Alice Weidel, November 26, 2025, Deutschland Plan

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/43, pp. 4947-4951. 

Right honorable Frau President. Right honorable Herr Chancellor. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen. 

This end-stage coalition ever more recalls the bridge of the Titanic: Germany lists, the bulkheads break open. Yet you have the ship’s band play on with the same soothing melodies. 

            Katharina Dröge (Greens): The country is thus bad-mouthed!

The Captain has nothing more to say and simply looks on because the First Mate has snatched from him the Captain’s cap. 

            Ralf Stegner (SPD): And the ordinary seaman stands at the speaker’s podium.

Germany can no longer continue to afford this clowns theater which you here allow for half a year. The crisis is here and it is not only one iceberg, it is at least five which rip open the hull of our ship of state. 

Crisis site number one: The social state. The social security system is out of control and becomes unaffordable. A third of the Bund’s total tax income in the coming year alone will need to be expended for stabilizing the pension account. In that regard, the demographic costs resulting from the retirement of the high birthrate cohorts have been acknowledged for decades. 

            Britta Haßelmann (Greens): Explain for once to the citizens how you want to                                          finance your pensions package! 70 percent!

42.3 percent of non-wage costs. That is a record and warning sign. Instead, when it is much too late to reform the system and form reserves for the future, you still pulverize the at hand financial scope of action so as to gain time. 

The social state crisis is inseparable from the migration crisis. Millions of people have in the last ten years streamed uncontrolled into the country. They have in large part immigrated directly into the social system. The consequent costs one-sidedly burden the working population – the tax-payers and those who pay contributions. They shall stabilize, with renunciation of benefits and higher contributions, the unaffordable healthcare system and they need bear the costs of the Bürgergeld, long since become migrant money which continues out of control. Every second recipient is a foreign citizen and is provided for without cost and contribution. What of that is sozial justice? 

Your SPD coalition partner braces itself against even symbolic policy corrections. To merely remove the Ukrainians sustained by the benefits terms in the last half-year is not even a drop on the hot stone. In Germany, there are one million rejected asylum applicants; yet of your grandiosely announced deportation offensive nothing continues to be seen. Despite receding asylum numbers, each year a large city immigrates by abuse of the asylum law, and an additional large city comes after by way of the family reunification. 

The citizens who need pay for this moreover lose their Heimat. In 275 Bavarian school classes sits not a single native German-speaking child. That is a declaration of bankruptcy. 

The migration crisis kills the right of entire generations to an orderly education. And while the borders remain open, our Christmas markets are transformed into fortresses or will even be entirely cancelled. 

Needing to bear these burdens is a country which for over three years is stuck deep in a recession. The industrial core erodes at a breath-taking speed. The German automobile industry has lost 50,000 jobs within one year. Down-sizing and exodus take hold of the entire production industry. 41 percent of the operations plan in 2026 a further down-sizing. A never before seen wave of bankruptcy sweeps across the country and decimates the Mittelstand. Credit insurers fear the number of insolvencies could climb in the coming year to 30,000. 

What drives the businesses and workplaces out of the country is primarily the homemade energy crisis; the industrial chiefs, who unfortunately were silent for much too long, now say this to you.

The artificially increased expense of energy by means of the so-called CO₂ pricing will still further accelerate the de-industrialization. You raise an arbitrarily imposed tax on the air, artificially drive it further to the heights, and still call that a market economy instrument, Herr Merz. The green nonsense can scarcely be further driven to the extreme. 

The dogmas of open borders and climate protection drive our country, our beloved Germany, to ruin. Instead of coming about, your coalition steps on the gas along this wrong way, and wants with a “new boost” for the international climate protection bless the entire world with the downfall. 

And because you do not want to acknowledge all of that, but toss around money which does not belong to you as if there was no tomorrow, Germany is also stuck in a binding finance and state indebtedness crisis. 

With the financial coup d’état, euphemistically called “special funds” [Sondervermögen], you have burdened Germany with the largest mountain of debt in post-war history. Of that will remain only the interest and tax costs for the tax and contribution payers. Every second euro of the special funds supposedly foreseen for investment will, according to your planning, be mis-appropriated for consumption expenditures. That quite clearly does not conform to the constitution. Your budget does not conform to the constitution. 

            Sven Lehmann (Green): Your party does not conform to the constitution!

Instead of, as promised, eliminating superfluous spending and consolidating the budget, you toss the money by the handful out the window. A billion for a dubious tropical forest, six billion  moreover for an international climate protection, 11.5 billion for the Ukraine without knowing whether or not the money yet again lands at corrupt war profiteers. Gott sei Dank – Gott sei Dank! – we have with Donald Trump a real chance of peace, to which you have contributed no part. Quite the contrary. 

The fivefold crisis is not a fatal destiny but a direct consequence of false political decisions. It cannot so continue; you also quite precisely know that, and I do not want to again do the math for you, for you of the SPD just so not. 

            Jürgen Cosse (SPD): You do the math!

You are stuck so deep in the morass of the socialist superstition of redistribution that you cannot grasp what you, with your ideological wrong way, have generally done to our country. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): What do you say of your members’ Russia travel?

Primitive Antifa screaming 

            Britta Haßelmann (Greens): Which was good! 

            Alexander Hoffmann (CSU/CSU): Why? The Antifa is pleased to be in Russia!

and mindless, anti-democratic Verbot fantasies for you replace the competition of political ideas. The stereotypical cry for more and still higher taxes and for more and higher debt for you take the place of economic expertise. 

            President Julia Klöckner: Frau member, do you permit an interim question from                                        member Wiese of the SPD delegation?

No, that is unusual in the budget debate; you know that. 

            Katharina Dröge (Greens): That is not at all unusual. You simply do not dare! 

            Alexander Hoffmann (CSU/CSU): You are scared, Frau Weidel! You are scared!                                         Nothing other! You are scared of the interim question!

No, I am not scared, anyway of you. You are scared. Might I please continue? 

            Alexander Hoffmann (CSU/CSU): The answer is not in the speaking                                                         notes, ne?

             President Julia Klöckner: Excuse me. She or the member herself decides                                                whether he or she permits an interim question. 

            Sven Lehmann (Green): Yes, but not with the reasoning. 

            Götz Frömming (AfD): It is nevertheless possible for all to speak. What is this?

            President Julia Klöckner: We need not now comment on that here.                                        Please continue.

How you here smirk! That, the voters will exactly note before all things at the impending State legislative elections! 

            Frauke Heiligenstadt (SPD): You don’t smirk, ne? 

            Sören Pellmann (Green): That’s certainly a level in the early morning!

