Employees at the Virchow Clinic in Berlin, which belongs to the Charité, are appalled. The Mitte district has declared streets around the hospital to be a paid parking zone. In the future, doctors and nurses could have to pay several hundred euros a month for parking at their workplace.
The excitement is great: from next week, employees at the Virchow Clinic in Berlin who use the car for their work will have to dig much deeper into their pockets than before. The Mitte district office declared the area around the hospital to be a parking zone subject to charges. In the future, you will have to pay two euros per hour to park for one hour. With a five-day week, more than 300 euros could be collected per month.
As the RBB reported, exceptions were actually planned for employees in shift work. However, the district office had rejected all previously processed applications. The reason: The grant is only possible in the presence of a special exceptional situation, for example if the shift starts before 5.30 a.m. or the shift ends after 0.30 a.m. According to a report by "BZ", the shift system at the Charité, to which the Virchow Clinic belongs, is not sufficient for this. The conditions of the district showed "that only people who are not in shift work could have come up with this," said Alexander Eichholtz from the clinic staff council in an interview with RBB.
The clinic is shocked. "I don't understand how you can reject the applications, knowing that it is difficult to recruit midwives and pediatric nurses anyway and that we have a supply crisis for a wide range of outpatients," said Eichholtz. At a time when everything is becoming more expensive anyway, additional costs of up to 300 euros per month for parking alone could have drastic consequences. "My colleagues will go," said Eichholtz. Switching to public transport is not an alternative for many employees: "If you come out of the clinic at 10:48 p.m. as a young colleague and live further outside, you don't go or don't want to."
The misunderstanding of the employees is great. “We were applauded during the pandemic, wage increases were promised and now we, who save lives, should pay for parking at work,” nurse Claudia Kluge criticized the new regulation in an interview with “BZ”. "Given the nursing shortage, the Senate cannot afford to let staff go."
