Martin Franke had a hard time: two years ago his wife suffered a severe stroke. There was no place in a nursing home for such patients, and Franke decided to provide his wife with home care. At first, a private care service helped him, but soon this company went bankrupt.
Later, Franke himself was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease. The search for household helpers in his area yielded no results. So Martin used his contacts in Lithuania. There he found four women who have been taking turns helping him with housework, shopping, and caring for his wife for three months. "These women are our angels," says Franke. True, they are in Germany illegally.
Where football players or artists get residence permits and work permits without any problems, housekeepers from Eastern Europe still have to work illegally, fearing at any moment to be deported from the country. People who resort to their services out of necessity also risk. "The situation is worse than ever," says Frank Lehmann.
Stock exchange analyst and TV presenter Frank Lehmann himself faced a similar situation in 2001. The prosecutor's office detained and eventually deported a Slovak woman he had hired to care for his father-in-law. At the same time, Lehmann tried to obtain an official work permit for her. But he achieved nothing, although there were no Germans willing to take this job.
The situation in which Lehmann found himself is typical of hundreds of other German families. Therefore, the TV presenter came up with an initiative. And not without success: the then Minister of Labor Walter Riester (SPD) allowed housekeepers from Eastern Europe to work in Germany legally. However, this order had a limited validity period - until the end of 2002. And it was too over-bureaucratized.
Instead of the expected 100,000 permits, only 1,276 were issued. About a thousand housekeepers came from Poland, the rest from Slovakia, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovenia. Until the end of 2005, they can work legally in German families. "However, the majority still work illegally," says Lehmann. "And raids are still carried out, and things have become worse than in 2001."
No new order is even expected. Riester promised that a corresponding clause would be included in the new immigration law, but this law is stuck in the Bundestag and Bundesrat. Minister of Labor Wolfgang Clement (SPD) refers to the opportunities provided by the mini-job regulation, which came into force on April 1 of this year.
"But this is not the case," says Lehmann. "Helping old and frail people cannot be compared to making packages." The permitted 15 hours are not enough to care for a helpless person. And the set 400 euros as earnings is also very little.
In professional care services, Lehmann also does not find understanding. Unable to satisfy even a small fraction of requests, they, citing problems related to language and culture, fear that Polish or Slovak women will take away work from Germans, and money from unions. And some services even dispute the very fact of a labor shortage. Which is not surprising - care for the sick provided by Germans costs up to 5,000 euros per month.
"Up to 15 disappointed people contact me every week who do not know how to organize care for sick or elderly relatives," says Lehmann. Most likely, this is just the tip of the iceberg. According to estimates, 1.9 million people in the country need help, of whom 1.3 million are single.
For Martin Franke, despite all the problems, hope has dawned again. His wife, who had been silent for almost two years, is slowly beginning to speak. The "angels" from Lithuania helped her a lot. He wants them to work for him legally, he is ready to pay taxes. But for this, Germany lacks a reasonable law.