get fair pay and proper contracts. Seasonal workers should learn about their rights in their own language. The state should check workplace safety better.

Staff councils and works councils in the food industry are to be strengthened, and setting them up is to be supported where needed. Mobile advice teams are to inform seasonal and contract workers about rights, duties and workplace safety. Advice services on EU freedom of movement for workers are to get permanent funding. Exploitation in retail and processing is to be stopped, and the situation of women in agriculture is to get special attention.

The SPD wants to create a new type of professional, the Vor-Ort-für-dich-Kraft ("on-site-for-you worker"), who offers health, nursing and social support from a single source in villages and neighborhoods. This person is to reach out to people actively because, in the platform's view, existing help often fails to reach people or arrives too late due to high barriers.

The SPD wants a new helper in every town and neighborhood. The helper visits people at home. The helper assists with health, care and social questions. This way people should get help faster.

Through preventive home visits, the worker is meant to help older people stay in familiar surroundings for a long time and also to support people with disabilities, people needing care, expectant parents, families, children and teenagers. The roles are to be filled by professionals already working in home nursing, social work and hospital nursing who receive further training in the other fields. They are to work in teams at the municipal or district-office level. Funding is to come from existing benefits across the different support systems. The SPD wants to develop the implementation plan with service providers and involve volunteers.

The SPD wants collective bargaining agreements in health and social services that are binding on all employers in the sector. All non-academic training programs in the social field are to be well paid. With this it aims to counter the shortage of skilled workers in nursing, child care, social work, midwifery and emergency services.

Nursing, child care and social work lack many skilled workers. The SPD wants wage agreements there to apply to everyone. A wage agreement sets pay and working conditions. Trainees in social jobs should also get good pay.

The platform relies on a workforce projection saying that social professions will show the largest demographic gap in 2035. Training pay is to be achieved through broader collective bargaining coverage and social partnership; the SPD calls on unions and employers to keep building sector-wide bargaining structures. The Vocational Training Act is to be strengthened in the social professions. Skilled workers with specialist further training are to receive equal pay for the same or comparable work, even if they come from different original professions.

The SPD wants a state action plan to strengthen municipalities that take targeted action against poverty. A report on poverty and wealth in the state is to be published in every legislative term. The focus is on poor children and poor older people.

The SPD wants to do more against poverty. There should be a plan for the whole state. Cities and towns should get help with this. Every few years a report should show how poor and rich people are. Poor children and poor older people matter most here.

The platform also sees fighting poverty as a global task that the state shares in. The SPD therefore wants to support the educational work of the Bündnis Eine Welt (One World Alliance) as well as partnerships of cities, schools, associations and businesses with countries of the Global South. Education for sustainable development is to rest on a state strategy involving several ministries.

The SPD wants to create a training guarantee: anyone who cannot find a company placement should be able to start the first year of training at a vocational school. An "Auszubildendenwerk" modeled on the student services organization is to support trainees, for example with affordable housing.

The SPD wants a guarantee for job training. If you find no place at a company, you can start at a vocational school. A new organization should help trainees. For example, it should offer cheap apartments for trainees.

The trainee services organization is to meet the same standards as the Studentenwerk (student services) and, among other things, provide trainee apartments in tight housing markets. For trainees with block instruction, the SPD wants to push the construction of dormitories; subsidies for housing costs are planned for state and federal vocational classes. The party is also examining whether to found a vocational university on the Hamburg model. Trainees are to get psychosocial counseling similar to what students have.

The SPD wants to work with the unions toward a collective bargaining agreement for student and research assistants. Pay for adjunct lecturers and student assistants, unchanged for years, is also to rise. The platform justifies this with social fairness at universities.

Many assistants work at universities. Their pay has stayed the same for years. The SPD wants them to get more money. There should be a collective agreement. That is a fixed contract on pay and working conditions.

According to the platform, only Berlin has such an agreement so far. Pay is to at least move closer to the general rise in costs. The SPD is also examining whether practical phases in teacher training degrees can be paid, because students often cannot keep their side jobs during that time.