What do the parties in North Rhine-Westphalia say on work and social affairs?

The AfD calls full employment the best social policy and wants unemployed people trained in ways that fit what employers need. It plans a dedicated support program for older citizens so their expertise stays in the labor market.

The AfD wants as many people as possible to have work. Jobless people should learn what companies really need. There should be a special support program for older people. People who do not work without a good reason should be told to work.

The AfD wants stronger incentives for employers to hire people with disabilities at fair pay. Integration should begin as early as vocational training.

Many people with severe disabilities have no job. The AfD wants companies to hire them more often. Companies should get more incentives for this. The pay should be fair.

The AfD wants to limit Kindergeld (child benefit) for children living abroad to the level customary there. It sees today's full payment as an incentive to immigrate into the welfare system.

Germany also pays child benefit for children abroad. The AfD wants to change that. These children should only get the amount usual in their country. The AfD says people otherwise come just for the money.

The CDU wants as many businesses as possible to be covered by collective agreements and considers strong works councils and staff councils indispensable. In the platform's view, collective bargaining coverage ensures fair competition, peace in the workplace and good working conditions.

The CDU wants many companies to pay by collective agreement. That is a contract on pay and working hours. Works councils should be strong. No one may block the election of a works council.

The CDU wants to bring as many long-term unemployed people as possible into regular employment. Young people without work in particular are to find their way into working life by catching up on qualifications.

Some people have been out of work for years. The CDU wants to help them get a regular job. Young people above all should be able to catch up on qualifications. Simple programs should give them a steady daily routine.

The CDU wants to strengthen the state's occupational safety administration and have five percent of businesses inspected each year. Inspections are to focus on places with precarious employment. In the platform's view, exploitative working arrangements have no place in society.

The state should inspect companies more often. Each year, five out of a hundred companies should be checked. Inspectors should look mostly at insecure jobs. Workers should also get more advice.

The CDU wants to give people with disabilities more opportunities to participate, above all through training and work in the regular labor market. Inclusion companies are to receive more funding, and the state civil service is to lead by example in hiring.

People with disabilities should be able to take part everywhere. The CDU wants to get them more regular jobs. The state itself should hire more of them. More of them should be able to live on their own.

The CDU wants to reduce homelessness and child poverty and continue state programs for that purpose. Regarding the federal government's planned Bürgergeld (citizen's income), it wants to insist that support remains tied to recipients' cooperation. At the same time, standard benefit rates are to be adjusted to the higher cost of living.

The CDU wants to help people without a home. Poor children should also get more help. People who get money from the state should still have to do their part. The money should go up because food and energy cost more.

The CDU wants to reduce child poverty mainly by getting unemployed parents into jobs. It plans an agenda titled "No Child in Poverty – For Parents in Work." In the platform's view, children are poor when their parents have no work.

The CDU says children are poor when their parents have no job. So it wants to get parents into work. It wants to reach out to these parents and support them. It will pay special attention to single parents. The same goes for children with disabilities.

The FDP wants to strengthen tailored labor-market measures for people with disabilities, refugees and people with an immigrant background. People without a school diploma and the long-term unemployed should be able to enter and move up step by step. The platform calls access to the job market a central question of fairness.

The FDP wants to get more people into work. This applies to people with disabilities and to refugees. It also applies to people without a school diploma. Moving from a mini-job to a full-time job should pay off more.

The FDP wants counties and independent cities to be able to pay housing and heating costs for benefit recipients as a monthly flat rate. The state would use the options under federal law to the full for this. The platform sees it as a step toward a "liberal Bürgergeld" (citizen's income).

Some people get money from the state for rent and heating. The FDP wants cities and counties to be able to pay a fixed amount for this. The amount can differ from place to place. Cities and counties should decide this themselves.

The FDP wants to make the Working Hours Act more flexible and expand mobile work beyond the pandemic without constraining it through complicated home-office rules. Total working time and breaks would stay the same; only scheduling would become freer. This is meant to make work, family and leisure easier to combine.

The FDP wants freer rules on working hours. Nobody should work more than today. But people should be able to plan their hours more freely. Working from home should stay simple. That way work and family fit together better.

The FDP sees the shortage of skilled workers as the biggest challenge for the economy in the coming years. It wants to address it through education, integration, participation and targeted immigration of qualified people. More housing is to be created for apprentices.

