What this should look like, he left open in the APA interview. When dealing with street names polluted by the Nazis, he advocates historical additions instead of renaming. Sobotka sees the parliamentary restructuring in the timetable and wants to make the House a role model for inclusion.
“The question of active euthanasia in particular must be included in the constitution with certainty,” says Sobotka on this ethically charged topic. However, he deliberately does not express any preferences in which direction this should go. “The National Council has to come up with a new solution, no question at all,” is all he says. The VfGH had lifted the ban on assisted suicide. The Catholic Bishops’ Conference then called for the continuing ban on active euthanasia to be raised to constitutional status.
Sobotka, who is known to be active against anti-Semitism, is not convinced of the renaming of places that are named after people who are close to National Socialism. “If you want to correct a historical picture or have new documents, it is necessary to set it accordingly without removing the name again,” he says. “I think it would be more exciting if, for example, you put an appropriate explanation under the street name of the person exposed. That is a very important point because it means dealing with the story openly and honestly.”
Historians prefer to refer to the period of Austrofascism as the “Chancellor’s dictatorship”. For the President of the National Council, a time that needs more research, as he says. In any case, there is nothing to gloss over about this regime. Engelbert Dollfuss, whose portrait hung in the party’s club premises for a long time, was not the “ancestor of the ÖVP, but rather badly damaged the Christian-social idea,” said Sobotka. “That’s why it should stay in the museum.”
How history will see the change to the “New ÖVP” under party leader and Federal Chancellor Sebastian Kurz, for Sobotka the historians must finally clarify. Just so much: “I do believe that the approach has become a new one. And above all the attitude. Have you ever seen the Chancellor derail?” And further: “I also think it’s a good thing that no modern negative strategies like dirty campaigning are used. The party color turquoise is” a logical further development that is also perceived in the public image. Also with a new color “.
Sobotka remains confident that parliamentarians and employees will return to the renovated building on the Ring in the autumn of next year. What the new house must be in any case is a role model in terms of inclusion. After all, 20 percent of people had some form of disability.
Sobotka, who is also chairman of the Ibiza committee of inquiry, expects changes to the rules of the game in the house. “After the delivery period has expired, I will make a proposal to the parties that they sit down with an expert and think about the direction in which things could go. Everyone is dissatisfied,” he says. He again suggests that complex questions be submitted in writing to respondents. “There are very often inquiries. You could save yourself a lot of time, it would also be more efficient.”
Sobotka also plans to discuss the presidency itself soon. He can imagine two trial judges taking turns. Sobotka has no preference for possible live broadcasts of the U-Committee meetings, because: “It is a deeply separate task of the individual parliamentary groups to deal with this and to come up with a joint proposal in the Rules Committee.”
