New federal government: CSU blesses coalition agreement

As the first of the three parties involved, the CSU approved the coalition agreement between the Union and the SPD. The decision in a switching conference by the party executive, federal and state parliamentarians fell unanimously. “Our yes is also well founded,” said CSU boss Markus Söder afterwards. The agreement between the Union and the SPD is good for Germany and good for Bavaria.

At the CDU, a small party conference will decide on the planned coalition. April 28th is under discussion as an appointment. A survey of the over 358,000 members will begin at the SPD next Tuesday. The online tuning process should last two weeks and end at the end of April 29.

In the circuit conference, Söder specified the further timetable. If everything runs according to plan, the Union and SPD could sign the coalition agreement on May 5. The next day, CDU boss Friedrich Merz could be elected Chancellor in the Bundestag, the Bavarian Prime Minister said, according to participants. According to him, the names of the future minister should only be announced.

Coalition agreement was created in four weeks of struggle

The CDU, CSU and SPD had only concluded their approximately four -week negotiations on a coalition agreement the day before. The 144-page paper is the heading “Responsibility for Germany” and forms the working basis for the next black and red federal government-the fifth in German post-war history.

Among other things, the contract provides for relief from companies through better depreciation options or an industrial flow price. Citizens should also be relieved – for example by tax cuts for lower and medium -sized incomes in two years, higher parental allowance and an increase in the commuter flat rate.

In the migration area, rejections at the borders also agreed by asylum seekers. Rejected asylum seekers are to be brought back to their countries of origin. In the case of retirement, Schwarz-Rot wants to legally fix the current level of 48 percent by 2031. For internal security, telecommunications providers should be obliged to save IP addresses for possible investigations for three months. The external security is to be increased by higher defense spending and a – albeit voluntary – military service.

Experts sees relief of up to 50 billion euros

Citizens and companies could save up to 50 billion euros a year through the plans of the Union and the SPD. This emerges from calculations by the Institute of German Economy (IW) Cologne, which are available to the German Press Agency. However, these relief are certainly not, since the CDU, CSU and SPD would have made all plans under a financing reservation. So only what money is for is implemented.

“Due to various planned changes to the allowances for pensioners, volunteers, single parents, the higher commuter flat rate and tax-free overtime come together around seven billion relief per year,” said IW tax experts Tobias Hentze and Martin Beznoska. Other smaller promises such as the so-called early start pension, higher parental allowance, a increase in BAföG, the promotion of electric cars, the continuation of the Germany ticket, the subsidy of the agrardiesel and the reduction in air traffic tax added up to a further twelve billion euros a year.

Economic experts are skeptical about the contract

Large economic research institutes skeptically look at the government plans of the Union and SPD. This alone will hardly be able to solve the problems of the German economy, said Stefan Kooths from the Kiel Institute for the World Economy at the presentation of an economic forecast in Berlin. “The mere processing of the coalition agreement alone will hardly be sufficient.”

There were bright spots that showed that the parties had recognized the core problems. “But unfortunately there are also crucial empty spaces,” said Kooths. Among other things, he called a lack of solution approaches in the social security systems and for work incentives. Overall, the Union and the SPD would have taken measures to combat symptoms rather than a real change. Now it depends on whether, for example, subsidies are consistently reduced.

Change of course in asylum policy is also uncertain

It is not yet clear whether the new coalition of the course change in asylum policy, which is primarily required by the Union, will succeed. The project, in the future, will also reject asylum seekers, against whom there is no entry lock, to German borders, in neighboring countries.

The Swiss Federal Office of Migration insisted on compliance with European law on request. “Switzerland reserves the right to react accordingly, from our point of view, the rejection should violate the applicable law,” said a spokesman. Switzerland expects general passenger and goods traffic to remain as unaffected as possible. Similarly, a spokesman for the Austrian Ministry of the Interior said: “We are confident that the actions of the German authorities on the EU internal borders on the ground of the legal system will take place.”

Deportations to Afghanistan, which is ruled by the Islamist Taliban, are also extremely difficult. At the end of August 2024, with the help of Qatar, 28 male criminals from Germany were brought to Kabul. Since then, despite the corresponding efforts, there has been no further deportation. Due to the uncertain location after the fall of long-term power holder Bashar al-Assad, deportations to Syria are also considered difficult.

Union politicians nevertheless confident in migration

The CDU politician Thorsten Frei remains optimistic. The “picture” he says that the flight to Afghanistan 2024 finally showed that it works. “That is why we are convinced that we can do this in the future, permanently and in much larger areas.”

Bavaria’s Interior Minister Joachim Herrmann (CSU) emphasized that the coalition agreement negotiated by the Union and the SPD was a “reliable basis” to further reduce the number of asylum seekers. Herrmann cannot see a problem in the fact that the rejection of asylum seekers should take place at the borders in coordination with the neighbors. On the one hand, every state may decide who may and who is not. Above all, however, the other EU countries also wanted a reduction in refugee figures. “There will be no problem at all,” said Herrmann in Munich.

Criticism of the “financing reservation” in the coalition agreement

The BSW collects that all projects provided for in the coalition agreement are under a financing reservation. His founder Sahra Wagenknecht spoke of a “observation of people” and told the German press agency: “The coalition agreement is already very small, but the financing reservation is a breach of contract with an announcement. The fact that citizens and companies cannot rely on anything is a fatal signal and poison for the economy in these times.”