Protesters clash with police amid cutbacks
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-01-03 22:22

BERLIN - Several hundred protesters clashed with police at a Berlin unemployment office Monday as a sharp cutback in jobless benefits took effect in a government effort to push people to find work.

Police in riot helmets used pepper spray as they blocked protesters from entering the office in Wedding, a working-class neighborhood with high unemployment, and made several arrests.

Scattered protests in Nuremberg, Munich, Leipzig and Stuttgart drew only a few dozen people each and didn't match the mass marches of tens of thousands in August and September against Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's labor market reforms.

The new law, dubbed Hartz IV after Volkswagen executive Peter Hartz who headed the commission that drew up the reforms, is part of Schroeder's attempt to shake up the country's generous welfare state benefit system and spur more economic growth.

After people use up their basic jobless benefits — whose duration varies — their payments drop to 345 euros ($465) a month in western Germany and 331 euros ($408) in the east, plus rent and heating allowances. Previously, people could receive more than half of their last net salary.

In addition, those getting the reduced aid may be forced to take part in government make-work projects for one euro an hour if they don't get another job.

The idea is to provide an incentive to get off unemployment.

But, with the jobless rate higher than 10 percent, many unemployed fear there won't be work to find, and Schroeder's initiative has drawn critics from within his own Social Democratic party.

Still, Klaus Brandner, spokesman on labor issues for the Social Democrats in parliament, called the launch of the changes "a good day for our country."

He cautioned, however, that more changes could be in store if the new law doesn't work. "If it turns out it isn't efficient, it will be changed as soon as possible," he said on ZDF public television.

Conservative opposition politician Roland Koch warned that only an upturn in economic growth could create more jobs for people to take.

"The chancellor has left the impression that Hartz IV will create jobs," said Koch, the governor of the state of Hesse in the southwest. "The reform, by itself, won't create any new positions."

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