Karl van Berk

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Karl van Berk (born December 9, 1910 in Oberhausen -Alstaden; † May 28, 1998 ) was a German trade unionist and member of the SPD in the state parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia .

Origin and occupation

Karl van Berk, who comes from a family of miners, was born in Oberhausen-Alstaden. Both his father and six brothers worked as miners . After finishing primary school, Karl van Berk worked continuously from 1926 to 1946 as a tractor and coal miner at the Westende mine in Duisburg-Meiderich.

Union activity

Karl van Berk's trade union activity began in 1927 as a member of the Mining Industry Workers' Association Germany . As early as April 4, 1945, he was elected chairman of the provisionally elected works council at the Westende mine. In June 1946 he became secretary of the mining industry association in Duisburg-Hamborn. Then he carried out this activity in the head office in Bochum.

On May 26, 1950, Karl van Berk , who now lives in Alsdorf, was elected district manager Aachen of the mining industry union . He replaced the communist Georg Grosse . In 1956 he was elected to the executive board of IG Bergbau. Here he was head of the main tariff policy department.

From 1964 he was still a member of the advisory committee of the European Coal and Steel Community . Here he was vice-president from 1965 and its president from November 1969.

On November 16, 1969, the delegates of the Mining and Energy Industrial Union elect a new leadership at their trade union day in Dortmund. The new chairman for Walter Arendt (SPD), who was appointed Federal Minister of Labor , was Adolf Schmidt with 256 of 294 votes. Heinz Oskar's cousin Karl van Berk was elected as his deputy to succeed the new DGB Chairman Heinz Oskar . He carried out this task until his retirement in 1971.

Karl van Berk was also a member of the founding supervisory boards of Saarbergwerke (1957) and Ruhrkohle AG (1969).

Political activity

At 16 he became a member of the Socialist Workers' Youth . From 1930 he was an active member of the Reich Banner and joined the SPD. He ran for the SPD in the 1953 federal election in the Aachen district .

For the state election campaign in 1966, Heinz Kühn pushed through a group of “narrower” and “broader representation”. The group of the “closer representative” consisted of six people (including Johannes Rau ). The group of the "further representative office", to which Karl van Berk belonged as a main board member of the IGBE, consisted of nine people. These 15 men and women should be covered on the state list. At the state delegates' conference that met on May 7, 1966, those present only partially approved this proposal. Instead of 15, 12 people were placed at the top of the state list. Karl van Berk, who had not yet had a seat in the state parliament, was ranked 8th in the list. Johannes Rau was not secured in 1966.

Member of the state parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia was Karl van Berk in the 6th and 7th electoral period from December 8, 1967 to May 27, 1975. From July 31, 1970 to December 11, 1973 he was chairman of the parliamentary committee for Mine safety.

Honors

Karl van Berk was awarded the Order of Merit of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia on October 26, 1990 .

Quote

"If the works council is a guy, then he's the first on the pütt."

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Merit holders since 1986. State Chancellery of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, accessed on March 11, 2017 .
  2. ↑ "Now it's our turn", Karl van Berk tells in: DGB official newspaper "Die Quelle" May 1995, p. 6
personal data
SURNAME Berk, Karl van
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (SPD), member of the Bundestag and trade unionist
DATE OF BIRTH December 9, 1910
PLACE OF BIRTH Oberhausen- Alstaden
DATE OF DEATH May 28, 1998