On 18 February, a pilot collective agreement has been agreed between the IG Metall union and the Gesamtmetall employers' association, covering 700,000 metal and electronics workers in the federal state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). According to IG Metall, the agreement will be an excellent instrument to bridge both the decrease in production and to avoid redundancies until mid-2012. It can be adopted by a voluntarily company agreement in companies which have been in the official short-time arrangement ("Kurzarbeit") for at least 12 months. When a company is in statutory short-time, redundancies are not allowed. From 1 May 2010 till 31 March 2011 the pay scales of the former agreement will be extended, and a lump sum of Euro 320 (Euro 120 for apprentices) has to be paid in two steps, on 1 May 2010 and on 1 December 2010. On 1 April 2011 wages will be increased by 2.7 %. The agreement on wages ends after 23 months, on 31 March 2012. Afterwards, it has been agreed that the NRW agreement will also be implemented in three other states, Niedersachsen, Baden-Württemberg and Bavaria.
English: message of EUCOBAN network of EMF / EFFAT / ETUF-TCL / EMCEF ;
http://www.icem.org/en/78-ICEM-InBrief/3636-German-Metalworkers-Employers.
German: http://www.igmetall.de/cps/rde/xchg/internet/style.xsl/view_3615.htm
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