\n
A row has broken out in Germany after the coalition government announced changes to sick-leave rules, requiring Germans to provide a doctor’s note to their employers on the first day of their illness.<\/b><\/p>\n
The changes also mean workers will not be able to obtain the note by phone, scrapping a measure brought in due to the Covid-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n
“The number of sick days in Germany is too high,” said Chancellor Friedrich Merz.<\/p>\n
Under the current rules, a certificate is only required if a person is unfit for work for more than three days \u2013 in other words, on the fourth day, although employers are entitled to request the sick note earlier.<\/p>\n
The plans were agreed by Merz’s conservative Christian Democratic Party (CDU) and his coalition partner the Social Democrats (SPD).<\/p>\n
“This is a tough decision,” the chancellor said. “But we can no longer afford this competitive disadvantage caused by long periods of absence from work.”<\/p>\n
Merz said the government would not accept what he called “exorbitant” levels of sick leave in the wake of the pandemic.<\/p>\n
Germany was “returning to the arrangements we had before the coronavirus pandemic,” he told ARD TV on Thursday night. <\/p>\n
“At the same time, it is up to individual businesses to agree on other arrangements as well.”<\/p>\n
Medical groups have strongly criticised the plans.<\/p>\n
The KBV, a national association representing statutory health insurance physicians, said that it “bordered on madness” to force thousands of people to visit doctors’ surgeries simply to fill in forms.<\/p>\n
“Anyone who is coughing or has a gastrointestinal infection belongs in bed \u2013 not in an overcrowded surgery,” it said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The Association of General Practitioners warned that infection cases \u2013 which would only have required one or two days in bed \u2013 would fill up doctors’ waiting rooms.<\/p>\n
The leader of the SPD, Vice-Chancellor Lars Klingbeil, attempted to calm the situation, telling RTL TV he was looking for “workable solutions”.<\/p>\n
“We now need to put sensible arrangements in place for what has been proposed in the coalition committee,” he said.<\/p>\n
Labour Minister B\u00e4rbel Bas, also from the SPD, said she would investigate the requirement to provide a doctor’s certificate on the first day of illness. <\/p>\n
“That wasn’t my proposal,” Bas told RTL.<\/p>\n
“We will look into whether this actually has any effect at all, or whether it is more likely to cause difficulties.”<\/p>\n
But Jens Spahn, leader of the CDU’s parliamentary group, defended the plans.<\/p>\n
He said Germany’s rate of sick leave was among the steepest in the EU.<\/p>\n
“We have one of the highest numbers of sick days \u2013 around 18 per year per employee,” he said. <\/p>\n
“And those who are genuinely ill should, of course, be able to stay at home.”<\/p>\n
The changes were agreed as part of sweeping tax, labour and pension reforms aimed at reviving Germany’s economy.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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