You, dear colleagues of the Union, know quite precisely what you do. Some of you even speak ever again of what actually needs to be done. Yet you do exactly the opposite. 

And you, Herr Merz, have in the election campaign announced and promised all possible things, what is of bitter necessity and needs be urgently done. You thereby grandiosely helped yourself to our election program. 

            Jens Spahn (CDU/CS): Oh mann, oh mann, oh mann!

Yet then – since otherwise Herr Merz would not be Herr Merz – you broke every single one of your election promises. You left the citizens in the lurch and wore yourself out with slander and insult of the opposition, instead of addressing the problems in our country. 

            Ralf Stegner (SPD): Get a handkerchief!

You have thereby wasted valuable time and intensified the crisis, and all of that because you make yourself a prisoner of the leftist unity front as a result of your firewall. 

            Günter Krings (CDU/CSU): Do you come to the content?

 You let yourself be led about one time after another by the SPD. The SPD’s favor, upon which your chancellorship depends, is more important to you than the good of our country and of your own party. 

This tactic has failed. Germany requires an immediate program for reform of the state, economy and society. It is time for the Deutschland Plan of the Alternative für Deutschland. 

It is a twelve point plan to again get Germany on its feet. 

First, we require advantageous and secure energy. That is the basis for economic impetus and prosperity. We therefore need to immediately end the failed experiment of the energy transformation. We need to immediately end the destruction of nuclear power, the demolition of nuclear power plants, and push the re-entry into nuclear power and we need to buy natural gas and oil where it is most advantageous, and that is in Russia. 

            Reinhard Brandl (CDU/CSU): Now it comes out! 

            Alexander Hoffmann (CSU/CSU): Ah!

And that is in our national interest, and the Americans want that, too. And that is why there are these peace negotiations: Because the Americans represent their national interests, which you for Germany have forgotten, dear CDU. 

            Steffen Bilger (CDU/CSU): Here, it’s about Russian interests! 

            Reinhard Brandl (CDU/CSU): Which interests do you represent?                                            The mask has fallen!

Second. We need to end the wind and solar electricity subventions and, without replacement, eliminate the ruinous CO₂ pricing and the emissions trade. And we need to immediately abolish  the unhappy heating law which cold expropriates countless owners of real property. 

Third. In economic policy, the fundamentals need again apply: Market economy Ordnungspolitik instead of eco-socialist planned economy. 

            Claudia Roth (Greens): Oah!

That means the abolition of the combustion engine Verbot and all supply chain laws at the national as well as the EU level. We will end the Politik of Verbot and manipulation. 

            Katharina Dröge (Greens): Because human rights for you simply play not role at all!

Fourth. Our economy requires an unleashing program for setting free market economic powers which liberate them from bureaucratic regulations and drastically lowers the cost of taxes and duties. 

Fifth. In Sozialpolitik, we need to return consistently to the solidarity principle. Full social benefits only for members of the solidarity community who also make their contributions to the social security systems. I certainly do not know what you have against the solidarity principle. That, I find interesting. 

            Jürgen Cosse (SPD): Do you actually pay taxes in Germany? 

            Sven Lehmann (Greens): Against you we have something.

In place of the unfortunately baptised by you Bürgergeld, an activating basic security needs to enter which in fact drastically sinks the costs. 

Sixth. So that the statutory Pension Insurance remains affordable, it needs to be completely relieved of all non-insurance benefits and be supported by means of additional funded pillars. 

            Ines Schwerdtner (Linke): Neo-liberal!

To that also belongs a pension state fund, a so-called equalization [Ausgleich] fund for a stabilization of the statutory pension of the first pillar. The officials pension needs to be reformed, the civil service status strictly limited to a few sovereign areas of responsibility. Politicians, officials and holders of mandates need to be included in the statutory Pensions Insurance. 

Seventh. The absent migration change needs to be introduced by a Politik of the closed door. That means in clear text: Seamless border controls, turning back all illegals without exception, finally a rigorous deportation which the law besides prescribes, and an end to the multi-million violations of the law. 

Eighth. The migration magnets will be turned off. For asylum applicants, there is only benefits in kind instead of cash. Naturalized will be only those who, according to strong criteria and at earliest after ten years, are standing on their feet and fully at work. Naturalization by claim will be abolished. 

Ninth. State spending needs to be decisively slashed. Instead of unlimited new indebtedness, the public hand needs to get by with the tax intake. The state needs to keep itself out of the economy and out of the private life of the citizens, and confine itself to its core duties: Domestic and external security, maintenance of the state of law and public order. 

Tenth. Clientele policy subventions will be eliminated. The public financing of pseudo non-political organizations will be forbidden. The Antifa as a terrorist organization will be forbidden. The public broadcasting fees will be abolished. The squandering of tax money in all the world  ends. We require our remaining resources for our own country, for our own citizens. 

Eleventh. Urgently necessary is a structural reform which deconstructs the bureaucracy, clears away the funding jungle and leaves tax money in economic circulation with the citizens and business. 

Twelfth and last. A Tax Reform 25 with uniformly lowered tax rates, family splitting and a high allowance relieves the large majority of citizens, families, and before all the middle class. The solidarity surcharge will finally be completely abolished. 

That is our Deutschland Plan, that is our immediate program for Germany. 

            Götz Frömming (AfD): Bravo!

The most important and urgent measures to correct the damages we could in common immediately decide. Immediately! The majorities for that would be at hand in this house if the bürgerlichen powers of reason come together 

            Britta Haßelmann (Greens): You are not bürgerliche! 

            Derya Turk-Nachbaur (SPD): Extreme right is other than bürgerliche!

and finally fulfill the will of the voters, the majority of whom voted for a bürgerliche center-right Politik. 

            Michael Schrodi (SPD): Extreme right! 

            Claudia Roth (Greens): You are not bürgerliche!

It is thus about namely a center-right Politik, 

            Ralf Stegner (SPD): Extreme right!

a bürgerliche Politik and no progressive leftist-green Politik. You here have walled yourselves in. Make reasonable Politik for the citizens and business. 

It thus lies with you, right honorable colleagues of the Union, whether you want to continue to allow yourselves to be led by leftist apron strings and green losers, or 

            Britta Haßelmann (Greens): …whether you continue to surround yourself                                                 with right-wing extremists!

whether you are ready to place the good of the country above personal vanities and ideological prejudices. We are ready for that, out of love and responsibility for Germany. 

I am grateful. 

            Ralf Stegner (SPD): So simple-minded!

  

[trans: tem]

Bernd Schattner, October 16, 2025, Neff, Bosch, Lufthansa

German Bundestag, October 16, 2025, Plenarprotokoll 21/34, pp. 708-709. 

Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen. 

