Black and blue in Salzburg: the coalition should be in place by the end of May

The first meeting of the two negotiating teams today focused on modalities and the definition of a roadmap. “Our goal is to have the talks completed by the end of May,” said ÖVP Governor Wilfried Haslauer in a joint press statement with FPÖ leader Marlene Svazek in the afternoon. Details in the video:

“Targeted and Ambitious”

Haslauer, who is celebrating his 67th birthday today and is entering his fifth government negotiations, spoke of a constructive, sober working atmosphere. He assumes that the existing different ideas between the ÖVP and FPÖ are not so pronounced that they cannot be bridged. “We want to negotiate in a targeted and ambitious manner,” emphasized Svazek, who came to the appointment today with cake. “We have absolutely free hands and no interference from Vienna. It will stay that way,” she assured.

Twelve subgroups

The substantive negotiations will begin tomorrow, Thursday. In addition to a large working group, the individual chapters are to be discussed in a total of twelve sub-groups. These are staffed with two to three people on each side, with several days of negotiations per week. If problems arise that cannot be solved in the small groups, they should be delegated to the main working group.

“Everyone has to find themselves again”

In addition to Haslauer, the ÖVP team consists of state parliament president Brigitta Pallauf, state councilor Daniela Gutschi and state councilors Stefan Schnöll and Josef Schwaiger and club chairman Wolfgang Mayer Teufl and Martin Zauner, former FPÖ community representative in Bergheim and head of customer service at Salzburg AG.

Neither Haslauer nor Svazek wanted to talk about possible divisions of departments today. “It’s too early for that, the content of the vote comes first,” said the governor. But it is clear that the ÖVP would like to keep those departments that have traditionally always been there. “It can be solved. The content has to fit, everyone has to find themselves,” said Svazek. It is fixed that the ÖVP will provide four members of the government, the FPÖ three.

First criticism from the cultural sector

The two leaders of the party tried to take the wind out of the sails of the first criticism from the art and culture sector on black and blue in Salzburg today: “I think we can take these concerns away,” said Svazek, the reactions had a lot of reflexive effects, emphasized Haslauer and said. “The truth comes to light in everyday life and will certainly take away many fears.”

Completion by June 14th

The negotiations must be completed by June 14, because the newly elected state parliament must be constituted by this date at the latest. Before that, however, formal things such as Executive Committee decisions had to be made, stressed Haslauer. After the election on April 23, the new state parliament consists of twelve ÖVP deputies (minus 3), the FPÖ now has ten seats (plus 3), the SPÖ over seven (minus 1), the KPÖ plus four and the Greens over three mandates (as before). The NEOS, which had previously also been represented by three mandataries, were kicked out of the state parliament.