Zur Arbeitsförderung und Beratungsqualität in den Jobcentern: Stellungnahme des IAB zur öffentlichen Anhörung im Bundestagsausschuss für Arbeit und Soziales am 4. Mai 2020

During thepublichearingoftheCommittee for Labour andSocialAffairsoftheDeutscherBundestag on May 4, 2020, the Institute for Employment Research (IAB) issued a comment on the proposal "Improving Employment Promotion and Service Quality in Job Centres" by representatives Beate Muller-Gemmeke, Sven Lehmann, Dr. Wolfgang Strengmann-Kuhn, further representatives and the parliamentary group BUNDNIS 90/DIE GRUNEN. The IAB comments on 11 out of 13 topics of the list of questions and discusses the following demands: - Abolition of sanctions and voluntariness as starting pointfor support measures underthe Social Code II - Abolition of the primacy of job placement over any other measures of employment promotion - Legal entitlement to participate in qualification schemes for job seekers under Social Code II, further training benefit for unemployed people under Social Code II that is higher than the unemployment benefit II (UB II) and financial support for the complete duration of further training with a vocational degree - Abolition of integration agreements (Eingliederungsvereinbarungen) in their present form - Loosening of rules regarding acceptable jobs for recipients of UB II. - More discretion for job centres regarding budget and services. - Stronger focus of counselling on individual needs (regarding customers with health conditions and schemes for participation in employment (Leistungen zur Teilhabe am Arbeitsleben) in the course of vocational rehabilitation. - Reshaping of the procurement process for labour market schemes - Adequate staffing for case work in job centres - Improving transparency and traceability of all processes in job centres - Strengthening of regional cooperation of job centres.