THE TELEGRAPH: The Czech government has offered to pay thousands of unemployed foreign workers to go home.
Under the programme, which is costing just £2 million, the Czech state will pay for a one-way air or rail fare and provide 500 euros (£440) in cash to any foreign worker who wants to go home and can prove that they have been laid off from a legitimate job and have no means of support.
Ivan Langer, the interior minister, explained that if the scheme proved popular with migrant workers then he would ask the government to extend it beyond an initial eight-month period.
The Czech Republic's once booming economy attracted thousands of migrant workers, who flooded into the country from afar a field as Mongolia and Vietnam to work in flourishing sectors such as the car industry and construction.
Conservative estimates now put the number of foreigners working in the Central European country at 300,000, and that they now represent 6 per cent of the Czech workforce.
But with the small country reeling from the global recession, unemployment in January rose to a 21-month high of 6.8 per cent, and migrant workers are expected to bear the brunt of the lay-offs. >>> By Matthew Day in Warsaw | Monday, February 23, 2009
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