HUNGARY: Romanians in Hungary await government decision on worker restrictions after Romania and Bulgaria join the EU

The decision on whether Hungary will impose restrictions on workers from Romania and Bulgaria, after those two countries join the European Union next January, will have a significant impact on many Hungarian businesses and the tens of thousands of Romanians currently working in the country. Over the past 15 years, Hungarian companies have employed thousands of workers from Romania. One of these companies is Bergbau Tech in Cegled, about an hour and half east of Budapest. The Hungarian owned company has manufactured metal and steel structures, mostly for mining machines, since 1991. Its annual turnover is 1.5 billion forints, approx 6 million euros, and all its products are exported within the EU, mostly to Germany. But over the last decade the company has experienced increasing difficulties in finding skilled workers. There are not enough welders and locksmiths trained in Hungary to meet the demand. To make up the shortfall, Bergbau Tech turned to the Romanian labour market where they found, not only skilled workers, but also Hungarian speakers, courtesy of the large ethnic Hungarian minority living across the border. Currently between 40-50 of Bergbau Tech's 180 employees are Romanian. Gyorgy Armanhu came from Sfantu Gheorghe in Romania six years ago. The factory he used to work for closed in 2000, and he was headhunted to Hungary by Bergbau Tech. "The offer this company made was more favourable than the ones I could have received at home. So my family and I discussed what it would be like and found I should give it a go for a year or two. In the end the years kept passing by and I kept prolonging each year and now this is the sixth year that I have worked here," Armanhu said. Sandor Ocsai, CEO and owner of Bergbau Tech says he is in favour of Hungary opening its labour market, because he will need more workers from abroad next year as the company is extending its operations. "Our experiences with workers from Romania are very good. The Hungarian language is very important because we have very high quality demands of complex precision work. We managed to bring in highly trained people, mainly metal cutters, welders and locksmiths. They are trustworthy and diligent, so I am very satisfied," Ocsai said. At present companies who employ foreign workers have to apply for work permits for them at the regional labour centres. According to the statistics of the labour office, more than 45,000 Romanians work legally in Hungary, but experts say that the total number when including illegal workers could be double that. Workers from Romania with work permits account for nearly half of the foreign workers in Hungary. Most of whom work in construction, processing and trade, however according to statistics, Romanian labour is present in almost every segment of the domestic economy. In comparison, there are are fewer than a hundred Bulgarians applying for work permits a year. Hungary has not officially indicated whether it will impose restrictions in January. But a study released in October by the Labour Ministry proposes that Hungary should temporarily restrict worker influx from new member states. It suggested to limit Romanian and Bulgarian citizens to only work in health care, processing and construction industries, in which there currently are worker shortages. If the government accepts this, Hungary would be the only country in Central and Eastern Europe to partially close its labour market to workers from Bulgaria and Romania after January 2007. The head of the work permit department of the Pest regional office says that the workers from Romania are very much needed in the Hungarian economy. "In my opinion, and the numbers support me at the national level too, this [labour] is irreplaceable. It may sound like a discrepancy, but while the unemployment rate is currently rising in Hungary, we can still state that there is a shortage of labour in certain areas and professions. It is in these areas that employees from Romania make a significant contribution, and several companies would have difficulties without them," Robert Sabacz said. So far, the Netherlands, the UK, Ireland, Belgium, Germany and Austria have stated their intentions to introduce some protection to their labour markets, while Finland, Sweden, Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic announced that they will allow a free flow of workers. Hungary's government has not made a formal decision yet. The junior coalition member, the Liberal Party is against restrictions and has been in negotiations with the Socialist party ministers and the prime minister to convince them to open the labour market. Matyas Eorsi, Liberal party MP and president of the parliament's EU affairs committee believes complete openness would be the best way to reunify Europe and to get rid of the historical burden of the Trianon treaty. Hungary lost 2/3 of its territories to neighbouring countries, under the Trianon treaty, leaving large Hungarian minorities. "Hungary joined the European Union two and half years ago and since then we are fighting with the old fifteens (member states) that they should not impose any labour market restrictions. And we also heard that the enlargement was successful to all the fifteen, not only the ten who joined recently. And this is the lesson we should learn. If we argue for opening labour market how could we close ours? That would be such a controversial position. No, no, I think Hungary is obliged to morally and politically, to open also the labour market," Eorsi said. Eorsi was optimistic about the decision to come and said he believed it would be a positive one.

ITN Source | November 16, 2006

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