What is happening here in Germany is no structural transition, it is an economic mass death, unleashed by this government and its ideological nonsense. Germany, once a nation of industry, export world champion, technology leader, degenerates under your leadership into Europe’s industrial graveyard. 

A current example: Neff in Bretten, since 1877 a lighthouse of the German engineer’s art. Here, for decades were produced ovens and exhaust hoods “made in Germany”. And now, in the spring of 2028 is an end. Around 1,000 employees and their families lose their livelihood, their future, their home. The CDU Oberbürgermeister names that a slap in the face of the region. I say: That is a slap in the face of every German worker. Yet exactly these local politicians do not have the courage to finally say to their party superiors that only with the AfD can there be an authentic turn to a Politik for more workplaces in Germany. 

For long is the SPD no more a partner for a conservative economic policy. This SPD is no more the party of Helmut Schmidt, but of gender ga-ga, masquerade and climate craziness. Finance Minister Klingbeil professes himself preferably for an Antifa terrorist organization instead of for a free economy. That however does not surprise me personally: Of economy and finance, he has  not a clue. 

Meanwhile, you can daily read reports of insolvencies, factory closings, and work site re-locations. And the worst of it is: To the press, most of that is no longer news; since these reports meanwhile come daily over the wire. 

In 2024, the number of bankrupt firms was as high as it had not been in ten years, and in 2025 is expected a further increase. And what does the Union do? This eternal fellow-traveler party? 

            Hendrik Hoppenstedt (CSU/CSU): Na, na, na, na, na! Watch out!

Just nothing: No resistance, no backbone, no plan! Only the usual recipes: More debt, more bureaucracy, more unemployment, more bankruptcy! And that is no single instance! 

Bosch, the name once stood for German quality and technological excellence. 

            Andreas Lenz (CDU/CSU): Ever still!

Meanwhile, Bosch pulls the plug because your energy policy destroys everything, what here still  breathes. Over 20,000 workplaces in the next years to 2030 will be axed – our Economy Minister is not interested, she is today again not present – and thereby an entire stretch of land in Baden-Württemberg and Rheinland-Pfalz is de-industrialized. That is no longer an adaptation to the market, that is the result of your Politik hostile to economy. That is a clearing away in labor market policy. 

Next example: The Lufthansa, once pride of the nation, symbol of German reliability, today a business forced to its knees by you. You’ve plainly not rescued the Lufthansa in crisis, 

            Andreas Lenz (CSU/CSU): Oh, yes!

you’ve ruined it. And the consequence: Lay-offs, a strike, chaos – a symbol for all that goes awry  in this country, for what you get your hands on. You have, thanks to your Politik, achieved that we again have over 3 million unemployed in Germany. What a performance of your time in office so far! 

And do you know what the worst of it is? This catastrophe is no accident, it is intended. You sacrifice our industry, our workplaces on the the altar of your climate religion. While China builds factories, you here destroy entire branches of industry; while America promotes, here reigns a standstill; and while other countries invest, you force German business into insolvency. 

You speak of transformation, but what you really manage is destruction. You speak of sustainability, but the only things you sustainably create are unemployment and impoverishment. And while you in Berlin debate over gender questions, quotas and war rhetoric, millions of people out there need to witness their life’s work falls apart. The tradesman, the Mittelstandler, the worker who each day pay the price for your arrogance and your incompetence. 

Germany is losing its economic soul, ladies and gentlemen. And if we permit that, then we lose all that generations before us have built. Bosch, Neff, Lufthansa: Those are a warning signal, and if we continue to ignore it, then that is no longer a political failure, that is then the betrayal of the German people. Finally required is a 180 degree turnaround: Away from tutelage and the assistance swamp, towards performance, freedom and an authentic industrial policy – and that will only be with the AfD. We are the party of the Mittelstand, the worker, the German economy. We don’t invest in Brussels, not in Kiev, but here with us, in Germany. We do not distribute the taxpayers’ money in foreign lands, but to those who earned it, here with us in this country.  

Many thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Arno Bausemer, October 22, 2025, Russian Energy Imports

EU Parliament, Strasbourg, P10 CRE-REV(2025)10-22(3-0498-0000). 

Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen. 

At a late hour I say welcome to you in the multi-colored, energy policy fantasy world of the green world-improvers. There one rejoices over the the sun which shines, the wind which blows and over the electricity from the socket which costs so little since the sun and wind, ja, present no bill. And so as to make the world still a little better, there the gas valve is turned off and one thereby takes care that Russia goes down before the European Union. 

Who follows our debate here, he needs think, in this parliament, the madness has broken out. Have you not understood, even after three years, that ever new sanctions packages harm our own national economies, and presently in Germany alone 10,000 industrial workplaces disappear every month? They are gone. Have you not understood that Russia simply seeks new customers? Through the new pipeline Siberia 2, 50 billion cubic meters of natural gas will yearly flow to China. 

Putin party, Russia friend, Moscow’s fifth column, you only ever continue to insult the critics of your failed policy. The new, old Europe of fatherlands again makes sense, and acts to the advantage of these fatherlands and their citizens, and to that then also again belongs economic relations with Russia. 

 

[trans: tem]

Tino Chrupalla, October 16, 2025, Merz Government

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/34, pp. 3648-3651. 

Right honorable Frau President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen. Dear countrymen. 

The last days have shown: A wise Politik contributes to a balance of interests and to a strengthening of the common interest in peace. Herr Chancellor, the strivings for peace in the Gaza war have hopefully brought home to you that it pays to invest in diplomacy and negotiation. Both in Germany and within the European Union is sought to implement the solution of conflicts and wars with sanctions, weapons deliveries and war rhetoric. 

In this regard, I need to tie in the war in the Ukraine. And here also there needs be rapid solutions sufficient for a peace in Europe. Why cannot it also be your duty, Herr Merz, to step forward as a mediator between the Ukraine and Russia? That would be suitable for the office of the German Chancellor. 

And you should finally stop continually formulating new threat situations, even so as colleague Hardt has done yesterday here in his speech, without being able to deliver sufficient evidence for that. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): Who then has again written that down for you? The Russian                    embassy, or what? You stand for capitulation! 

You are always quite sure that it must have been Russia, Herr Wiese, as in regards Nord Stream. I thereby recall just the drone debate. Friedrich Merz in a talkshow assumed [vermutete] drones in German air space. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): Help! That is transcribed just so!

Herr Chancellor, to this day you could put forward not a single proof or evidence.  

Putting citizens into a panic, you nevertheless have done. Precisely that, Herr Wiese and Herr Merz, is irresponsible. You polarize, and with your political discourse regress to the time of the Cold War. 

