German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/213,
pp. 26826-26827.
Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen.
Since the introduction of our Basic Law, our political system
has taken on a development for which the Italians have a very pertinent
designation, a pun: “Partitocrazia”. Which
is translated: The rule of the parties. Which rests on three pillars.
First pillar: The limitation of powers, which we have laid
down in the Basic Law. It is the principal duty of the government coalitions,
come what may, to defend the government with tooth and nail. Parliamentary
control therefore rests on the much too narrow shoulders of the opposition.
Michael
Grosse-Brömer (CDU/CSU): You are a bit clueless there!
Second pillar: The self-disempowerment of the parliament,
conveyed by party and delegation discipline, which to oppose can have possibly
unpleasant consequences for one’s subsequent career- and life-planning, and on
which account, when in doubt, one prefers to walk softly.
Third pillar: The wretched business of the party book which
has proliferated in all state organizations and today nor more stops short of
the lower ranks. And this naturally serves the overcoming of competences and
the separation of authorities [Gewalten]
in the sense of the exercise of power [Macht].
This has led to a concentration of power in the hands of a
few leading functionaries, which the renowned mothers and fathers of our constitution
at Herrenchiemsee reliably wanted to prevent. A correction is required; an
opposing power is to be built which in a democracy only the people, the sovereign,
can present.
With our draft law [Drucksache
19/26906], we want to give to the people the means to exercise this power
which it should have. The core of our draft is that the expressed will of the
people must be the highest law.
Michael Grosse-Brömer (CDU/CSU): In the Basic Law, “elections” are for that!
In regards instruments, we refer to proven procedures from the Swiss federal constitution.
Anna
Christmann (Greens): Not at all agreed!
For one, the obligatory referendum; for another, the
facultative referendum. Obligatory, thus binding, popular votes are to be held
for changes to the constitution, for changes to the people’s previous
decisions, for cession of sovereignty, for entry into supra-national organizations.
For the facultative, the people themselves shall receive the possibility, from
their own ranks by means of a petition for referendum, to place before the
people a vote on substantive issues and draft laws. Finally, the government
shall maintain the possibility of realizing the people’s will by means of
organization of a people’s inquiry. Brexit sends it respects, one or the other
will say. With this instrument, much can be put in motion, as the example
indicates. On the whole, the realization of the presentations would at a
minimum distinctly reduce the power of the backrooms.
Michael Grosse-Brömer (CDU/CSU): You must free yourself of AfD customs!
Christoph
de Vries (CDU/CSU): The backrooms, which with you are of the worst!
I now greatly rejoice over the speakers of delegations which
themselves already have brought in initiatives for direct democracy; that is to
therein refer to the dislocations with which they set forth why all of this is
not at all needed.
Many thanks for the attention.
[trans: tem]
