Law on the Payment of Pensions from Employment in a Ghetto

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Basic data
Title: Law on the Payment of Pensions from Employment in a Ghetto
Short title: Ghetto pension law not official
Abbreviation: ZRBG non-official
Type: Federal law
Scope: Federal Republic of Germany
Legal matter: Social law
References : 826-31
Issued on: June 20, 2002
( BGBl. I p. 2074 )
Entry into force on: July 1, 1997
Last change by: Art. 1 G of 15 July 2014
( Federal Law Gazette I p. 952 )
Effective date of the
last change: 		predominantly August 1, 2014
partly July 1, 1997
(Art. 2 G of July 15, 2014)
GESTA : G010
Weblink: Text of the law
Please note the note on the applicable legal version.

The law for the payment of pensions from employment in a ghetto (short: Ghetto Pension Act ) is a German law for the recognition of voluntary work while staying in a ghetto during the National Socialist era .

History of origin

The law was passed by the German Bundestag in 2002 . In doing so, he followed a landmark ruling by the Federal Social Court on the Łódź Ghetto , in which it was established that such activities “have characteristics of a proper employment relationship”. This results in pension entitlements for those affected as well as for surviving dependents of Jewish ghetto residents in the areas formerly occupied by Germany.

Eligibility requirements

Eligibility is anyone who has worked in or outside the ghetto. The application deadline for a fixed pension beginning July 1, 1997 ended in June 2003. Applications can still be submitted, however, the pension then begins at the latest at the beginning of the month of application. The corresponding time must not have already been paid for by a pension provider in the country of residence. Salary recipients are looked after by the Deutsche Rentenversicherung Bund , salaried employees by the various regional agencies of the German pension insurance companies depending on their place of residence.

The ghetto pension represents reparation or compensation; contributions are considered paid for periods of employment of persecuted persons in a ghetto ( Section 2 of the Act). The application process is time-consuming for those affected who are usually very old and living abroad. The rejection rate was initially very high at 90 percent and residents of Eastern Europe are mostly excluded, as social security contracts with the respective governments exclude direct payments from Germany.

Jurisprudence

In June 2009, the Federal Social Court made decisive changes to the interpretation of the law. The change does not go back to the changed ruling practice of the State Social Court of North Rhine-Westphalia (Essen), 12th Senate. The 12th Senate is not responsible for appeal matters from the statutory pension insurance. Rather, in its decisions of June 2 and 3, 2009, the Federal Social Court took into account the living conditions in the ghettos and the will of the legislature of the ZRBG and also found a legally satisfactory solution. According to recent jurisprudence , the previously restrictive approach, according to which pensions are only paid for voluntary work, but ghetto work is forced labor and already compensated by the Remembrance, Responsibility and Future Foundation , is no longer permissible. The reason for this interpretation was that the State Social Court of North Rhine-Westphalia, with the help of international historians, had succeeded in proving that the people in the ghetto - in contrast to the concentration camp - had to seek work themselves. Your work is therefore legally considered voluntary . All pension applications are now decided again.

The judge Jan-Robert von Renesse , who ended the restrictive handling in 2006 (around 60 percent of the applications were then recognized), was transferred in spring 2010. In November 2011 it became known that the then competent judge had raised allegations against his authority (Landessozialgericht NRW, Essen). It is said to have come to agreements "between the court administration, the insurance supervisory authority and the defendant pension authority". The State Social Court should again only decide on the basis of the files, while he and another judge spoke several times with the very old applicants in Israel and in their own language, and the pension authority sent incomprehensible forms and so it came back to several thousand rejected applications on the basis of "Lack of cooperation" by the applicant. At the request of the pension authority, judicial decisions on costs to the detriment of the pension authority and in favor of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia in the amount of around half a million euros were repealed.

Results

Between 2009 and 2013 approx. 10,500 “full” ZRBG pensions were granted with retroactive payment beginning in 1997, a further 25,000 pensions beginning in 2005, and approx. 13,000 beginning in 2009. It is difficult to determine an overall success rate in the ZRBG proceedings. Many applicants died during the longstanding rejection practice by insurers and social courts. If these dead are included, it is estimated that around 55 percent of ghetto pensions have been granted. On June 5, 2014, the Bundestag passed an amendment to the law. This means that retirement has been provided for employment in a ghetto since 1997, regardless of when the application was made and how it was previously decided. In addition, the survivors have the right to choose between higher pensions for later payments or lower pensions, since 1997.

