On November 16th 2015, Germany’s Ministry of Labour submitted to the chancellery a draft law amending the Temporary Employment Act and other Acts.
Currently German law gives no clear upper limit on the duration of a temporary agency work assignment and the Ministry wants to see this changed. Under the proposed draft law it would be clearly stated that a temporary agency worker could not work for the same user company for more than 18 consecutive months without giving rise to an employment relationship between the worker and the user company. Extension of this maximum period would be possible only through collective agreement.
In addition, the draft law seeks to alter the rules on equal pay of temporary agency workers. Although statute currently provides that such workers must be paid the same as equivalent regular employees of the user company, it is possible for collective agreements to allow temporary agency workers to receive lower pay than their regular-employee counterparts. Under the draft law this exception would only apply to the first nine months in a job — after this point the temporary worker would be entitled to equal pay.
According to the draft law employers would also be prohibited from replacing regular employees with temporary workers during a strike.
Although this proposal must still pass through the full legislative process, it is expected to come into force on January 1st 2017.