Household
Union disagrees on debt brake reform
Markus Söder (CSU) speaks during the CSU delegates’ meeting for the European elections. photo
© Daniel Karmann/dpa
After the Karlsruhe budget ruling, savings have to be made, that much is clear. But there is still disagreement about how. The plaintiff Union also has differences of opinion after the success.
Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Söder sees Germany in a “severe national crisis” because of budget problems. “This government has run aground,” said Söder at the CSU delegates’ meeting for the European elections in Nuremberg.
“We don’t have a budget emergency, we have a government emergency,” said Söder. He spoke out against using the debt brake to solve budget problems. “The debt brake made us strong, this is the only way help is possible in crisis situations,” wrote Söder on the X platform (formerly Twitter).
After the Karlsruhe budget ruling, there is a big gap in the budget. The Federal Constitutional Court had declared a reallocation of loans worth 60 billion euros from the 2021 budget to be invalid. Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) announced on Thursday that he would present a supplementary budget for 2023 to the cabinet next week. The government wants to propose to the Bundestag that it declare an extraordinary emergency, which would allow the debt brake to be suspended. The aim is to subsequently legally secure loans that have already been used this year.
Union divided
The opposition Union sued in Karlsruhe. After the clear verdict, she initially cheered and made a clear commitment to the debt brake. CDU party leader Merz said on Tuesday: “I don’t see at the moment that we have to approach the debt brake.”
The parliamentary managing director of the Union faction, Thorsten Frei (CDU), recently described the government’s intended suspension of the debt brake as a “daring legal maneuver”. “I find it difficult that at the beginning of the year we are not talking about an emergency situation, but we basically already had the basis for what is now to become the basis for an emergency situation a year ago,” said Frei on Friday Deutschlandfunk.
The CDU state leaders in Berlin, Saxony-Anhalt and Saxony, on the other hand, have recently shown themselves to be open to reforming the debt brake. Berlin’s governing mayor Kai Wegner wrote on X on Thursday: “The debt brake is a good idea in the sense of sound finances. However, I consider its current design to be dangerous.”
Saxony-Anhalt’s Prime Minister Reiner Haseloff told “Stern” that the debt brake must remain. “But for very important future investments in business, technology and science, constitutionally compliant ways must be found to realize them.” North Rhine-Westphalia’s Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst was more reserved but willing to talk. In his view, reform should only be the last of all options, as he made clear on Friday evening on ARD.
Reform rejection from the government
Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing declared the discussion about reforming the debt brake a sham debate. “There is obviously no majority to change the constitution,” he told the German Press Agency in Mainz. “This is an abstract debate, but we have a concrete problem.”
In order to reform the debt brake, the Basic Law would have to be changed. This requires a two-thirds majority in the Bundestag and Bundesrat. On Friday, government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit said that such a reform was not currently pending.
Scholz wants to implement the judgment quickly
Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) once again announced a rapid restructuring of the federal budget. “Once the court has spoken, it’s just a matter of implementing it,” said Scholz on Saturday at a party conference of the Brandenburg SPD in Schönefeld near Berlin. And this should happen quickly.
Next Tuesday, Scholz wants to make a government statement on the budget situation in the Bundestag. A debate is planned afterwards. The Bundestag is scheduled to discuss the supplementary budget for the first time on Friday.