Differentiation from forced labor (Foundation Remembrance, Responsibility and Future)

The application period for all claims under the Foundation Act began when the law came into force on August 12, 2000. It ended on December 31, 2001 (preclusive period). The law saw u. a. Benefits to applicants who were imprisoned in a concentration camp within the meaning of Section 42 (2) BEG or in another detention facility outside the territory of today's Republic of Austria or in a ghetto under comparable conditions or who were forced to work (Section 11 (1) no .1 EVZ StiftG). The foundation was supposed to compensate for lost wages through Nazi forced labor and a lump sum for those conditions of forced labor (bad treatment, beatings, malnutrition, etc.) that were not eligible for compensation under German law. With a benefit in accordance with the Foundation Act, however, damage caused by former forced laborers in the statutory pension insurance was also compensated. During forced labor in Germany, many victims often paid contributions to the German statutory pension insurance for several years without acquiring a pension entitlement. The pension entitlements of those affected then fail due to the current legal situation, according to which a minimum contribution period / waiting period of five years is required for a pension entitlement. With the granting of a benefit according to the Foundation Act, claims of the beneficiary are also satisfied that the pension insurance institution must grant a pension even if the waiting period is not fulfilled due to National Socialist measures.

The Foundation Act contains a special "exclusion regulation" in §16 EVZ StiftG. According to Section 16 (1) EVZ StiftG, benefits from public funds including social security and German companies for National Socialist injustice suffered within the meaning of Section 11 EVZ StiftG can only be applied for in accordance with these provisions. Any further claims in connection with National Socialist injustice are excluded. Each beneficiary submitted a declaration in the application process, naming a place where the forced labor took place, that he was forced to do slave labor during the Nazi regime. In addition, he had to personally declare in the application that upon receipt of a benefit under this law, any further assertion of claims against the public sector for forced labor is waived. The waiver only becomes effective upon receipt of a benefit under the Foundation Act. Further compensation regulations remain unaffected by the waiver, as can be seen from Section 16 (3) EVZ StiftG. Accordingly, the granting of benefits under the Foundation Act does not exclude the granting of a pension based on claims under compensation law.

The Foundation Act provided for several categories of beneficiaries. According to Section 11 (1) EVZ StiftG, anyone who was imprisoned in a concentration camp within the meaning of Section 42 (2) BEG or in another detention facility outside the territory of today's Republic of Austria or in a ghetto under comparable difficult conditions and was forced to work was entitled to benefits . The explanatory memorandum for the law shows that these prerequisites may be present for people who lived and had to work in a closed ghetto. For comparably difficult conditions could be assumed if the slave laborer was subject to significant and ongoing restrictions of his freedom of movement, strictly monitored by the authorities, and according to the other resulting conditions - e.g. B. inadequate nutrition and lack of medical care - had to lead a life very close to that of a prisoner. The term forced labor within the meaning of §11 EVZ StiftG included forced labor performed in a closed ghetto for which an extremely low wage (starvation wage) was paid. The maximum amount of compensation for former forced laborers in concentration camps and other places of detention is according to Section 9 Paragraph 1 EVZ StiftG in conjunction with Section 11 Paragraph 1 EVZ StiftG 7,669 EURO The compensation amount was determined in each case as a lump sum. It didn't matter how long someone was B. was held in a camp and forced to work. In theory, a single day of imprisonment was sufficient for entitlement to benefits. The advantages of such a general (symbolic) compensation scheme are obvious. Time-consuming investigations to clarify the fate of persecution are unnecessary under these circumstances. This made the foundation's goal of helping forced laborers cooperatively, unbureaucratically and, above all, quickly - i. H. during their lifetime - achieved.

