[NUJ Bristol] German TV show 'to win a job'

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'Win a job' game show sparks union outrage 
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Wednesday September 25, 2002 
http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,7493,798777,00.html


Neun Live
 German TV has been criticised over plans to screen a show in which a
selection of the country's four million unemployed people fight it out for
a job.

The plan has been criticised as "sick and unfeeling" by unions as
unemployed people are set a series of practical tasks on screen in an hour
long programme to be shown on the Neun Live network.

Director Marcus Wolter said: "The viewers will decide by telephone votes
who wins the job at the end of the programme. The employment contract will
be signed immediately at the end of the programme by a company that has
sponsored the programme."

One job will be given away each week and at the end of the programme the
last two will be filmed in real job interview for the vacancy.

Neun Live is a Munich-based TV company whose managing director is a minor
royal - Princess Christiane zu Salm.

Marion Knappe, a spokeswoman for the German Trades Union Federation, said;
"Unemployment is not fun. A TV show is no place for a job to be gained.
Jobs only come from employers in the normal way."

A spokesman for the giant IG Metall Union, Europe's most powerful union,
said the plan was "sick and unfeeling." He added: "People will get jobs on
the strength of their personality, not their abilities."

But the network is going ahead with plans to screen the series beginning in
the middle of October.

Programme director Marcus Wolter said: "Naturally we want to make the show
as entertaining as possible."

The programme has echoes of a Channel 4 game show called Down and Out in
which homeless people competed to win a dream home.

However, after media outrage had subsided it transpired the show was a
stunt designed to attract attention to the plight of the homeless.


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