German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/71, pp. 8519-8520.
Thank you, Frau President. Ladies and gentlemen. Dear taxpayers, before all things.
It unfortunately has first required the blockade of a sea strait so that movement comes in the discussion on the financial relief of our occupational commuters.
For long my delegation demands that we correspondingly relieve the employees – those are, as a reminder, the people who feed us members and the entire ministerial bureaucracy – in regards the costs of the practice of their occupational activity. Many times, ladies and gentlemen, have you rejected in the last couple of years our corresponding motion [Drucksache 21/2363] here in the sovereign house. With the increase of the commuter allowance, we are still by far not there where we should be.
I want to make clear as an example a classic “corner commuter”. The commuter allowance has namely just as little to do with the tax reality and the inflation in Germany as do the income tax and other tax-relevant rates.
The commuter allowance which you in 2025 increased to 38 cents, regardless of the situation in 2021, you since 2001 have de facto reduced by 18 percent. Again for you there in the galleries: The commuter allowance since 2001 has been reduced about 18 percent. The official rise in the inflation since 2001 – hear and marvel! – is at 59 percent. That is a cold expropriation of the diligent people in this country, ladies and gentlemen. Shame on you for that.
Michael
Thews (SPD): Herr Gottschalk, figuring is not your strength! That needs be said.
It thus can be stated: The increase of the commuter allowance is by far under half the rise in the inflation rate.
Frau Esdar, it is a mockery when you say: It finally becomes time to again relieve the hard-working employees. That is the factual example of why in Germany Bürgergeld pays more than honest work, ladies and gentlemen. And of that, you are all guilty!
I want to make it clear with an example. A man who commutes 25 kilometers and rather lives in the country will only be correspondingly compensated for the simple distance, thus as he arrives at work. How he comes home, or perhaps as per the coalition’s dictation spends the night there, is all the same to you. For such a man, at the present prices, costs per workday come to 9.50 euros. There presently incur fuel costs of 8.80 euros. According to an AfA Standard, with purchase costs of 36,000 euros for an automobile which he uses 225 workdays, insurance on top of that, and with half private use, he thus has additional expenses of 22 euros per workday.
A self-employed man can always compensate this at full cost and, if he keeps a driving book, make applicable these corresponding costs. That, the employee cannot do, ladies and gentlemen. The employee remains sitting, according to your figuring, at 12.50 euros per workday. And, on account of that, you should actually be in sackcloth and ashes, ladies and gentlemen.
Renowned institutes, and the ADAC, two years ago prepared a study and have recommended raising the commuter allowance at a minimum to 50 cents per driven kilometer. For two years we demanded that, and you rejected it. That belongs to the truth.
Yet it goes still further. Let us look for once at the composition of the benzine price: 49 percent of the price are procurement costs, the portion of the 19 percent sales tax comes to 16 percent, a 6 percent portion for your CO2 tax, 29 percent for the energy tax. The result is: You collect more than half at the tank, ladies and gentlemen. No product in Germany is taxed higher.
On that account, fully right, my delegation demands: Now finally lower the energy tax to the European minimum. Please stop the erroneous business concept of wanting to tax the air. Abolish the CO2 tax, ladies and gentlemen. Lower the sales tax for mineral oil to 7 percent! Then, you really relieve the people!
Katharina
Beck (Greens): Putin will rejoice!
And you protect, before all things, the logistics and the people from inflation. We now again have an inflation of 2.7 percent. Who shall still be able to actually benefit from living in Germany with your Politik?
To again reduce the speed is then a Green proposal. Frau Beck, I see again you are running warm. It is nevertheless grotesque, your Politik drives the country to attrition. Ultimately, our desolate infrastructure is the greatest hindrance. One is happy if one can drive on the autobahn at 90 km/hr [55 mph]. Thus freely according to Kelsen’s Pure Theory of Law: It is the normative power of the factual.
Your 12 hour regulation contributes to a price explosion. And in addition comes the leftist-socialist idea of skimming off excess profits – analogous to 2022. Herr Merz, I see that you now with Frau Reiche again want to defend yourself, yet so far you’ve shown yourself in the last year and a half as the Chancellor who here really lets himself be led through the arena by the nose-ring of the socialists. You are no longer a representative of the market economy. You are a representative of power because you cling to that seat. And Herr Klingbeil – he is not there, Herr Schrodi performed competently yesterday – how would it then be if you skim off the excess profit which you aim at by means of the value-added tax on mineral oil products, and give it back to the poor automobile drivers? Ladies and gentlemen, the truth is: The greatest profiteer of this price crisis sits there on the government bench! The sole glue of this coalition is really just the pure maintenance of power.
Ladies and gentlemen in the galleries, you truly no longer play a role in this Politik of the SPD and CDU/CSU. The Finance Minister schert sich doch einen Dreck um das, what you say. With the Austrians, the Portuguese and the Italians, Herr Merz already tinkers at an excess profits tax.
President
Julia Klöckner: Your speaking time is over.
In the end, you will again knuckle under as always, ladies and gentlemen.
President
Julia Klöckner: Your speaking time is over.
If you want a change,
President
Julia Klöckner: Nein, your time is
over!
vote for the AfD! Join in our motion [Drucksache 21/2363].
Many thanks.
[trans: tem]