            Steffen Bilger (CDU/CSU): Do you contest the drone over-flights? 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): You want to sell the country to Russia! That is what your                                            party does!

Success worthy of the name for peace and the German people, Herr Chancellor, you clearly do not have on your side. Otherwise, you perhaps might have sat according to protocol in the first row in Egypt. 

The current Federal government behaves with similar carelessness at home. Allow me as lobbyist of the skilled trades to here select one point from the sozial area. This, so it appears, is indeed less controversial, yet is an absolutely more destructive compromise from the government coalition, namely the active pension, as you name it. With the decision to take into consideration only those employees with social insurance mandates, numerous pensioners may not even participate. That is a clear violation of the equal treatment principle. 

I speak of many of thousands of self-employed, as for example the many tradesmen who have worked in individual or small firms, in family businesses. Precisely those who have pursued work with social insurance obligations should continue to pay social duties on the additional income. Since the tradesmen who were and are self-employed shall clearly not be able to earn 2,000 euros tax-free. That is unjust, that is shabby, and before all you divide the pensioners. 

You primarily confirm with these measures one picture: The pensions are plainly not sufficient. On cannot thus live from the pension in the twilight of life. Frau Bas, your request is on that account scarcely sozial or democratic. It is dishonest to again leave the pensioners alone to bear the cost for the political failures of the Federal government. Therefore: Were you to honestly mean it, you would demand of all of us to agree to the abolition of double taxation of old age pensions. 

Ladies and gentlemen, by whom have you in the Federal government actually been advised? Is there no one there who can comprehend the cares and wishes of the old and young? The pensioner should continue to work. The young are thereby allowed to bear still more costs and excessive debts. They also, with the obligatory service, shall be made into the combat-ready weapons while war still reigns in Europe. 

I hope that many citizens today have also heard the speech of Jens Spahn; since he made clear what the conscription for him is primarily about: For sending those obliged to serve against Russia to the front. 

            Alexander Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): Ach, rubbish, what you are telling! My                            goodness! 

            Steffen Bilger (CDU/CSU): Of what are you speaking here actually? 

Precisely that, we do not want. That, we will never permit, Herr Hoffmann. 

            Alexander Hoffmann (CDU/CSU): You are telling stories, Herr Chrupalla,                            stories!

Beyond that, our children need come to terms with increasing criminality in schools, on the streets. All of that is a situation which you expect of us after 35 years of German unity. You governed for so long, Herr Hoffmann. You are co-responsible for that. 

Valued colleagues of the Greens, you should so slowly make your appearance in your role in  the opposition. When I look at your resolution motion for today’s daily order, I note: You have still not understood the signs of the time. 

            Britta Haßelmann (Greens): We require no tutoring from you!

You want to make Europe the world’s first climate-neutral continent, standing there. Apparently you never really re-evaluated the botched government time of the Ampel with Herr Habeck or Frau Baerbock, otherwise it would have come even to you that the German citizens now really have enough of your Politik. Your Green trash was voted out, Frau Haßelmann. 

With your so-called climate neutrality, you really mean de-industrialization and loss of prosperity for the broad population – your consulting firms naturally excepted. To you, the energy security in Germany is all the same, like a concept of who should actually pay for the Green utopia. We too stand for the protection of nature, yet see humanity as a part of that. And for this part, we make Politik. 

Since to whom is it of use when Europe stands there as a climate-neutral yet economically weak continent? Precisely those who then can sell their technologies to us because we no longer have our own industrial and development venues. That is not in the German and also not in the European interest. 

We expect much more of Chancellor Merz, that he stands up for Made in Germany, has concepts developed which let us again become a strong and reliable partner in Europe and worldwide. For that, we require leg room and less regulation, an attractive infrastructure and, before all things, finally advantageous energy prices. 

Those are the priority duties with which the Politik has to concern itself, all of us here in common in the German Bundestag. Behind the interests for Germany and its citizens, all members need to be able to gather. Hide and seek behind the firewall does not belong to that. 

            President Julia Klöckner: Herr member, do you permit an interim question from                                        member Herr Wiese?

Please, Herr Wiese. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): Herr Chrupalla, many thanks that you permit the interim question.  You said that the Federal government needs to invest in the infrastructure, in the future of this country. Thus I ask you quite openly – I have a further question – : Why have you then rejected the investment in the future of the country, the 500 billion euros which we invest in the infrastructure, in the schools, in the education of the country, so that the next generation finds an intact infrastructure? I have a second question. You have just comprehensively philosophized on what your visions and goals are. Yet I want to say one thing: The success of the German economy in the past years, decades, is in fact based on         that we are embedded in the European Union, in the European internal market. The visions which you in your party program have mean to put the axe to the European unification, means the exit from the European Union. Do you agree with me: “If you do   that, you actually need to rename yourself: AfD is like Arbeitslosigkeit für Deutschland”?  

Herr Wiese, perhaps to begin with a remark on your last sentence. As to the AfD, we will and cannot agree with the SPD on many points – and certainly not with the previous one. And that we are thereby right is certainly also shown in the present election surveys. That is point one. 

            Alexander Hoffmann (CSU/CSU): Do you have an argument for that, Herr                            Chrupalla?

Point two. On the budget. We have put forward an alternative budget – and it certainly distinguishes us – which is plainly not based on debts, which plainly does not force the children and the grandchildren into the debts orgy so as to pay those debts. We want – and this is the distinction for the SPD – that from the regular budget – we have put forward a corresponding budget – precisely those measures which you cited be paid for, and for that not to take up debts of 500 billion euros 

            Alice Weidel (AfD): That certainly does not go to infrastructure; not                                        a cent goes to infrastructure!

and, in part, 850 billion euros until the year 2029. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): To invest in the future of the country! You want to throttle                        this country! Just say it!

That is unserious. That is before all things not sustainable. On this point, we differ massively. I am not yet done, Herr Wiese. I would gladly answer your second question which pertains to the economic situation. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): You’ve already said a sentence on that.

Your sanctions policy, before all things, in the last three, four, years has led to that the German economy in this country can scarcely do industry, which, before all things, requires large quantities of energy, like the chemical industry or the steel industry, which emigrate. Have you  actually been cognizant of what all is happening in this country? For that, you principally are responsible with your last Federal government and this Federal government. 

It is thus important that we have good contacts to all European countries. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): You want to get out of the European Union!                                                That is your goal! Say that for once to the citizens!

Yes, we also need Russian gas because it is advantageous, because with it we would again have a price of 4 or 5 cents per kilowatt-hour for our businesses. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): We do that, industrial electricity price!

Because energy is so expensive, on that account they emigrate. On that account, they go. 

            Dirk Wiese (SPD): You grind down employee rights! That it is, what you do!

