Austria’s coalition government has vowed to ban Muslim face-covering veils and to restrict eastern European workers’ access to the labour market. <br /><br /> They are part of a package of policies agreed after five days of talks between the centrist Social Democratic Party (SPO) and its junior ruling partner the conservative People’s Party.(OVP)<br /><br /> Austrian chancellor Christian Kern expressed a reluctance at some of the new policies demanded by his conservative partners:<br /><br /> “We have we accepted the ban on full Muslim face veils. This is deal which was not easy for us. There are pros and cons. But is necessary for a joint government to agree on a course of action”<br /><br /> On the other hand Ausrita’s conservative Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz took to social media expressing his satisfaction with the so-called burka ban which the Social Democrats has previously blocked.<br /><br /> “These symbols of the “counter-society like full veils – such as the Burqa and Niqab – or even where the Koran is distributed by Salafists … these will be banned.” said Kurz.<br /><br /> The 35-page programme also includes beefing up surveillance and security measures, obliging migrants granted the right to stay to sign an “integration contract” and a “statement of values”.<br /><br /> There are also measures promising to lower taxes and non-wage labour costs and to create 70,000 new jobs.<br /><br /> Many of the measures set out in the programme must be hammered out in detail and receive parliamentary approval before they can come into force.<br /><br /> With a parliamentary election due next year, Chancellor Kern hopes the package will provide fresh impetus to an eight-month-old coalition which has bee described as “ineffective” by critics.<br /><br /> It is also designed to counter the rise of the far-right Freedom Party (FPO). The anti-Islam FPO has topped opinion polls for months, boosted by the influx of more than a million migrants into Europe in the past two years and concerns over their impact on jobs and security. Last month the FPO candidate came close to winning Austria’s presidential election.<br />
