The German employees of the Ryanair subsidiary Malta Air continue to receive short-time work benefits. The North Rhine-Westphalia State Social Court ruled that the Federal Employment Agency remains provisionally bound by the original decision, which recognized the fulfilled benefit requirements. Originally, the German flight attendants and pilots of Malta Air were granted short-time work. This was also confirmed by the employment office by means of a decision. Just a few weeks later, this was withdrawn and short-time work was rejected. Unions and company management jointly protested publicly against this decision. Malta Air went to court. The court dealt with the challenge under the file number "L 20 AL 109/20 B ER". The Federal Employment Agency could not provide a convincing explanation for the original approval and subsequent rejection. The fact that no administration is maintained in Germany is also irrelevant to the court. The employment office subsequently objected that Malta Air did not maintain any operations in Germany. This would not have been apparent when the application was originally submitted and would only have been recognized later. The Malta Air employees stationed in Germany pay their taxes and social security contributions in the Federal Republic. The matter is now in the second judicial instance, because the Social Court of Cologne found that the objection has a suspensive effect and that short-time work benefits for the Malta Air employees must therefore continue to be paid for the time being. The Federal Employment Agency appealed against this, so that the case ended up before the State Social Court of North Rhine-Westphalia. However, this court confirmed the decision of the lower court. The legal specialist portal Beck Aktuell writes about the ruling as follows: "The defendant cannot rely on the possible lack of the operational requirements in the