European Election Program
Program of the Alternative für Deutschland
for Election
of
the 9th European Parliament 2019
4. Finance and Economy
…According to the established judgment of the
Federal Constitutional Court, the EU is not a state. Thus neither the Basic Law
[Grundgesetz] (Budget Reservation of
the Parliament, GG Art. 110) nor the EU treaties (with constitutional order)
permit EU taxes: As a loose union of states, the EU presently has no tax
authority of its own and therefore may raise no “EU-taxes”. The AfD gives a decisive
refusal to efforts, especially from the French side, to alter this. This would
sap the budget authority of the national parliaments and clearly over-exerts
the EU’s legitimacy.
We especially reject taxes which serve
exclusively to finance the EU budget. The EU should finance itself like a club,
simply out of contributions from its member states according to their economic
power. The tariffs shall be raised by the member states and should also flow
into their budgets. Any EU taxation competence stokes the pressure for the EU
to become a self-standing state. We therefore decisively reject the proposal to
reform the EU resource system so that the EU obtains access to financial
sources independent of the contributions of the member states. As such financial
sources will be presently mentioned plastic taxes, diesel taxes, proceeds from
the emissions’ management, business taxes, financial transaction taxes or even
the EZB’s coinage profit. The EU can never be allowed to raise taxes. The AfD
demands extensive expenditure cuts instead of a superfluous EU finance
ministry.
The EU’s usual practice of issuing a seven
year budget plan, and thus with de facto binding effect for the national parliaments
over a [5 year] EU election period, undermines the national budget authority.
Thus budget planning will be limited to the respective election period of the
EU parliament. The AfD demands that the German portion of EU expenditure and
income be yearly adjusted in the federal budget.
[Translated by Todd Martin]