And, for that, you are responsible. 

            President Julia Klöckner: I see the question as answered, and request you                                continue your speech.

Many thanks. I want to go into two points, Herr Merz, which you should thoroughly address at the European Council. I speak of the refusals of the Poles and Italians to deliver the presumed perpetrators who, with the assault on Nord Stream, have attacked our critical infrastructure. Again is thereby brought home to us that the Federal government was exactly so little aware of the seriousness of the situation as it is today; since the willingness for a clarification simply appears not to be at hand. 

Or why do you commit yourself, Herr Merz – also on this not a word from you today – neither at the national nor at the European level to that the investigations of our General Federal Prosecutor be brought forward and the responsible perpetrators be punished with the full harshness of the law? It cannot be, Herr Merz, that supposed friends protect terrorists in Europe. Yes, now come again all the reasons why it is no longer wanted to buy gas from Russia. Yet it is not alone about that in this debate, Herr Spahn. 

            Jens Spahn (CDU/CSU): Putin’s party!

It is about the interest of Germany – which has been mislaid by all of you – about the interests of individual citizens, of the Mittelstand and, before all things, of the industry. 

            Jens Spahn (CDU/CSU): You should make a Russia insignia for yourself!

It is these which need pay the price for that through the high costs of energy, even so as for the cost of the inflation. German business invested 4 billion euros in the Nord Stream pipelines so they receive advantageous gas for our industry and the Mittelstand. You have destroyed all of that. 

For the emigration of those creating value, you have to take responsibility, Herr Chancellor. With all understanding that you have taken up a really heavy inheritance for that: You were cognizant and could know that your “autumn of reform”, as you announced it, will not be one. We have not even a mild puff of wind. The Mittelstand, of which here in this country much is always spoken, dies not easily, as I recently needed to read in a newspaper. This Mittelstand dies loud. If you by now still have not heard the shot, then I am really sorry for you. Then you are not the parties which make Politik for Germany. 

And still one sentence on Nord Stream. Here, it is also about namely the fundamentals. Should the presumed actors not be transferred, and you wait that out, you automatically invite an imitation. So far, by failure to implement applicable law were the domestic security and our social system endangered. Yet now here also the legal institutions are hindered. That needs to be solved politically.   

At the European Council, approach your Polish and Italian office partners. I still proceed on the basis that it is in the interest of the Poles and Italians to clarify this assault. 

Many hearty thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Markus Buchheit, October 8, 2025, Combustion Engine Verbot

EU Parliament, Strasbourg, P10 CRE REV(2025)10-08(3-0208-0000). 

Herr President, my valued ladies and gentlemen. 

In 2019, as the Green Deal stood directly in the starting blocks, and as Greta Thunberg here still strode through the meadow, we already had studies which said that we in the next years alone in Germany would lose 200,000 to 400,000 workplaces in the automobile industry, if it came to the Verbot of the combustion engine. Now we stand here again today, and the question is put: Man, the industry, it goes so badly; we just don’t know why it goes so badly. 

Herr colleague Wölken of the SPD: It goes badly for the industry because people like you want to represent an activating industrial policy, and it is called nothing other – the viewers may want to look at the previous video of colleague Wölken – than a planned economy. You want to interfere in the production management of individual firms, and that certainly cannot be. If here is brought in the examples of iphones and the accomplishment in relation to Nokia, of the horse and carriage and the setbacks of the automobile, then to all that can only be said: These projects, these technologies have succeeded – planned by free undertakings, demanded by free citizens. 

What we require is freedom, not still more planned economy, not still more Wölkens in this house here. We again need freedom for our businesses and for our citizens. In this sense: Away with this Verbot, yet also away with the fleet penalty payments! 

 

[trans: tem]

Michael Kaufmann, September 11, 2025, Research and Economy

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/21, p. 2096. 

Right honorable Herr President. Right honorable Frau Minister. Honorable colleagues. 

I have the impression that the governing delegations have placed this extra theme on the daily order in the current hour because they have nothing else to present. But let us look more closely. In your Hightech Agenda is initially one positive thing: You finally admit that we in many areas of research and innovation no longer stand at the top of the world, and that we in many fields are in danger of losing the connection. That is honest, and that distinguishes you from earlier governments which ever only spread the rally cry of carry on. Only he who unsparingly describes the starting point can at all achieve improvements. 

But then: Much paper, little plan. Your Hightech Agenda is full of programs, roadmaps and hubs, yet without clear measurable goals. Who wants to, can lose himself in this wasteland, but it does not indicate the way to the future. Just quite at the end, there will be a few more concrete – for all that – yet too few. Explanations of intention are no strategy. 

I do not want to contest that you have good intentions. Yet your euphoria I share not at all; for all of your predecessors have promised one thing: Dismantlement of bureaucracy. And what has happened each time? The opposite. Each year new prescriptions, new formulas, more bureaucracy. You, Union and SPD, have shown in the last 20 years that you cannot do bureaucracy dismantlement. Why should it this time suddenly be different? And, hand on heart: Have you ever dared in Moloch Brussels to defy a new bureaucracy? 

            Holger Mann (SPD): Come still to the theme?

And in regards the financing, there remains disillusionment. The means in the core budget stagnate for years, and a couple of billion euros of special debts alter nothing of that. You speak of a “big heave”. Yet where is it? With the 2025 and 2026 budgets, half of the legislature is already committed. 

            Florian Müller (CDU/CSU): Ja!

Thus when does the game-changer come? In the second half, or not at all? 

You yourselves speak of deficits in regards transfer from research to the economy – fully right. Yet you conceal the origins: Research in Germany, yes; foundings, no. In Germany, research still pays, but foundings long since no longer pay. The highest taxes, ruinous energy costs, bureaucracy without end. So long as it remains so, value creation emigrates to foreign lands. So long as you change nothing of that, your technology transfer remains an illusion. 

The fact is: Our research landscape is exploited so as to create value elsewhere. This is no longer allowed to remain so. You talk of gigafactories in Germany. But you tell me: Where actually is the announced megaplant for chips in Magdeburg? Not even the sponsored 10 million euro subvention could move Intel to this investment. 

            Holger Mann (SPD): You wanted it just so not!

And now gigfactories for giga euros, only with billions from the pocket of the taxpayers. Under today’s conditions, no energy-intensive plant comes to Germany. 

Without fundamental reform, your promises remain illusions. A change of the economy with you, honored colleagues of the CDU/CSU, is not for the making. That, you showed yesterday as in regards TOP 5 – Economic Change for Germany – precisely five CDU/CSU members sat in the plenary session. The Hightech Agenda should be your business plan for the future. Yet quite frankly: Would you approach a bank for credit with this paper? Ich nicht; since explanations of intention replace no concrete measures; vague sketches are no strategy. We need no colorful roadmaps. You need an authentic plan, and which I do not see here. 

