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Germany – Delays to New Immigration Law
December 2002
Germany’s Constitutional Court on 23 December 2002 declared void a German
Parliament Upper House vote of early 2002, stopping the implementation of the
new German immigration law. Germany’s new Immigration Act had been due to come
into force on 1 January 2003. The new law would have allowed the entry of
thousands more high-skilled workers that are desperately needed by the German
economy to fill skill shortage areas.
Six of Germany's conservative-run states had challenged the bill's legality in
an appeal to the Constitutional Court. They successfully claimed that one
disputed vote in favour of the law in the Bundesrat (Parliament Upper House)
should not have counted when the bill was narrowly accepted in March 2002.
Officials of the opposition conservative CDU who hold a Bundesrat majority have
now declared they would want to see major changes in the law before they will
consider it further. Although there is a general consensus among political
parties, business and other groups about the necessity of a reformed immigration
policy, it is now unlikely that agreement over the reform package will be
reached quickly, as the opposition conservatives have argued that Germany should
not be encouraging further immigration with an unemployment rate of ten percent.
The new immigration law would have made the German immigration system probably
the most liberal in Europe. However, the German
Green Card system is still in place, and permits entry of highly skilled IT
professionals into Germany very quickly. It is hoped that there will still be
significant reforms to the German system and we will keep you informed of future
developments.
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