Federal Construction Minister Verena Hubertz (SPD) has called for maternity protection rights to be extended to self-employed women in Germany. "We need more female entrepreneurs in this country, we need women who create jobs and drive the economy forward," Hubertz told the Rheinpfalz newspaper on Tuesday. She described it as "absurd" to allow pregnancy to become a financial risk for precisely these women.
Her call received backing from German lawyers, where self-employment is widespread. The German Bar Association (DAV) responded with a pointed: "Time's up!"
"We need maternity protection for the self-employed," Hubertz told the newspaper. The minister herself recently returned to her ministry after a three-month maternity leave. She had announced during her pregnancy that she would pause her ministerial duties during this period, with her partner taking over parental leave responsibilities.
Germany's Maternity Protection Act currently covers all pregnant and breastfeeding employees, including those in vocational training or minor employment. However, the law does not apply to self-employed women, among others. Beyond the employment ban in the weeks before and after birth — the maternity protection period — the law also provides workplace health protections and special dismissal protection.
"When self-employed women become pregnant, they are significantly less protected than employees," the DAV said, adding that it had already raised the issue during coalition negotiations. "Whether a master craftswoman, artist, founder, or lawyer with her own practice: self-employed women should not have to choose between starting a family and their professional activities."
The DAV pointed to its own sector, where self-employment is particularly common. "Something needs to happen here if we want to inspire and attract young female lawyers to the profession, including in self-employed roles." The introduction of statutory maternity protection for the self-employed could close a critical gap in the system, the association said.
Hubertz told the Rheinpfalz that she was pleased to be returning to work full-time. She also said she was surprised by "how backward some comments on social media were." An astonishing number of people, she said, still firmly believe that politics, career, and family cannot go together. "That motivates me," the SPD politician said. There were still too many obstacles placed in the way of mothers trying to balance family and career, she added.
According to Hubertz, outdated gender roles, the working father and the stay-at-home mother, remain deeply embedded in society. "But that is not the reality in very many families," she said. Politics itself also had catching up to do, she noted, as its structures were not designed with family-friendliness in mind. "When there is a vote in the German Bundestag just before midnight, nobody asks who is putting the children to bed in the meantime."
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