German
Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/9, pp. 388-390.
Frau
President. Honored colleagues.
We were, ja, already accustomed under the Groko to some imputations. Yet it is
certainly a noteworthy achievement of the FDP Finance Minister in his first of
all weeks in office to break alike two central FDP election campaign promises:
First of all, with the compulsory vaccination for care-givers, the maintenance
of one of the people’s elementary basic rights and freedoms; and today, the
promise of a serious fiscal policy. This sell-out of the liberal silverware you
should urgently explain to your deceived voters, Herr Lindner.
The 2021
supplementary budget of over 60 billion euros shall be retroactively concluded
in January of next year, which is manifestly absurd. No money is to be borrowed
for a year in which the Bund has moreover already made 180 billion euros in
debts just because the old Groko allows
itself to approve an additional 60 billion euros and simply could no longer
expend it in 2021; such like the Ampel
also now can plainly no more do.
Otto Fricke (FDP): No money will be borrowed!
These are
nevertheless irresponsible tricks unworthy of a Federal government.
If I hear you
clearly, Herr Fricke, that the money will not even be expended, then it is all
the more an argument not to borrow it today. If you are no longer able to
expend it in 2021 in a public budget, then you are not allowed to borrow it. These
are bookkeeping tricks; I am coming to that.
It is, ja, already obviously known how much
money in these four years will be required at the pump, and it then preferably begins
even in the first days to be correctly debited. To this are posed complex legal
questions which are apparently too complex for the Union and even the FDP. This
is indicated by the erratic behavior of these delegations since 2020; we have
certainly and correctly heard it. The FDP in opposition had designated its
present procedure in the government as unconstitutional, namely the formation
of reserves financed by excess new indebtedness
Christian Dürr (FDP): That is false!
– that is not
false; those were your words – as well as the alienation of Corona means for
other purposes.
Christian Dürr (FDP): Nein!
I am still
coming to you, Herr Dürr. You also will be cited; everything is well.
The Union
also is today convinced that its own, fully analogous procedure as a governing
party in 2020/2021 was now suddenly illegal “financial acrobatics” – a citation
of a CSU colleague. You now want – apparently in a state of memory loss – your own
conduct of that time, which today is that of the Ampel, to be subsequently tested by a complaint in Karlsruhe. This could
not be invented.
The AfD
naturally regards these procedures in any case and as always as illegal – as always
therefore because we and only we already in 2020 here in the house had brought
in corresponding motions of complaint for control of standards [Normencontrollklageanträge]. You may
re-read it for yourself, Herr Brinkhaus, Herr Dobrindt, Herr Haase, and gladly
also the media: Drucksachen 19/22926
of September 2020, and 19/26549 of February 2021.
Not a single
member of the Union then wanted to support these constitutional complaints. And
now you explain, Herr Haase, in the FAZ:
“The term ‘breach of the constitution’ is in the air”, or here you plainly call
the procedure “unconstitutional”. You have, ja,
just said so. Or what you have said: Now "Corona credits” become “climate
credits”. Ja, that was the same to
you. You have done exactly the same, only with somewhat smaller sums; this here
nevertheless is pure real satire.
The formation
of debt-financed reserves is naturally in general illegal. Not only sound
economic understanding
Otto Fricke (FDP): Oh!
and fiscal
understanding and the AfD say this, but also Kirchhof, the former
Vice-president of the Federal Constitutional Court, and the Federal Audit
Authority which sees as violated the fiscal constitutional principles of per
annum and clarity – precisely those which earlier the FDP somehow also saw thusly.
Professor
Schwarz of the Würzburg Uni in any case explains this blatancy – cite – it may
be “unconstitutional” and an “impermissible evasion of the debts brake”. And
even the very liberal constitutional lawyer Gröpl wrote in the Handelsblatt: “A breach of the
constitution par excellence”. Look it up!
Then we do
not want in point of fact to entirely forget the just so very active FDP
colleague Dürr. You, Herr Dürr, said here in this place on July 2, 2020, as
Finance Minister Scholz wanted to employ exactly this same reserves trick
Christian Dürr (FDP): Nein!
– cite; the
protocol is unequivocal:
It – that budget – violates the Basic Law…I do not understand why careers can only be made in the SPD – and the SPD case of Walter-Borjans was comparable – when unconstitutional budgets are put forward…
– And you
further inquired –
… why the CDU/CSU Bundestag delegation here becomes the assistant’s assistant of a possible breach of the constitution.
Today the FDP
Minister Lindner wants to hear nothing more of this. What a difference just
eight days in power can make; that is really astonishing. Once more for the
Union: Until the autumn of 2021, the Union shared in these unconstitutional
procedures of the governing parties, and now you speak demonstratively of a
policy of stability, of a breach of the constitution. What a difference just
eight days in the opposition comes to; this also is astonishing.
Who, like
Herr Dobrindt, seriously on the previous Tuesday states to the press: “Who
replaces financial policy with financial acrobatics, he quickly removes himself
beyond the pale of the law”,
Alexander Dobrindt (CSU/CDU): So is it!
should quite
urgently look in the rear view mirror at his own two past fiscal years and in
shame keep quiet. This practiced double morality is really still scarcely to be
endured.
Nein, dear colleagues of the Union, you do not get away
so easily from the constitution-breaking inheritance of the Merkel era.
Alexander Dobrindt (CSU/CDU): You have not understood it!
You here
criticize something which you yourselves since 2020 have done in many budgets.
Yet the good news is: We are gladly prepared to place at your disposal our
motions of complaint for control of standards.
The 240
billion euros of new indebtedness for 2021 are allowed to be taken up only on
account of the ostensible pandemic state of emergency, and self-evidently will
also be used for this state of emergency; this is the legally established
connectivity [Konnexität] principle. The
Groko already disregarded it. Yet the
Ampel no longer makes a secret of it.
Ostensible Corona emergency credits will as reserves be quite openly stuck in the
new climate and transformation funds. A connection with a cause [Verlassungszusammenhang] will no longer
even be dissimulated.
Christian Dürr (FDP): That also is false!
And the Hessen
State Court – already just cited – has just declared as illegal a very similar
procedure of the Hessen State government. Herr Rohde, you have cited very
selectively.
Dennis Rohde (SPD): Read it for once! Read not only the heading! That helps!
The verdict of
the Hessen State Court is much more comprehensive than what you have just
cited.
The Finance
Minister today seriously sees his duty as an – cite – “enabler minister”. Herr
Lindner, it would be your duty to do all that is able to be done so as to
defend the taxpayer against further super expensive encroachments of the
red-green planned economy and ideology politics, not to somehow “enable” these.
My last
sentence. The FDP, in regards compulsory vaccination and financial probity in
the central points prior to the election, has lied. The new motto of the FDP
appears to be: Better to govern unconstitutionally and perjured than not to govern.
Many thanks.
[trans: tem]
