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Dispute over summer holidays: NRW wants cheaper trips in September!
The school minister is calling for later summer holidays in North Rhine-Westphalia for cheaper travel prices. Bavaria's tradition runs counter to this.
Dispute over summer holidays: NRW wants cheaper trips in September!
There is currently a heated debate in Germany about the summer holidays. North Rhine-Westphalia's School Minister Dorothee Feller (FDP) has expressed the wish to adapt the timing of the summer holidays to the model of Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg in order to benefit from cheaper travel prices in September. These two federal states have the latest holidays, which last until September, but Feller considers this special option to be no longer appropriate.
The summer holidays begin staggered by federal state in order to avoid too many holidaymakers traveling at the same time. Currently only 14 federal states participate in rotating holiday dates. These dates are set by the Conference of Ministers of Education and Cultural Affairs (KMK) in accordance with the “State Agreement on the Common Basic Structure of the School System”. This means that the holidays will take place between June 20th and September 15th, which includes a total of 88 days.
Holiday dates and their effects
Current holiday dates are set until 2030, but the full range of available time is often not used in many countries. This year the summer holidays in Saxony, Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt began on June 28th. Next year the holiday corridor will even start on June 29th. Teacher representatives argue that earlier holidays in 2025 would have protected children in particular from the heat in classrooms.
The discussion about future holiday dates from 2031 has not yet begun. While Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg insist on their traditional holiday rhythm, other federal states have supported Feller's cause. Bavaria's Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) has made it clear that the current holiday routine is deeply anchored in Bavarian culture. In addition to the criticism of the late holiday dates, reference is also made to the longer Pentecost holidays in these two federal states.
Criticism from the tourism industry
The close staggering of holidays has also brought the tourism industry into action. DTV President Reinhard Meyer calls for a holiday corridor of at least 90 days to be introduced. The demand for holiday planning based on solidarity between the federal states is of great importance. An exception is the year 2029, in which the holidays in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania begin before the calendar start of summer, which results in a holiday corridor of 87 days.
Christoph Ploß, tourism coordinator for the CDU, supports the call for more flexibility to equalize the holidays. The assessment of a TUI spokesman underlines that holidaymakers who travel towards the end of the summer holidays tend to receive cheaper prices. However, these late holidays in Bavaria can mean that the peak season in many other holiday countries is already over, which requires flexible travel planning.