            Stephan Albani (CSU/CSU): You need only use the eyes!

You’ve recognized many problems. That is the first step. But now you need to deliver; otherwise, our country’s future is in danger. And, for that, you bear the responsibility. 

Thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Volker Schnurrbusch, October 8, 2025, EU Digital Rules

EU Parliament, Strasbourg, P10 CRE-REV(2025)10-08(3-0217-0000). 

Frau President. Valued colleagues.

The core of the EU is the Common Market. Yet what does this Commission do? It builds one hurdle after another. It would be nice if we too had a Silicon Valley. Yet instead of complaining that a few U.S. firms dominate the tech market and the platforms, it would be the duty of the EU to promote the entrepreneurial spirit which first made this dominance possible. Why does the risk capital flow to California and Texas and not to Germany and France? Why do IT professionals emigrate from Asia to the U.S.A. and not here? Why do we experience the emigration of our programmers? 

Because this Commission is hostile to business and growth; because it constructs ever higher bureaucratic hurdles; because it understands the market not as the exchange of ideas but as something un-regulated which is to be surveilled. Thus it invents tools like the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act. The EU wants to control, it blocks entrepreneurial freedom, and it wants to censor freedom of opinion on the internet so that only its own propaganda will be spread, as in Roumania, as in Moldavia, as in Georgia, and lastly also in the Ukraine. We reject that. 

 

[trans: tem]

Michael Espendiller, September 16, 2025, Fiscal Policy, II

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/23, pp. 2316-2317. 

…We here in Germany need to do our household chores, and we require the money, much too much of which at the moment is being transferred to the European Union, in our own country. We therefore reduce our contribution to the EU by about 18 billion euros. And now one may call  me out, that it does not go, there are binding treaties. Then good, it agrees with the treaties. 

            Johannes Fechner (SPD): Ach!

Yet treaties are not laws of nature and can be changed. Best example: Margaret Thatcher, the “Iron Lady” of Great Britain. When it was very bad in her country, she negotiated with the EU and extracted the so-called “British rebate”. Great Britain thus every year saved billions in contributions to the EU. Why should that not also work for Germany? Germany is ultimately the largest net payer to the EU and the stability anchor in the euro area. When Germany falls, the euro also falls. And against this background, we are very optimistic that the EU would prefer to agree with Germany rather than lose us completely. It thus may go, if one really wants to. 

Where do we save? The Federal government provides a large portion of its new debts for military expenditures. As you know, we have ever criticized the bad equipment of the Bundeswehr and committed ourselves in recent years to corresponding budget increases. Yet the present Federal government here exceeds every reasonable measure and schedules for this year debt-financed increases which, in fact, it simply cannot expend this year. For this reason, we in an AfD budget expend 10.7 billion euros less for military spending and thereby come to a total outlay in the defense area of 76.9 billion euros. And that is again very much money. Yet also in the following years, the Federal government in the military area simply wants to expend too much and too quickly. Decades-long shortcomings plainly cannot be compensated with a wave of the hand. 

Yet you not only thereby worsen Germany’s position, but also with delivery of military material to the Ukraine. In 2025, you want to spend all of 8.7 billion euros for the weapons deliveries to the Ukraine. And these costs we eliminate completely. You only prolong the unnecessary dying in the Ukraine. Besides, the Ukrainians themselves have meanwhile grasped this, which is why the number of deserters ever further increases. Yet that interests no one in the government, because reason is on vacation. 

Less reasonable besides are the exorbitant costs for a misguided climate policy. We do not at all save the climate with the deconstruction of industry in Germany. Here too, the red pencil. And we therefore can save with the elimination of the senseless climate projects of the climate and transformation funds around 37.6 billion euros, and indeed completely. 

Still what? The Sozial budget of Bärbel Bas is next, which blows up in our faces. It is absolutely right that we support the pension account with tax monies. That, our pensioners after a life of hard work have honestly earned. Yet it is wrong that we extend it, at the cost of the working middle, to millions of Bürgergeld recipients who are fully capable of earning. 

            Johannes Fechner (SPD): That’s just not right! What nonsense                                                are you then telling?

Moreover, it thus comes to that around 50 percent of the Bürgergeld recipients have a foreign citizenship. That is further evidence for the uncontrolled mass immigration into our social system. By means of a corresponding adjustment of our laws, we may end this social injustice, and here save an additional 14.6 billion euros. 

And still more money is to be found in the Federal budget: One billion euros as a “reconciliation payment” to Namibia can, for various reasons, go. 

In regards the political foundations, we eliminate means to the sum of 444 million euros. In addition, the Federal government plans to expend one billion euros for the performance of integration courses. The driver’s license in Germany needs to be paid by oneself; we can thus expect a German course will be paid by oneself if then one wants to have the German citizenship. 

The Union-led Federal government in addition herein continues to breed its own political opponents and carry on the financing of the leftist “Democracy Lives” programs. With its abolition, we save an additional 200 million euros. 

This and much more we can eliminate and, except for a few lobby groups, no one in Germany would notice. 

Yet what millions of people in Germany would notice in the purse are the reliefs of our AfD budget, the key points of which I want to here go into. 

We are of the opinion that the present climate policy damages the economic position and burdens the consumers with charges. The CO₂ price and the CO₂ emissions trade we therefore eliminate completely. 

And the trucking fee we cut by around 2.25 billion euros so as to lower the transportation costs in Germany. Everyone who drives to work with an auto, or who plans the next large purchase for the family, will notice that in the supermarket balance. These alone are 23 billion euros of relief for the consumers in Germany. 

And while we’re especially on the families: When both parent spouses are earning so as to feed the family and somehow pay for their own home, the budget account also suffers under the enormously high non-wage costs [Lohnnebenkosten]. This money does not at all land in one’s own account, but goes directly to the state. In our finance planning, enough money is available so that we can stabilize the social security system with 7.7 billion euros. This would prevent that in this year the contribution rate and with it the non-wage costs increase, and that keeps workplaces in Germany. 

Yet not only duties, but also taxes we in our AfD budget can properly save. Alone in regards the wages tax, that is one billion euros. With the income tax, we come to around two billion euros on top of that.  And the enormous burden on our Mittelstand we can reduce with three billion euros in the corporate tax. And the solidarity surtax with 12.45 billion euros we can completely eliminate. Work shall again pay. 

And we also want that good earners continue to remain in the country and plainly not – as presently – in large numbers of around 200,000 men and women each year leave our country, and thereby as contribution- and tax-payers permanently fall out of our social system. 

