Maybe when it comes to the SPD we have to go back to election night for a moment. The first forecasts were there, the SPD ended up with 8.4 percent. And there was a round of top candidates on Bavarian television: explaining the results, sometimes glossing over them. Done, said the presenter, and back to the main studio. Oops, oh dear, “one is still missing, Mr. von Brunn”. The frontman of the Socialists was simply forgotten. An oversight, sure, but a telling one. The shrunken SPD faction has now been constituted. What will happen to this group so that they are not forgotten?
One thing is certain: Florian von Brunn, also SPD state leader, can stay at the top of the parliamentary group. The team, which had already fallen apart, somehow pulled itself together. That wasn’t certain, after this election debacle, another historic low. And after that strange SPD campaign, which was completely focused on Brunn, who Bayern “needs” instead of Markus Söder. Bayern obviously didn’t need Brunn. By the way, the new parliamentary group board has eight people, with a total strength of 17 people. Brunn may have secured his place by the fact that many people can now print more on their business cards.
But how can things continue? Above all, the SPD has to ask itself why it got seven percent of workers in the election, while the AfD got 25 percent. Only some of them are right-wing extremist spirits, many protest and despair voters. The SPD must finally embody social justice credibly, beyond empty phrases. And without realism in migration, the mega issue according to surveys, it won’t work. Even in the refugee fall of 2015, the so-called little people were reassured that “nothing would be taken away” from them through immigration. Now with inflation and the economic crisis, many people have exactly the same feeling, even without the direct connection.
Otherwise, the SPD could take the FDP as a role model – attention: not a joke. As a mini faction, it has had a suitable concept in place in recent years, just like the Greens used to do when they were still a dwarf party: not wanting to focus on every topic, not wanting to get involved in everything. Instead, head to the core of the brand as a speedboat and do well there. To do this, the Bavarian SPD would have to break away from the belief that it is a people’s party. That is the case in Saarland, but not in the Free State. Maneuverable speedboat, sometimes cheeky and a pinch of populist, instead of a boring freighter – a conceivable new role so as not to be forgotten.