Sunday, May 5, 2019

European Election Program, 9th European Parliament 2019, Finance and Economy


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]