In the debate about more home offices in the fight against the corona pandemic, the pressure on the economy is increasing. Both Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD) and CSU boss Markus Söder announced talks with companies to create more opportunities for employees to work from home. However, the economy rejects calls for a home office obligation.

On Monday, Heil urged companies to assign employees to home office during the Corona crisis grant. “Arbitrarily refusing home office would be irresponsible now,” he told the broadcaster NDR Info. He will reaffirm his appeal to companies to enable work from home on Tuesday in a conference with the HR directors of large companies.

Where home offices are not possible Hygiene requirements must be strictly adhered to, said Heil. Otherwise he cannot rule out a standstill in production either. The deputy leader of the SPD parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Katja Mast, affirmed: “Now is not the time to think about a physical return to the office. Where home office is possible, that is now the trend.”

Exploit the potential of home office Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Söder also asked companies to offer more home office opportunities for employees. He also brought concrete targets into play for employers in the Free State. Presumably on Wednesday he wants to talk about it at a home office summit with business and trade unions.

First of all, one must consider how the potential for home office that exists could be better exploited – so far it has been not yet sufficiently the case. “That has to be fundamentally improved,” demanded Söder. If that doesn’t work, you might have to think about “other measures”.

No right to home office Im extended lockdown has taken off the debate about business responsibility in the fight against the coronavirus. Green parliamentary leader Katrin Göring-Eckardt called for the economy to be more focused on when fighting the pandemic. The federal and state governments have taken tough measures in retail, culture and schools. For large areas of the economy, however, there are hardly any binding rules.

In the latest federal and state resolutions, it was said that employers were “urgently asked to create home office opportunities”. There is no regulation. A draft law by Labor Minister Heil provides that employees should have the right to discuss a wish for regular mobile work with their employer. An originally envisaged right to work from home is no longer planned – the Union is against it.

Rules for home office in Corona times Unions are now bringing the legal right to work from home back into play. “We demand a legal right to home office – at least where it is feasible,” said DGB boss Reiner Hoffmann of the Süddeutsche Zeitung . “It cannot be that employers decide on this alone,” he added. It must also be ensured that “no one can be forced into the home office,” says the head of the German Trade Union Confederation.

The Left demanded precise rules for working life in Corona times from the federal government. “We need a fundamental legal right to work from home during the lockdown and an employer must provide reasons if home office is not possible,” said the chairman of the left-wing parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Dietmar Bartsch to the editorial network Germany.

Business versus duty to work from home The economy is resisting increasing demands for home office, according to Oliver Stettes from the employer-related institute t the German economy (IW) would be a mandatory home office “a serious intervention in the operational disposition, for which the basis is missing”. In addition, it is not possible or even sensible to work from home permanently everywhere. In some cases, the home office has to be dispensed with because, for example, the IT is insufficient, data security cannot be guaranteed or the work organization requires attendance.

The mechanical engineering association VDMA rejects the obligation to work in the home office. “Even in times of Corona, our companies have to meet their social responsibility and maintain production,” argued VDMA General Manager Thilo Brodtmann. The machine builders ensured that employees could work on the move whose jobs were not directly linked to production. A legal obligation to work from home with fines would be “absurd” from his point of view.

In many areas, home office is not possible at all, for example in food retailing, care and factories. The President of the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW), Marcel Fratzscher, puts the proportion of employees in Germany who cannot work from home at 60 Percent.

(olb)