By means of the lowering of the CO₂ duty and the wage tax, together with the other measures, the small earners at the same time will be relieved by us, so that they can again live from their own income. 

All together, we relieve the citizens with 66.1 billion euros in our draft budget. That is impressive! 

In sum: Saving is something for the advanced. We have shown there is an alternative to limitless debt creation, and put forward a reform budget which we will also still further construct. We are convinced: This is the draft which Germany now needs, and which has what it takes to kindle a dynamic and again bring our economy into the running. 

The AfD is ready, and we hope the Union soon gives up its failed experiment with the SPD so as to include itself in the rescue mission for our country. We can, simply and profoundly, no longer afford this firewall. 

 

[trans: tem]

Michael Espendiller, September 16, 2025, Fiscal Policy, I

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/23, pp. 2314-2316. 

Right honorable Frau President. Right honorable colleagues. Dear spectators in the hall and at the screens. 

The budget consultations for the 2025 Federal budget lay behind us, and for us in the AfD Bundestag delegation, in regards these consultations, was precisely one, single question decisive: How can we financially relieve the citizens and the economy. For this of all is exactly the decisive question: What can we do for the citizens and the economy so as to finally relieve them from the high taxes and duties. This question we need to answer. And for my delegation, I can say: We have answered this question. 

Seen fiscally, the essence of our state, simply said, rests on two pillars. That is for one, the demography; and that is for the other, a functioning economy with sufficient jobs. 

As everyone in the country knows, the demographic development has for us as a state long since slipped away. The birthrate in the year 2024 has again fallen, and currently lies at 1.35 children which a woman has on average in Germany. That means for our levy-financed pension system, sufficient contribution payers are no longer available. And that, in turn, means that at some time sufficient people will no longer be there who generate for our people their pensions. 

For the pension is plainly no credit, but one pays with his contributions the pensions of others, and indeed in the hope that later, when one is himself at pension age, the younger may generate the pension for oneself. That this at some time for Germany becomes a problem is for long recognized. And for just as long was nothing actually done about it. Yet the day of the Big Bang is meanwhile no longer at a far distance, but one can now already very well see it. 

The 2025 Federal budget pension grant runs to, believe it or not, 134.4 billion euros. That corresponds to 25.8 percent of expenditures from the core budget; thus, an entire quarter. Taken from the total tax revenue of the Federal government, the quota for the pension grant contributes even 34.7 percent. That is to say, that from the entire tax revenue of the Bund, every third euro flows as an added contribution into the Pension Insurance. And we speak not of an upper, luxury pension, but of a pension level of 48 percent. 

In that the demography has long since slipped away from us, we are therein reliant on that the second pillar of our system functions: The economy. Without a properly running economy which offers enough jobs, I also have no more contribution payers who finance the pensions of our seniors, and I also have no more tax revenue from which every third euro can be stuck in the pension. 

In regards the health contribution, there is besides exactly the same basic problem; which is namely financed also by contribution payers. When we in Germany have fewer jobs, then we have fewer contributions for our sickness insurance, and then arise also the financing gaps. Since the number of insured and of treatments do not, ja, decrease. On the contrary, also here, everything becomes more expensive. Alone in the statutory sickness insurance in the coming year, 6.3 billion euros are lacking. In the year after, 12 billion are lacking, the year after 18 billion, and at the end of the legislature it is 24 billion euros. 

These holes I can either fill by which I increase the contribution amount for the insured. That would however make more expensive the labor factor which now already is no longer at a competitive price. Or I need also here again to go with tax money. 

The situation is in any case dramatic, and we are directly in a rapidly intensifying fiscal crisis. For us as the AfD delegation is it thereby clear as sunshine that a reasonable Politik needs now set everything, without compromise, on the stimulation of the economy, since that which in no case may happen is that still more jobs are lost to us which would have a consequence that we have still fewer contribution payers for our pension and sickness insurance systems. 

We in the AfD have told you all of this in the last ten years here, and said what you need do so as to prevent this downfall. Yet you did not want to listen. I have still well before my eyes the statements of the political competitors and of the mainstream press that the evil AfD paints the devil on the wall and with fear-mongering hunts for votes. That would certainly not at all agree with the bad economic situation. – Yet we knew that we were right. You needed to concede that this summer, since the Federal Statistics Office has subjected its numbers since 2008 to a “reappraisal”, and – hoopla! – it at once came out that we since 2023 are not in a situation of economic stagnation, but are stuck knee-deep in a recession. That which was plainly just Fake News has thus now become reality. 

During this phase of statistical denial of reality, valuable time has been lost in our country. The last three years, thus the time of the Ampel  government, was the time that the rudder in Germany would have been able, and needed to be, turned about. It needs be said quite clearly: Now for some comes any help too late; and from now on, it becomes really unpleasant; since the money is gone. It is gone, and it does not come again. 

The country’s citizens are fully right to rage over that. Yet the hard reality is: It helps not at all. We need to so deal with this situation as it now is, and here we all again sit in the same boat, whether one wants that or not. 

With our programmatic approaches we could in the last budget years still achieve savings relatively easily. Yet for us now will it become more difficult. Precisely here besides, the good, old debt brake would now come strongly to bear. Since it forces politicians who simply cannot say no to nevertheless give consideration to where one could then save, and what of all could then be structurally changed. 

            Markus Frohnmaier (AfD): So it is!

This Federal government freed itself from this constraint, as you know, with its debt putsch and unashamedly piled up the most crass indebtedness which this country has ever seen. Yet we of the AfD delegation have ourselves further enjoined this same restraint and maintain in our budget plan the original debt brake. 

And despite that, we would relieve the citizens and the economy. How do we do this? We have presented a total of 1,000 motions to amend the Federal budget: In Herr Klingbeil’s draft budget, we can dispense with 111 billion euros from his state expenditures in this year. 

Where then do we see the greatest savings potential? Let us begin with the payments to the European Union. In the 2025 draft budget, the Federal government plans payments in the sum of 33.7 billion euros to Brussels. This EU payment shall next year rise a further 14 billion euros to 47.7 billion euros – quite as if money here in Germany simply grows on trees. Yet each year there flows back to Germany just some 12 billion euros. And thus we finance every year with two-figure billions in contributions to whichever bureaucrat who regulates our cucumbers and deposit bottle caps. And from that, we have purely nothing. 

Far worse is that the EU in addition also wants to destroy our automobile sector with a combustion engine Verbot. 3.2 million jobs are here in play. What that means for our country, I have plainly explained to you. 

