Industry organizations advocate introduction of 'Partial and Retraining NOW'

FHI calls in a large coalition of industry organizations for the introduction of a 'Partial and Retraining NOW'. Together with Techniek Nederland, FME and Bouwend Nederland, among others, we sent a letter to Minister Koolmees of Social Affairs and Employment on May 14. In this letter, we advocate an adjusted NOW scheme from September 1 for companies in technology, construction, infrastructure and industry.

The industry organizations expect that the crisis will not start for their affiliated companies until after the summer. The drop in demand and loss of turnover will cause a deeper crisis from August and September. This is also evident from the survey we held corona survey.

With this call, employers want to achieve that skilled workers can be retained with the help of a temporary wage cost compensation and additional or retraining. This training can also be used to attract new people from shrinking sectors. Think of training technical people.

The Part-NOW can ensure that companies are entitled to a partial wage cost compensation for employees for whom they temporarily have less work. They can then use this time for, for example, further training. This scheme should ensure that the government also contributes to further training, in addition to existing sector plans.

The proposed Retraining NOW will ensure that employees in distressed industries will receive resources to qualify for a job in a more promising sector. Think of the technology and industry sector. Companies in these sectors are essential for tackling future challenges, such as making the built environment more sustainable.

The letter was signed by a large number of industry organisations: FHI, Techniek Nederland, Bouwend Nederland, FME, Aannemersfederatie Nederland, Nederlandse Vereniging voor Afbouwbedrijven, Koninklijke OnderhoudNL, Cumela, Vereniging van Waterbouwers, GeoBusiness Nederland, NVKL and the Dutch Association of Architectural Firms (BNA). These organisations represent more than 23,000 companies with 775,000 employees and a turnover of more than 200 billion euros.
 
read here the letter from the industry organizations to Minister Koolmees.