Recognition for work without coercion in the ghetto

Against the background of the very high rate of rejection of the applications under the ZRBG, the Federal Government had issued the guideline of October 1, 2007 on a recognition payment for victims of persecution for voluntary work in a ghetto, which so far has not been taken into account under social security law. As a humanitarian gesture, the guideline provided for one-off payments of EUR 2,000 for former employees in a ghetto. The one-off payment came alongside the benefits from the Foundation Act "Remembrance, Responsibility and Future". It was aimed at those persecuted whose work in a ghetto does not meet all the criteria of an employment relationship under pension law. A pension under the ZRBG only precluded a one-off payment under the Recognition Guideline if the pension was actually paid and the periods of work in the ghetto were also fully taken into account as contribution periods. Even the receipt of a service from the funds of the "Remembrance, Responsibility and Future" foundation did not necessarily lead to the rejection of the application for recognition. This applies in particular if the foundation benefit was paid for another activity in the same or a different ghetto or for a stay in a concentration camp or a concentration camp-like camp. The one-time benefit is only granted on request. The guideline is implemented by the Federal Office for Central Services and Unresolved Property Issues following instructions from the Federal Ministry of Finance.

The recognition guideline was revised twice, with an announcement in the Federal Gazette on December 20, 2011 (BAnz. P. 4608) and most recently in the Federal Gazette on July 12, 2017 (published July 14, 2017). According to the new versions, the actual payment of a pension with ghetto working hours no longer precludes the granting of a recognition benefit.

literature

  • Marc Reuter: Ghetto pensions - A legal methodical and historical investigation into dealing with National Socialist injustice in social security, ISBN 978-3-16-156574-8 .
  • Stephan Lehnstaedt : History and interpretation of the law. On the continuity and change of the Federal German reparation discourse using the example of ghetto pensions. fiber Verlag, Osnabrück 2011, ISBN 978-3-938-40069-2 .
  • Kristin Platt : Doubtful memory, denied credibility. Holocaust survivors in the ghetto pension proceedings. Munich 2012, ISBN 978-3-7705-5373-0 .
  • Jürgen Zarusky (Ed.): Ghetto pensions. Compensation Policy, Jurisprudence and Historical Research. Munich 2010, ISBN 978-3-486-58941-2 .
  • Friedrich Joswig: The granting of old-age pensions from the statutory pension insurance to former ghetto workers in NJOZ 2008, 3616ff
  • Sven Simon, Avraham Weber: Ghetto Pensions , in German Law Journal , Vol. 14 No. 09, pages 1787-1816, of September 2013. Web link to the online version

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Federal Social Court, judgment of June 18, 1997, 5 RJ 66/95, NJW 1998, p. 2309.
  2. ↑ Stephan Lehnstaedt: "Reparation in the 21st Century. The Ministry of Labor and the Ghetto Pensions", in: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 61 (2013), p. 364.
  3. ↑ Federal Association of Information and Advice for Victims of Nazism : Survival… , No. 9, September 2005 ( Memento of the original of September 28, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 215 kB). @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.nsberatung.de
  4. ↑ Federal Social Court facilitates access to "ghetto pensions" .
  5. ↑ a b The bitter taste of victory - A judge and his fight for ghetto survivors , Deutschlandradio , January 21, 2011.
  6. ↑ Stephan Lehnstaedt: "Reparation in the 21st Century. The Ministry of Labor and the Ghetto Pensions", in: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 61 (2013), p. 366f. Ulrike Pletscher: "Ghetto-Rente" - a milestone in the history of the compensation for National Socialist injustice , Die Sozialgerichtsbarkeit 2011, p. 429 (435).
  7. ^ Bitter victory for Richter von Renesse , wa.de, January 31, 2011.
  8. ↑ Holocaust survivors Victims of brawls? , soester-anzeiger.de , November 14, 2011.
  9. ↑ Jan Robert von Renesse: Judge Mundtot. In: zeit.de . August 23, 2016. Retrieved August 25, 2016 .
  10. ↑ Stephan Lehnstaedt: "Reparation in the 21st Century. The Ministry of Labor and the Ghetto Pensions", in: Vierteljahrshefte für Zeitgeschichte 61 (2013), p. 388.
  11. ↑ German Bundestag, Plenary Protocol 18/39, June 5, 2014, pp. 3402–3409.