Companies often cannot find enough skilled workers. The FDP wants to change that. It relies on good education. It also wants skilled workers to come from abroad. There should be more housing for apprentices.

The FDP wants to set up a "one-stop agency" as a central contact and guidance point for support services. People should find and use help more easily. In the party's view, the goal of state aid is for people to get back on their own feet.

The FDP wants one single place for all kinds of help. People in need should get advice there. Social workers should be easy to reach, for example in a neighborhood café. They then connect people with further help.

The FDP wants older people to take a greater part in society and plans a state-level contact person for seniors. Statutory maximum age limits are to be removed and the transition into retirement made more flexible. People should also be able to stay in their own homes as long as possible.

The FDP wants older people to be able to take part fully. The state should have one person for their concerns. Fixed age limits in laws should go. Older people should be able to live at home for a long time.

The FDP wants to integrate people with disabilities more fully into the job market, relying on workplace-based solutions and digital aids. Employers are to receive more information, and work assistance services are to be expanded.

The FDP wants to help people with disabilities at work. Companies should get more information. There should be more assistance in the workplace. Digital technology should help too.

The FDP wants more people with disabilities to use the personal budget. Instead of in-kind services they receive money and decide for themselves who provides their support.

People with disabilities can get money instead of ready-made help. This is called the personal budget. They then choose who helps them. The FDP wants more people to use this.

The Greens want to tie state subsidies to collectively agreed or equivalent working conditions and to a benefit for the climate. Workers from fossil fuel industries are to find new, comparable jobs and get support for retraining.

Climate protection creates many new jobs. This work should be paid fairly. Companies should get state money only if working conditions are good. Some people lose their jobs in coal. They should get help to learn new jobs.

The Greens want stricter enforcement of existing protections for truck drivers and want to hold large logistics companies responsible for their subcontractors. According to the program, the sector's growth has come at the expense of its workers.

Drivers and couriers often work under poor conditions. The Greens want better checks on rest-time rules. Big companies should also answer for their subcontractors. A subcontractor is a firm that does jobs for another firm.

The Greens want to expand working from home in the public sector and promote co-working spaces close to where people live, especially in rural areas. The program argues this makes work more flexible, saves space and cuts commuting. Employee co-determination is to be adapted to the new world of work.

Many people work from home today. The Greens want to make this possible more often in public service. Shared offices should be set up in rural areas. Then fewer people have to travel far to work.

The Greens want to tackle child poverty with a dedicated pact, arguing that an especially large number of minors in NRW are affected. Local prevention chains would be expanded statewide so that support on the ground is coordinated.

Many children in NRW are poor. The Greens want a pact against child poverty. Professionals in each town should work together better. That way children get the right help.

The Greens want to better reach teenagers and young adults living in poverty, since not all of them seek out government offices on their own. Street work, youth vocational assistance and youth residences would be expanded.

Poor young people need help that comes to them. The Greens want more street work in affected neighborhoods. There should be more job counseling. There should also be more residences for young people.

The Greens want to improve debt counseling and make it free of charge, partly in response to the fallout from the COVID crisis. The split in responsibility between municipalities and the state for debt and insolvency counseling would end.

Many people are in debt. The Greens want better counseling for them. The counseling should be free. Right now, towns and the state handle different parts. That should change.

The Greens want to support people with poor prospects in the regular job market through the so-called social labor market. Centers and counseling services for unemployed people would keep receiving state funding.

Some people have a hard time finding a job. The Greens want to help them with subsidized jobs. This is called the social labor market. Advice centers for jobless people will keep getting money.

The Greens aim for a labor market where people with and without disabilities can work together. Public contracts would go only to companies that meet their legal duty to employ severely disabled people, and sheltered workshops would pay more fairly.

People with disabilities have a harder time finding work. The Greens want to change that. Companies only get government contracts if they employ enough people with severe disabilities. Sheltered workshops should pay fair wages.

The Greens want to tie public contracts to social and environmental standards such as coverage by collective wage agreements. In addition, workplace safety enforcement would get more money and staff, and Sundays would generally stay work-free.

The state gives contracts to companies. The Greens want stricter rules for this. Companies should pay union-negotiated wages. Workplace safety checks will get more staff. Sunday should usually be a day off.

The Greens want work and personal circumstances to fit together better. To that end, they would promote lifetime working-time accounts, working from home, co-working spaces close to home, and part-time vocational training and university study.

