As a precaution, Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) has pointed out to the traffic light groups in the Bundestag that funds will continue to be tight at a time. This emerges from a letter that Lindner wrote to the parliamentary group leaders Rolf Mützenich (SPD), Katharina Dröge and Britta Haßelmann (both Greens) and Christian Dürr (FDP). With reference to the anniversary of the traffic light government this week, Lindner first takes stock of the past twelve months in the letter. The traffic light didn’t have a grace period, he writes, political solutions often had to be found “under immense pressure to act and time.”
With regard to conflicts within the coalition, Lindner emphasizes that it was not always easy to reach an agreement, “also in view of our different political positions and perspectives”. However, the coalition has demonstrated its ability to act, determination and internal cohesion. “When it came down to it, the traffic light stopped,” said Lindner.
After thanking the coalition leaders for their “tireless work in the parliamentary process” and a brief outline of his financial policy, Lindner then talks about the coming year – and thus about the 2024 budget, which must now be drawn up. “However, we must not be under any illusions,” the letter says. Due to the changed economic environment, the 2024 budget will be “a much larger political task”. And: “We will not be able to avoid the need to set priorities.”
Obviously nobody should get the idea that Lindner could be more generous
The 2023 budget was already accompanied by numerous arguments – from the wishes of some departments that were well above the key points to the government decision to take out a further 200 billion euros in loans for the electricity and gas price brake, bypassing the debt brake. The fact that Lindner now classifies the upcoming budget as even more challenging in his letter to the parliamentary group leaders can confidently be understood as a precautionary warning. Obviously, the coalition partners should not even get the idea that Lindner could be more generous with the 2024 budget than before.
“We owe it to future generations to return to the stabilization path,” stressed the finance minister. Fiscal policy must bring together both, coping with the present and a solid, sustainable use of public funds, “in accordance with the debt brake of the Basic Law”.
The Bundestag passed the 2023 budget with expenditures of 476 billion euros a week and a half ago. If additional spending cannot be prevented over the course of the next year or if revenues collapse, the finance minister would have to react with a supplementary budget – or a budget freeze. For 2024, the financial planning of the federal government so far provides for expenditure of 423.7 billion euros.