Source: AFP
Like a million of her compatriots, hairdresser Valentyna Vysotska left Ukraine for Germany when Russia invaded. After a 10-month course to learn German, she got a job at a hair salon in Berlin.
“My German is not great, but my boss, my colleagues and the customers are all very understanding,” Vysotska, 54, told AFP.
As far as Chancellor Olaf Solz is concerned, Vysotska is an example he wishes he could see more of.
Among Ukrainians who arrived in the past two years, only 170,000 have since found work.
Scholz himself recently urged newcomers to stand on their own two feet instead of relying on social handouts.
“We offered them integration and German lessons. Now they have to find a job,” the German leader said.
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The urgency is not only due to financial reasons.
The cost of welcoming the newcomers is certainly heavy — between 5.5-6 billion euros ($5.4-6.1 billion) have been earmarked for Ukrainians this year alone.
But Germany also suffers from a severe labor shortage and could do with more hands on deck.
And there is a political imperative for Scholz’s government to achieve more integration success stories.
Immigration and integration are the hot topics in the upcoming European elections, with the far-right leading the argument that Europe’s biggest economy, which is currently ailing, must take care of its own first.
Mindful of the fact that the far-right AfD party had entered parliament in 2017 amid popular anger over the influx of a million Syrians and Iraqis in the previous two years, Scholz’s government is wary of what a repeat of that might mean. anger. on the EU polls.
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To fend off far-right arguments, the government recently tightened rules for asylum seekers.
Among them is the introduction of a new payment card that provides social grants to refugees as credits that can only be used locally — effectively removing the ability of migrants to send cash back to their countries.
But for Ukrainian refugees in particular, the key to the government’s strategy is to get them into the labor market, which is sorely lacking workers.
Bureaucratic obstacles
Vysotska’s boss, Civan Ucar, recalled how relieved he was to find the Ukrainian, who had worked for 35 years as a hairdresser in her homeland, at a job fair.
“It’s very difficult to find qualified staff,” he said, pointing to Germany’s aging population.
Ukar shrugged off Vysotska’s imperfect German, saying it could only improve while she’s on the job.
“We learn German faster when we work because we have to talk to our colleagues,” he said.
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But language is only one of many obstacles for Ukrainian job seekers.
Andreas Peikert, who runs a job center in Berlin, told the TAZ daily that Ukrainians who have sought refuge in Germany are mostly women and children, but “we have very few places for kindergartens and schools.”
“If a mother can’t be sure where she can get childcare, she won’t look for work,” she said.
A study by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation also found that Germany poses far more administrative obstacles compared to countries like Poland or the Netherlands where between 60-70 percent of Ukrainians work.
Professionals must obtain equivalent qualifications in Germany to be allowed to practice, and applications must be submitted for degrees that will be approved and recognized by the authorities.
A high level of German is often required for white-collar work, effectively excluding many newcomers who struggle to learn a new language from scratch in adulthood.
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To smooth the process, the government is pushing big companies to be more lenient with language requirements and offer help to new employees to improve their qualifications.
But German authorities said newcomers should also lower their expectations and take the first step.
Employment Minister Hubertus Heil, revealing his desperation to encourage more people to take up work, said: “It’s not about finding your dream job, it’s about entering the job market and then moving up the ranks.”
Source: AFP