Work should fit better with people's lives. The Greens want accounts that track working time over a whole career. Then people can work less in some years. For example, when they care for relatives. Working from home should also get easier.

The Greens want to implement the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities consistently in NRW. Accessibility is to be planned into construction from the start, and people with disabilities should gain easier access to work, volunteering and public administration.

The Greens want more participation for people with disabilities. New public buildings and homes should have no barriers. Public offices should give information in easy language and sign language. Companies should find it easier to hire people with disabilities.

The Greens distinguish between sex work and human trafficking for sexual exploitation, which they want to combat. Sex workers are to have safe working conditions, social security coverage and reliable counseling services.

The Greens separate sex work from human trafficking. They want to fight human trafficking. Sex workers should be able to work safely. They should have health insurance. Advice centers should help them, also if they want to quit.

The SPD wants employees to share more in company profits, through higher wages and through jointly controlled equity stakes. It also wants to extend co-determination in workplaces and companies to more topics. The party argues this makes the economy stronger.

The SPD wants workers to get more of their company's profit. This should happen through higher pay. It should also happen through shares that workers manage together. Workers should also have more say in their company.

The SPD wants to tie the state's public investments to fair pay by law. A Tariftreue- und Vergabegesetz (law on collective-wage compliance in public procurement) is meant to ensure the planned spending on climate and digitalization also benefits workers.

The state spends a lot of money on contracts. The SPD wants a law for this. The law should secure fair pay. Companies with state contracts should pay their workers fairly.

The SPD wants to add 1,000 positions to the workplace safety authority and equip it better. Violations are to be pursued more consistently, with every public prosecutor's office getting a prosecutor trained in workplace safety law. The party says this is to prevent exploitation.

The SPD wants to strengthen workplace safety. It plans 1,000 new jobs for this. The inspectors should get good equipment. Every prosecutor's office should have an expert on workplace safety.

The SPD wants to strengthen the Sozialer Arbeitsmarkt (publicly subsidized jobs for the long-term unemployed) in regions with high unemployment through an eight-million-euro state program. For people without a qualification, training is to take priority over job placement, and the inclusive labor market is to be expanded with state programs.

The SPD wants to give better help to people without work. The state should provide eight million euros for this. People without a diploma should be able to learn first. People with disabilities should find work more easily. Debt counseling should be expanded.

The SPD wants to give people of every age a right to a volunteer service placement. The voluntary social year and the voluntary ecological year are to get more state money, and volunteers are to ride buses and trains in the state for free.

The SPD wants everyone to be allowed to do volunteer service. Age should not matter. The state should give more money for this. Volunteers should ride buses and trains in North Rhine-Westphalia for free.

The SPD supports a nationwide Kindergrundsicherung (basic child benefit) and an appropriate increase in basic income support for adults. At the state level it wants to keep school materials free and fund advice centers for people in debt, consumers and the unemployed.

The SPD wants to fight poverty. It backs a basic child benefit for all of Germany. This is money for children. Adults with little money should also get more. School books should stay free. Advice centers should keep getting state money.

The SPD wants to fund opportunities for people in all life situations to meet one another. Loneliness and isolation are to be treated as a cross-departmental task of the state government.

Many people are lonely. The SPD wants to fund places and programs where people can meet. The whole state government should work on this issue. Senior officials should coordinate the work.

The SPD wants to help older people take part in life within their familiar surroundings. Municipalities are to get support, research on aging is to be strengthened, and senior citizens' councils expanded.

The SPD wants old people to live well in their neighborhood. Cities and towns should get help for this. Researchers should find out which local services are needed. Old people should have more of a say.

The SPD wants to strengthen the participation of people with disabilities and chronic illnesses in work and society. Counseling is to be better connected, assistants trained, and gaps in care closed.

The SPD wants to give people with disabilities better support. They should be able to work and take part everywhere. Counseling services should work together better. Helpers of people with disabilities should get training. People with long-term illness should also get more help.

The SPD wants employees in the social services sector to receive collectively agreed wages and good working conditions, whoever the provider is. When social services are commissioned, the cheapest provider should not automatically be chosen.

Many people work in social jobs. The SPD wants all of them to get union-negotiated pay. That is pay agreed between unions and employers. The cheapest provider should not always get the contract.