FRANKFURT, Jan 20: German workers should all get pay rises this year, and the government should bring in a minimum wage of 7.50 euros ($9.72) an hour, the head of Germany's main service sector union said in comments released on Saturday.

“Working shouldn't make people poor,” Verdi chief Frank Bsirske told German mass-market Sunday newspaper Bild am Sonntag. “2007 must be the year of wage rises for all.” Germany is entering a season of sector-wide wage negotiations, and one of Bsirske's counterparts at Germany's main industrial union, IG Metall, has called for wage rises of 4.1-6.5 per cent.

German wages have grown slowly in recent years, improving its workers' international competitiveness. Unemployment has fallen, but it is still high at 9.7pc of the workforce.—Reuters