Migration: Greens leader wants more support for municipalities

Green Party leader Ricarda Lang believes that local authorities need better support in view of growing migration. “Some municipalities have reached their breaking point. Giving them better support over the long term, including financially, is the right way,” Lang told the German Press Agency in Berlin.

In mid-May, the federal government promised the states one billion euros as an additional contribution to the costs of refugee care for this year. This is intended to support them in further relieving their municipalities and in financing the digitization of the immigration authorities.

Demand for faster asylum procedures

The number of asylum applications has recently increased significantly. In the first half of the year, 162,271 people in Germany applied for protection – this corresponds to around 64 percent of the number for the whole of 2022. Since the start of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine in February 2022, there have also been around one million people from this country.

When asked if she could understand that municipalities feel overburdened in the face of growing asylum applications and the influx of refugees from Ukraine, Lang said: “I can understand that. We should all recognize that the municipalities have achieved great things in the last year. They took in a lot of people from Ukraine at high speed, made sure that they had a roof over their heads and that the children could go to school.”

Faster asylum procedures are also needed, said Lang. “I also think an integration offensive is necessary, with quick access to language and integration courses, more daycare and school places, faster recognition of professional and educational qualifications. All of this requires that we better equip and digitize the immigration authorities.”

Combat the causes of flight

Asylum seekers would also have to be better distributed in Europe and the causes of flight would have to be tackled so that fewer people would have to flee, said Lang. Lang rejected an abolition of the right of individuals to apply for asylum on German soil, which the CDU politician Thorsten Frei had proposed. “The individual right to asylum is a lesson our grandparents’ generation learned from the darkest chapters of our history.”

The Geneva Refugee Convention and the European Convention on Human Rights are a direct response to the horrors of World War II. “We must – and we can – find solutions that combine humanity and order within the framework of these historical lessons: with fast procedures, good distribution within the EU and sufficient support from our municipalities.”