The head of a commission set up by the government to help reduce Germany's high unemployment defended its proposals at the weekend in the face of a claim by the leader of the opposition that it was "rubbish".

Commission chairman and Volkswagen executive Mr Peter Hartz told Bild am Sonntag newspaper that the government which took office after a September 22nd general election would not be able to ignore the proposals, due to be published on August 16th.

"Whoever comes to rule in this country cannot get round our proposals," Mr Hartz was quoted as saying, noting representatives of all parties and interest groups had been involved in preparing its recommendations.

Germany's jobless total vaulted the politically-sensitive four million level in July, a nightmare for Chancellor Gerhard Schröder's Social Democrats (SPD), who promised to cut unemployment to 3.5 million after they won office in 1998.

Mr Hartz repeated that the proposals could create two million jobs in three years but did not discuss them in detail.

But in an interview with Welt am Sonntag newspaper he confirmed his suggested €150 billion job and infrastructure programme, financed partly via bonds issued by state-owned Kreditanstalt fuer Wiederaufbau, would be smaller in scale. Another commission member has spoken of €20 billion.

Separately, Financial Times Deutschland said yesterday the report proposed the complete liberalisation of temporary employment in Germany, including in the building sector.

The SPD hopes the Hartz report will help turn the tables on the opposition conservatives, who have built up a steady lead in opinion polls with a campaign focused on Germany's weak economy.

The conservatives' leader, Mr Edmund Stoiber, said at an election rally on Saturday that "Hartz's rubbish serves nothing".