Germany's public sector workers get €1,300 coronavirus bonus

Germany's public sector workers are to be given a 1,300-euro pandemic bonus, and a pay rise of 2.8 per cent from next year, reported dpa.

More than 1 million employees in the public service of the federal states will now receive a tax-free coronavirus special payment by March at the latest.

The deal follows a threat of industrial action by workers at university hospitals, daycare centres, schools, and in police departments and administrations. Talks to resolve the dispute spilled over from the weekend into the early hours of Monday.

The chairman of the Verdi union, Frank Werneke, called the agreement "respectable." Verdi and the civil servants' association dbb had entered the collective bargaining round in the late summer with the demand for a salary increase of at least 150 euros more per month, amounting to around 5 per cent. For employees in the health-care sector, they had asked for an increase of 300 euros.

The federal states as employers had described the demands as unrealistic and referred to already high pandemic-related expenditures for the support of the health service, the economy and the municipalities.