CDU railway policy: Does the railway threaten the dismantling under a chancellor Merz?

CDU railway policy: Does the railway threaten the dismantling under a chancellor Merz?

CDU railway policy
Does the train threaten the breakdown under a Chancellor Merz?






Separate the company and network of the Deutsche Bahn – the Union has been promoting this for a long time. Under a Chancellor Merz, the idea of ​​dynamics should gain. What would that mean for the passengers?

The Deutsche Bahn threatens to be destroyed after the federal election. The Union plans to completely change the federal group under a possible Chancellor Friedrich Merz and separate the operation and infrastructure. The railway and transport union (EVG) is on the street in Berlin. She warns of a “fundamental attack on our jobs”.

“Fach-based opportunists ignite fog candles in order to enforce the interests of the neoliberal competitive lobby at the expense of the employees,” said EVG boss Martin Burkert about the Union parties. The demonstration train is to lead from the Chancellery past the main train station to the Bahntower on Potsdamer Platz.

Union wants to “put from the head onto the feet”

The Union has long had clear ideas about how the group should be set up in the medium term – and wants a hard break with the traffic light policy. “It is clear to us that the railway must be put on our feet if improvements should arise,” said the deputy chair of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group for Transport, Ulrich Lange (CSU), the dpa.

The railway and “their countless participations and subsidiaries” should be dissolved, infrastructure and transport sectors should be separated and the rail network should be transferred to a federal, instruction-based GmbH analogously to the highway. “This gives the federal government greater access to the output, new and conversion of the rail infrastructure,” argued Lange. The federal requirements would have to be implemented.

“The fact that the DB only has to concentrate on its core business and assert itself to other providers will improve the performance on the rail,” emphasizes Lange.

According to Transport Minister Volker Wissing (non-party), a splitting of the railway group would not solve the problems of the company. “The demand for the breakdown of the railway is another example of how people are currently promised supposedly simple solutions for complex problems, Wissing told the German Press Agency.” Instead of on the organizational chart, everyone should concentrate on the renovation program to continue consistently. Because the core of the problem lies in the infrastructure saved over the past few decades, “said Wissing.

More than a third of the long -distance trains

The fact is: there is no day passing when the German train passengers do not experience the poor condition of the company themselves. The long -distance trains were as unpunctual than in more than 20 years in 2024. More than every third ICE or IC arrived too late.

“We are facing the broken pieces of 20 years of railway policy,” said train expert Christian Böttger from the University of Technology and Economy (HTW) Berlin. “The railroad is no longer future -proof in this structure.” So something has to change. Just what? Opinions differ widely.

There was already a small reform under the old federal government. The network division has been renamed and is now to be geared towards the common good. However, it remains as a DB Infrago under the roof of the overall group. With a comprehensive general renovation of dozens of busy routes, the new society wants to get punctuality gradually under control in the next few years. Many specialists are not going far enough.

EVG: more investments are required permanently

Bahn expert Böttger says that he is basically for an “organizational reform” of the company. “But the railway does not automatically get better.

The EVG sees it similarly. “What really needs is more investments in the rail infrastructure to reduce the wear that has built up for decades,” said Union Chairman Burkert. “Three Union Transport Minister are largely responsible for this.” With a fundamental restructuring, the decades of underfunding is not solved.

Expert: Bahn dances the Confederation on the nose

Railway researcher Böttger also says: “As a big, monolithic Klotz, the DB is so politically so powerful that it dances around its owner on the nose.” That is why the owner has no access to the infrastructure societies. “The railway might be better controllable if you had separate societies.”

Nevertheless, Böttger does not necessarily see the solution in a separation of network and operated at short notice. He warns that every organizational change causes considerable unrest. “If you look at the poor condition in which the train is today, you have to ask the question of whether a complete separation can currently be implemented.”

Separation in smaller steps

Instead, he initially advocates getting into the separation with two smaller steps: the expulsion of the domination contracts and more transparency in finances. “At the moment it is the case that DB in particular sends its people to the Supervisory Board of the Infrastructure, not the state. If you cancel the domination contracts, politicians could determine supervisory boards itself.” In addition, more transparency would come into the financial flows.

So does the rapid breakdown of the railway come after the federal election? Böttger is skeptical: “The new Chancellor will not say first on his first working day: Now I have to take care of the train.”

dpa

Source: Stern

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