"It is downright adventurous how the conservative and green government wants to whip through the National Council a completely deficient legislative package on important issues in such a brief assessment of just only 4 days", Active Unemployed Austria chairman Martin Mair is indignant about the recent botch of the apparently overwhelmed government.
Lockinfalle home office
In order to be able to get out of the “home office” again, according to the government's request, the workers should one declare "important reason"! The workes have suffered many disadvantages in the corona epidemic such as lockdown of social, cultural and civil society life for the benefit of the economy with almost undiminished obligation to work. With this, the bait voluntariness has done its job and the “home office” becomes all too easily a lock-in trap. The government bill from the new Labor Minister Martin Kocher is unfortunately characterized by further disadvantages for the workers:
- Financial burdens for female workers: Only 300 euros in investment costs for “digital work equipment” should be tax-deductible per year. Far too little for professional equipment. Analog work equipment or necessary conversions in the living area are not taken into account. Expense allowances exceeding EUR 300 per year should even be counted as income and taxed, while companies can save themselves a lot of money in the long term.
- Liability for damage caused by other people and animals living in the household to equipment made available by the company should be assumed by the workers on a flat-rate basis, without there should be a judicial right of moderation.
- Company agreements are not mandatory and do not have to meet any minimum standards.
- Works councils stay outside and have no special control rights!
- The reduced contact with the company, the reduced possibility to exchange ideas and to organize collectively is not compensated by any regulation. This increases the power imbalance between company and staff! Career opportunities in the company are blocked.
- Essential areas such as data protection and data security are completely left out, the isolated workers in the “home office” are left in the lurch and expose themselves to risks that are difficult to assess.
- Due to the alleged “voluntariness”, the workers themselves are ultimately made responsible if they work from home under poor conditions, as in the century before last. Since the work itself is often still largely determined by others and participation in the company is not significantly expanded, workers run the risk of ultimately being degraded again to cheap workers for increasing company profits.
The potential advantages of working from home, which undoubtedly exist in part, run the risk of being destroyed by the many problematic and open points of the amendment, which is rather weak in terms of content, despite one year of preparation. The fact that the new Labor Minister Martin Kocher, who has come from science with many advance praise, is now turning out to be a partial refusal to work, does not mean that we can expect little good for the future if this hastily rushed botch is to be the new type of motivation.