According to Remix News, Germany’s left-wing government is planning to import thousands of foreign workers, mostly from Turkey, to fill jobs at Germany’s airports, where there is confusion over staff shortages.
The situation at German airports is quite tense and chaotic, with a shortage of 5 500 workers. This is partly the result of the Chinese virus pandemic, as many baggage handlers left their jobs during the pandemic and did not return. The solution of the traffic light coalition led by the Social Democrats is, of course, to import foreign labour, although critics of this decision point out that it would have been more sensible to employ local workers, or at least migrants already in Germany.
Problems at airports due to delays and congestion are becoming more and more acute in view of the summer and the tourist season. The Liberal Federal Minister for Transport, Volker Wissing, told the press that he hoped that “experts from abroad” would be brought in to solve the problem and that the problem would be solved.
German airports thus want to recruit thousands of foreign “guest workers” from Turkey and, among other countries, the Balkans, who would be given a three-month work permit. Negotiations are currently under way with the federal government, which approves of such a plan. However, a final decision has not yet been taken in coordination with the Ministry of Labour, the Ministry of the Interior and the Ministry of Transport.
The plan is similar to that of the post-World War II era, when Germany decided to import almost one million Turkish ‘guest workers’, who largely remained in Germany. At the same time, at that time, because of the war, there was a shortage of male labour, and at the same time Germany had almost no non-European migrants.
