Compared to Habeck’s ex-State Secretary Graichen, the allegations against State Secretary Philipp seem unspectacular. Now his behavior is causing trouble. Because Philipp no longer wants to testify in the committee.
Julia Klöckner smells “arrogance of power”. The economic policy spokeswoman for the CDU/CSU parliamentary group in the Bundestag is annoyed that State Secretary for Economic Affairs Udo Philipp does not want to come personally to the Bundestag’s Economic Committee – to once again refute the suspicion that he has supported companies in which he has a stake through funds.
Klöckner has questions: “After all, it’s about 600,000 euros in subsidies that have flowed to companies in his fund holdings.” Philipp and the Federal Ministry of Economics think that everything has been said about that. This dispute is not new.
Philipp is scheduled to come into committee on July 5
If it weren’t for the invitation from the representatives of the Economic Committee to Philipp to appear there in person on July 5th. In the past week of meetings, the committee decided unanimously – i.e. also with the votes of the SPD, FDP and the Greens – that Philipp should take part. The relevant document is at ARD Capital Studio before. According to this, Philipp’s participation had already been promised for the previous meeting by Parliamentary State Secretary Franziska Brantner (Greens). But then she failed due to a trip abroad. Hence the new attempt for July 5th.
But on Wednesday this week, Brantner informed committee chairman Michael Grosse-Brömer (CDU) that Philipp would not appear. In the opinion of the Ministry of Economics, sufficient information was given about Philipp’s company holdings and possible conflicts of interest in the company promotion.
SPD and FDP criticize Philipp’s cancellation
So Philipp doesn’t want to accept the invitation to join the committee, and it’s not just the opposition that sees that as an affront. “I don’t understand that,” complains SPD chairman Bernd Westphal. The behavior towards Parliament was “disrespectful”. And FDP chairman Reinhard Houben says so ARD Capital Studio: “Udo Philipp would do himself a favor if he came to the Economic Committee next Wednesday.”
In theory, the committee representatives could decide with a traffic light majority to uninvite Philipp again, for reasons of coalition, for example, simply because the Ministry of Economic Affairs or the Greens want it that way. But for SPD and FDP that is out of the question. “Pacta sunt servanda,” that is, contracts must be kept, says Houben. SPD colleague Westphal believes in the “consensual decision of the meeting of the representatives […] the three fractions of the traffic light also have to stick to it.”
The first interrogation of Philipp was unspectacular
One can only speculate as to why the Greens-led Economics Ministry is still shielding its state secretary and thus angering the coalition partners. According to observers, Philipp survived an initial committee questioning together with Minister Robert Habeck without a scratch. The suspicion that the state secretary – responsible for start-up financing, among other things – could have conflicts of interest because of his fund investments and company investments seemed far-fetched to observers.
According to “Spiegel”, it later became known that Philipp was involved in a total of seven companies through an investment fund that received money from state subsidy programs. According to the information, he holds shares in the private equity fund First Momentum Ventures. The Federal Ministry of Economics stated that it was not involved in deciding which start-ups received support. “There is therefore no conflict of interest,” the “Spiegel” quoted the ministry as saying.
At the request of ARD Capital Studios the ministry goes on to argue that it is “the nature of fund holdings that there is no impact on investment strategy associated with it.” The projects requested by the Bundestag were also checked. Result: The grants were made through project sponsors; it is not planned to deal with the management level and this has not taken place. So: nothing went over Philipp’s desk. The ministry thinks that Habeck and Philipp explained this mechanism precisely enough during the first committee survey.
In the Bundestag, however, one wonders why Philipp does not simply want to present this argument again in the committee himself – especially since his appearance was promised. “Anyone who has nothing to hide shouldn’t really have a problem with a survey,” says CDU/CSU chairman Hansjörg Durz. “It therefore remains unclear whether and if so what Udo Philipp has to hide.” FDP chairman Houben hopes that the state secretary will join the committee after all: “That would put an end to speculation about him.”
Officially, an appearance by Philipp in the Economic Committee is still planned. In the chairman’s invitation to the meeting on July 5th, agenda item 2, which deals with Philipp’s possible conflicts of interest, says: Will take place “in the presence of State Secretary Udo Philipp”.