Germany’s coalition government has agreed to introduce minimum wage legislation for the entirepostal sector to avoid private firms substantially undercutting Deutsche Post’s pay levels. The law
would force the likes of TNT Post and PIN Group to pay higher salaries but the minimum wage islikely to be fixed below the lowest Deutsche Post pay rate.The law could come into force early next year, soon after full liberalisation of the domesticmail market on January 1. It follows months of lobbying by trade unions and the Social Democratsover the issue of alleged “pay-dumping” by private mail operators.
At a summit on August 20 to decide on major policy issues for the next two years, the rulingChristian Democrats and Social Democrats (SPD) decided to incorporate the postal sector into thelaw on minimum wage industries. This means that employers and unions can agree a collective dealthat the German employment minister would then declare to be valid for the entire industry,including companies that had not agreed to the collective deal.
The SPD declared that average pay at private firms was already 30%-60% below that of DeutschePost. Pressure would increase once the market was fully liberalised, and so it was necessary toensure “sensible” operating conditions, including the prevention of “wage-dumping”.
The agreement was welcomed by Verdi but the union demanded that the postal sector be coveredby the minimum wage legislation from January 1, 2008. It would now start talks with thenewly-founded “Postal Services Employers Association” to negotiate an agreement for the entirepostal sector, Verdi board member Andrea Kocsis declared. The union had already started separatetalks with TNT Post and PIN Group several months ago.
The Postal Services Employers Association was founded at the start of this week by DeutschePost and several private postal companies. The association’s 20 members have about 200,000 staffand thus account for about 80% of postal industry employees. But TNT Post and PIN Group are not yetmembers. The association’s chairman, Wolfhard Bender, said he was ready to negotiate an hourlyminimum wage of “between EUR 9 and EUR 10”.
