Status: 04/17/2023 5:23 p.m
The defeat in the 2021 federal election was a turning point for the CDU. The party therefore wants a new basic program – and asked its members about it. CDU leader Merz has now presented the results.
The CDU base sees freedom and the protection of human dignity as the most important political goals for their party. This is a result of the member survey for the new CDU basic program. The party leadership was satisfied with the course of the survey. The participation of around 66,000 of the almost 372,000 CDU members is “a very pleasing result” and a “great success”, said party leader Friedrich Merz in Berlin.
For him, this is also a sign that “the members “want to actively participate,” he said. “The party lives, the party works, the party discusses, the party thinks along.” The CDU had written to around 240,000 members and around Participation in the survey requested Merz explained the discrepancy with the total number of members by the fact that only those for whom the party had an e-mail address were contacted.
A total of 17 questions were presented to the participants. “It took a not inconsiderable amount of time,” emphasized Merz. “You had to sit in front of the computer for half an hour and answer the questions in peace.”
High values for safeguarding freedom
Among other things, a whole range of possible political goals was queried. 82.5 percent named “freedom” as particularly important, “protecting human dignity” (80.7 percent) and “respect, decency and fairness ” (80.3 percent) mentioned. Internal security and securing the energy supply were named as the greatest challenges. With regard to the EU, 82.8 percent approved of a stronger common security and defense policy.
The survey also included suggestions on individual political problem areas, including pensions. The participants were then asked to come up with a given number of ideas that they think are the most important to solve the problem. Accordingly, when it comes to retirement, almost half of those surveyed would like greater state support for private old-age provision. Only a good three percent advocated lowering the pension level. To secure the energy supply, 66 percent called for investment in new technologies such as nuclear fusion, 64 percent for the significant expansion of renewables and 55 percent for the permanent use of nuclear power.
The chairman of the basic program commission, CDU Vice Carsten Linnemann, also praised what he saw as a high level of participation. The survey is “a milestone on the way to a new basic program”.
The program should be ready in a year
The results are now to be incorporated into the new policy program, which should be ready in just over a year. The CDU initiated the process after losing power in the 2021 federal election. Four regional conferences were held in March. The further schedule for the basic program envisages a small party congress and a convention in mid-July. A text proposal is to be available in September. The basic program is then to be discussed, changed and finally decided at a party conference in May 2024.