From October, gas customers are to pay a state levy to relieve import companies and prevent a collapse in the energy supply. Dissatisfaction with the levy is great.
The planned state gas levy to support large energy importers is also causing growing tension in the governing coalition. SPD leader Lars Klingbeil accused Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck of technical errors and called for corrections and a policy with substance instead of “nice words”. The federal government recently announced corrections to the gas levy.
However, the opposition, economists and business associations continue to call for a reform or a complete waiver of the levy that private households and industry are to pay from October.
The levy is intended to compensate for the sharp rise in costs for major importers due to the shortage of Russian gas supplies, in order to protect them from bankruptcy and the German energy system from collapsing. All gas customers should pay an additional 2.4 cents per kilowatt hour. The main criticism is that companies that are doing well economically could also benefit. That is why the federal government is now examining corrections. However, this is considered to be legally complicated.
Klingbeil said there is no doubt that Economics Minister Habeck (Greens) had an interesting style of communication. “And of course we notice that this is well received by the public,” said the SPD leader “Zeit online”. In the end, it wasn’t just nice words that counted in politics: “Above all, the substance has to be right. That’s what we’re measured by.” That’s why it’s important to eliminate the technical errors together: “It can’t be that companies that made billions in the crisis still collect billions in tax money.”
FDP parliamentary group leader Christian Dürr also emphasized: “The gas levy must under no circumstances lead to extra returns for companies. We have to be careful that well-intentioned regulations do not turn into the opposite,” said Dürr on Saturday. It is now a matter of saving as much gas as possible in an acute emergency. “An extension of the lifespan of the remaining nuclear power plants would help to a large extent to reduce gas consumption in electricity production and bring prices on the electricity market down again.”
Demand for sharpening of the criteria
The FDP proposes a staged test procedure. The group of recipients should be restricted in such a way that only companies that have got into economic difficulties and where this has also been determined can claim compensation payments, said the FDP energy expert Michael Kruse of the “Rheinische Post”.
The employer-oriented Institute of the German Economy (IW) also calls for the criteria to be sharpened and the financial situation of companies and their systemic relevance to be taken more into account. At the same time, the economists in the editorial network Germany (RND) called the idea of dividing the additional costs of gas procurement through a levy on a solidarity basis correct.
The President of the RWI-Leibniz Institute, Christoph Schmidt, considers the gas levy “in the current form to be poorly targeted”. “It would make more economic sense to specifically support the few companies that are actually in extreme difficulties, such as Uniper in particular, regardless of whether this is financed by a levy on gas consumers or with tax money,” he told the “Rheinische Post “.
The Green politician Anton Hofreiter spoke out in the RND in favor of dropping the gas levy. To relieve the citizens, the money from a newly introduced “excess profit tax” should be distributed. The President of the Tenants’ Association, Lukas Siebenkotten, is also in favor of waiving the levy. “They should be stamped out, what’s all this nonsense about?” he told the newspapers of the Bayern media group. It can be assumed that the reduction in VAT will not completely offset the burden of the levy.” The number of households in which the housing cost share is more than 40 or even 50 percent of income is increasing – which has to do in particular with the increase in heating costs have: “This has to do with the fact that the ancillary cost advance payments are already being adjusted.”
“Great doubts as to whether Robert Habeck can crisis”
From the point of view of CDU leader Friedrich Merz, Habeck will “have to correct the first really big mistake”. He criticized the fact that companies that are doing well economically could also benefit from the gas levy: “If the state puts up a honeypot on the market square, then you shouldn’t be surprised if the doors around it open and everyone up to their upper arms in stuck in this pot,” said Merz, who is also the head of the Union parliamentary group in the Bundestag, on Saturday at a party conference of the CDU state association in Oldenburg.
The left co-head of the parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Dietmar Bartsch, said he had “great doubts as to whether Robert Habeck could handle the crisis”. The Economics Minister is currently disenchanting himself. Ministers should solve crises and not create them. The “gas allocation botch” belongs politically buried and not revised. For the coming session of the Bundestag there must be an effective relief package that relieves the middle of society.
Industry fears company deaths
The German Chamber of Industry and Commerce fears further burdens. The industry consumed around 20 percent less gas in July than in the same month last year. However, this saving is less due to increases in efficiency or the switch to other energy sources, but above all the result of reduced production as a result of high energy prices, said Deputy General Manager Achim Dercks to the RND. Many companies could disappear. The narrowly defined emergency payments should be extended and expanded. In the case of the gas levy, consideration should be given to paying the costs directly from the state budget.
The President of the Federal Network Agency, Klaus Müller, warned of a further throttling of Russian gas supplies. With his announcement of “technical maintenance” of Nord Stream 1 on August 31, Russian President Vladimir Putin was “price driver number one,” said Müller of the “Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung”. If Putin continues to turn off the gas tap after the maintenance, either more than 20 percent would have to be saved or more gas would have to be found from other countries. The situation is also difficult because a “quarter of our storage facilities, and this includes the largest ones, such as Rehden in Lower Saxony, are still far from the prescribed fill levels, despite good progress,” said Müller.
Source: Stern
Jane Stock is a technology author, who has written for 24 Hours World. She writes about the latest in technology news and trends, and is always on the lookout for new and innovative ways to improve his audience’s experience.
