Berlin, 2nd of April Protest against the burial of the
employer model in personal assistance by the Berlin senat
Hello, I am Jules.
I am part of the board of the Employers' Association
for Disabled People with Personal Assistance.
I have been living with personal assistance since 2009
and fight to be able to continue living a self-determined life
and, above all, to achieve equal pay
for the assistants.
I am Christine Damaschke
I am 50 years old.
I live since
1997 in Berlin
and also need since
then personal assistance.
First I was with an assitance agency
and now I am in the employers’ model.
I am now here at the demonstration as a board member of the employers' association.
Personal assistance is when
disabled people need assistance
with all kinds of activities, that they themselves
can’t do by themselves alone.
In everyday life, at work,
all kinds of other activities.
And I for example, organise my assistance
via the employers’ model.
This means that I hire my assistants myself.
I do all the formalities, write employment contracts,
we do the duty scheduling ourselves
and the assistants also have to step in
and cover for each other when someone falls ill.
And that is definitely the big difference in contrast to
assistance from an assistance service.
The employer model simply offers
the highest level of self-determination
for people who are dependent on assistance.
I am Jan Gehling.
I work as Personal Assistant
in the employers’ model in Berlin and
am a member of the Employees' Wage Commission [Tarifkommission].
Today we are protesting at the event
“Global Disability Summit”
because it is about the rights of disabled people.
We have been fighting for years to ensure that our assistants
receive equal pay,
that the wage agreement we have worked hard to achieve,
is refinanced.
And yes, that is why we are here today,
to draw attention to this.
At the moment it looks like this,
that due to the financing problem
those assistants who
work through an assistant agency
receive better wages than our people
although the same work is being done.
We have been trying to implement our collective agreement for five years,
which we have developed together with the employers' association
– employers with disabilities have joined forces
to form an employers' association, AAPA e.V.
and we are the union [ver.di] and together
we wrote a wage agreement five years ago.
And we are fighting for refinancing
of this agreement, which the Senate Administration
has to provide.
The beginnings were pretty good
but since the Social Democratic Party
has taken over the department, the wage agreement is blocked.
Our wages were frozen at the level of 2022
and this is not about to change.
Senator Kiziltepe believes,
that equal pay for equal work
in the domain of personal assistance
does not count in the employers’ model.
And the fact that precisely this sector is being attacked is shameful.
In addition, the agencies of course
have to bring the assistants to the assistance recipients
which represents a considerable expense,
which translates into costs and the employees who
who hire their staff directly do not have these costs.
They are also not paid for this.
That's why on such a 24-hour shift the Senate is saving
between €75,000 and €100,000 per year.
There was also an appointment,
first with ver.di [the union] and with the
State Secretary for Social Affairs, Bozkurt,
in which we were told, in fact,
that no funds were available for our employer model.
And then we found out afterwards
that 6 million euros would be reallocated.
Simply because we wouldn't have spent them.
We did have the money, or the money was there,
but we didn't get permission to spend them.
And when you then say afterwards that we wouldn't have spent it,
that's pretty – how can I put this?
Sneaky, I have to say.
So we are being lied to.
Because the Senate for Social Affairs in Berlin refuses to increase wages
in line with the latest wage agreement between ver.di and AAPA e.V.
in accordance with the wage agreement in the public sector of the federal states
or to pay an inflation adjustment bonus, assistants in the employer model
currently receive €340 less than employees in assistance services.
With the discriminatory downgrading from TVL-E5 to E3,
employees would be deducted several hundred euros again.
Those affected are demanding equal pay for equal work.