"An absolute work drama in which many people break"

It is quiet on the grounds of the Frankfurt University Hospital, one of the largest hospitals in Hesse. Patients sit in front of the main entrance, drink coffee or talk to their visitors. A few meters away, a nurse in a light blue uniform lies on a bench, her eyes closed, her face turned to the sun, smoking a cigarette and inhaling deeply.

However, the calm mood could soon be over. Next week, strikes are threatening for the second time in a short space of time. Because the industrial dispute is raging behind the scenes of the clinic.

The third round of negotiations between the Verdi union and the clinic management to relieve around 4,000 non-medical employees was unsuccessful. In many areas one is "still a long way from a short-term noticeable relief", says Verdi negotiator Georg Schulze.

Yasmin Fahimi supports the workforce. The new head of the German Trade Union Confederation (DGB) has invited to the summer tour, for two days she will get an overview of the current crises in several Hessian companies.

Fahimi, wearing a dark blue suit and white sneakers, wants to make himself visible: to the workforce in the companies, but also to the public. Because the employee representatives in many sectors have recently been able to achieve high wage agreements.

But the basic problem of the unions - the significant decline in membership numbers - is still acute under the new leadership. Fahimi and her team therefore want to convince people that it is worth being a union member, especially in times of crisis.

If the industry is primarily plagued by the increased prices and the energy crisis, the visit to the university clinic is about the basics. So the focus is not on any wage increases.

Among other things, Verdi calls for a limit on how many patients a nurse on the ward has to take care of per shift. It is also about better training conditions and compensation for work in overwork situations.

Fahimi supports this: "The situation has become an absolute work drama in many clinics, in which people are mentally broken." The working conditions have to improve fundamentally. "Otherwise you will not be able to change the situation with whatever collective agreement," says the DGB boss.

The Frankfurt strike has received little media attention so far. This annoys Hilke Sauthof-Schäfer. "There is a broad public disinterest," says the Verdi union secretary.

This was shown in the strikes in the North Rhine-Westphalian university hospitals. Only after 77 days of strikes and 25 rounds of negotiations were the collective bargaining partners able to come to an agreement.

"However, if there is a strike at Lufthansa for just one day, the excitement is great," says Sauthof-Schäfer. She is angry about the contempt for the industry. "A little clap, after that there wasn't much," she says, referring to the expressions of solidarity at the beginning of the corona pandemic.

The hope that the new Health Minister Karl Lauterbach (SPD) would improve the situation in the clinics has given way. "Nothing has changed since Jens Spahn was no longer in office, but Karl Lauterbach."

When Fahimi visits, half a dozen employees report on the everyday conditions in the clinic. One trainee, for example, says that she is regularly deployed to other wards and hardly receives any data on the patients as instructions. This endangers their safety.

One of her colleagues reports that many trainees resigned during the probationary period. Another woman says she's burned out. Rubbish piles up on the stations and nobody clears it away, and breaks are often unthinkable.

Fearing reprisals, the majority of workers do not want their names to be read publicly. This fear is not unfounded: one of the employees is passing around a printout of an email from the hospital board. Its June announcement is intended to discourage employees from speaking directly to journalists.

It says: "Employees at the University Hospital Frankfurt are not authorized (...) to conduct communication without prior agreement and approval by the Communications Office." Then follows something that could be interpreted as a threat: "Disciplinary measures can be taken in the event of non-compliance. "

Fahimi shakes his head. "You have to take action against this," she urges the employees. They would have done that, replies one of the Verdi representatives. And indeed: The local press showed a photo of the trade unionists in front of the Frankfurt Administrative Court, who want to defend themselves against the "gag for press inquiries". But the matter is legally difficult.

And some things are difficult in the everyday life of the more than 4,000 employees of the hospital. Markus Jones, deputy head of the clinic, would now like to set up a pool of employees who can be used as "stand-ins" between the wards, so that employees do not have to be asked about services on their days off all the time.

Other approaches that Jones presented at the meeting with Fahimi: Employees should get one point for each understaffed shift – and an additional day off for 20 points. In addition, a lifetime account is to be introduced along the lines of other sectors. In addition, the previously applicable minimum personnel limit ordinance is to be reformed.

"It only looks at how many beds are occupied, but not who is in them with what disease." The clinic now wants to digitally link the information about the nursing needs of the individual patients, which varies greatly, with personnel planning. This would allow the personnel requirement to be calculated on a daily basis and for each shift.

The fight for the working conditions at the clinic is also a fight for the sovereignty of interpretation. Jones asserts that, unlike other university hospitals, the house did not lose staff during the pandemic. It is planned to increase further.

However, this does not correspond to the experience of the employees. The understaffing is more the norm than the exception, says one of the nurses. Sauthof-Schäfer even accuses the clinic management of trickery in communicating the number of employees.

Jones, who is also commercial director, can no longer comment on this. Because when Fahimi speaks to the employees, he has already left the meeting.

In the end it is clear to Fahimi: "We need massive improvements". What contributes to this is the much-repeated demand of all trade unions: more collective agreements. It remains to be seen whether the DBG boss's visit will have an impact on collective bargaining. If these fail, says Sauthof-Schäfer, a vote will be taken on a new strike day.

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