While the German economy thus shrinks, we in addition subsidize with our EU contributions our EU neighboring countries to which our firms now emigrate. Inquire for once at Schöneck in the Vogtland how one finds it that the firm TechniSat closes its plant there, all co-workers are laid off, and the production will now be shifted to Poland – and that, after the co-workers there for 33 long years have performed truly good work. 

That may no longer continue...

[trans: tem]

René Aust, September 10, 2025, State of the European Union

EU Parliament, Strasbourg, P10 CRE-REV (2025)09-10(3-0025-0000). 

Frau President. 

Europe, that was once a dream: A continent in which families could win by work a house of their own; a continent which was the motor of worldwide progress; a Europe in which women could live safely, the poor were secured by good sozial legislation, and young people had the opportunity to build by their own work a good life. 

Yet this dream has been destroyed by politicians like Angela Merkel and Ursula von der Leyen. While the world economy grew and new markets arose, Europe regressed. Who wants to know why, he need only attend again to the previous speech of Ursula von der Leyen. Not a single time did she mention the core of the market economy – business freedom – but, for that, a central planned program of billions – bureaucracy from above to below. Yet prosperity arises through work, through innovation, through entrepreneurial courage, not through Ursula von der Leyen’s five-year plan. 

And in the migration policy, the dreams of Europe have been severely damaged. Enrichment was promised. The reality: Knife attacks, terrorism, rape, drug gangs from Spain, Italy, through Germany to Rotterdam and Malmö. And in Brussels, where the EU ever still preaches diversity, the Belgian government seriously considers an army mission so as to at all be able to protect the capital city from the violence of migrant gangs. 

And Frau von der Leyen? She ever still speaks in melodious marketing phrases. She speaks of unity on our own continent. Which however will only be when finally on this continent the persecution of opposition ceases. In Roumania, elections were rescinded; in France and Germany, candidates were excluded from elections. 

If you want unity, then we need to return to democracy and freedom of opinion. On that account, we say: Yes to industrial workplaces which emit CO₂; no to chat controls and censorship; yes to remigration in all of Europe, and no to Ursula von der Leyen. 

 

[trans: tem]

 

Sergej Minich, July 10, 2025, Digitalization and CDU

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/18, pp. 1807-1808. 

Right honorable Herr President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen. 

The Federal government has created a new ministry for digitalization and state modernization. The plans sound great: Less bureaucracy, more tempo, finally digital, the lean state as a goal. 

Yet how exactly should that be implemented? Citizens shall surrender their data just once, the so-called Once Only Principle. That means once I report my address or my income to the office, then the state itself should then pass it on – sounds logical, sounds good. The truth however is: The authorities have different standards. I still need to give it multiple times: Once for the taxes, once for parents funds and once for housing funds. That is no digitalization, that is data ping-pong. And it costs us, according to internal estimates, over one billion euros every year because everything runs in duplicate and triplicate. 

Digital administration – such a nice theme; it was mentioned – promised for years, that all can be settled on-line: Building permission, Kindergeld, re-registration. And what have we today? Instead of on-line service, many citizens receive a pdf for printing. That is like “say digital, but deliver by stagecoach.” Only around 100 of over 500 benefits are really digital. The goal was ruinously missed. And hundreds of millions of euros were put into advisors, platforms, projects which scarcely anyone uses. 

The same with bureaucracy deconstruction – it was mentioned today. The new Minister says: We make the administration simpler. How shall that go? New projects, new platforms, new rules, yet no real simplification. A start-up in Berlin requires 26 forms and five office visits. In Estonia: One click, 15 minutes, done. In Germany, one application lasts a week – with luck. 

And then there’s the matter of the money. The State Modernization branch has been approved for 150 new posts. 

            Ronja Kemmer (CDU/CSU): Those are not new!

Many of them are still unoccupied. And where positions are unoccupied, external consultants are retrieved for a lot of money. After months, there are also interim bureaus. By the time you become able to act, we have the next election, and you again have achieved nothing! 

            Ronja Kemmer (CDU/CSU): Such rubbish!

It was desired to set up a new IT concept. Cost: Over four million euros. Result: It is not practical. The consultancy firms rejoice; they earned four million – for nothing. That is not progress, that is a squandering. 

The fiberglass construction should by the end of the year, thus 2025, reach 50 percent. We can gladly wager on whether you still reach it. We have a Ministry which wants much, but does little; a Ministry which wants to save, yet incinerates money; and a Ministry which wants to modernize, yet remains clinging to an old bureaucracy. “State Modernization” is not allowed to remain a slogan. We require clear data standards, mandatory [verbindliche] goals and, before all, consequences if things don’t work. For the state belongs to the citizens – you are only service providers – and they deserve something better than your expensive promises without effect. 

Herr Wildberger, perhaps just a small tip: In this coalition, you simply have not a chance. Previously, all of this coalition’s election promises were broken. Why should it be different with you? 

Dear Union, you act as if you were for the first time in government. In that regard, you however are guilty: In the Merkel years, you turned Germany into a digital developing country. 

Many thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Michael Espendiller, July 8, 2025, Fiscal Policy

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 21/16, pp. 1449-1451. 

Right honorable Frau President. Right honorable colleagues. Dear audience in the hall and at the screens. 

Governments can be voted out, but not debts. Alone in this year, the black-red Federal government plans with its budget new debts in the sum of 143.1 billion euros. That means that every fourth euro which is over-spent from this Federal budget comes from new debts, thus from money which we certainly do not have, and also to which no income is matched [gegenüberstehen]; since to the planned total budget in a sum of 564.3 billion euros, there is matched a total income of only 421.4 billion euros. Serious appears otherwise, Herr Klingbeil. 

In the mid-term finance planning to 2029, thus in the next four years, it appears worse. Black-red will here take up overall new debts in a sum of 846.9 billion euros, almost one trillion euros in just four years. Herren Merz and Klingbeil will thereby increase the current indebtedness within one election cycle by a whopping 50 percent. They have thereby even topped all the horror calculations which we here have queued-up, following your coup d’état of a Basic Law alteration with the voted-out Bundestag. Were the Union in the opposition, an outcry would go through the country. Axel Springer would fire from all barrels and the downfall of this country within the briefest time would be prophesied. 

Yet Friedrich Merz is Chancellor, he who longed to be a Chancellor of change, who however unfortunately wants only to be an extern Chancellor. Thus everything remains quiet as a mouse. All look away, stick the head in the sand. Many think: He hopefully will know what he is doing. Others are simply paralyzed and doubt the reality. It is the monstrosity of this indebtedness which basically nips in the bud every criticism. Who willingly places himself against such a huge tsunami? Now, to that, there is an answer. We do it, once more the only ones in this country. We, the AfD Bundestag delegation, decisively oppose this madness, are against this financial policy run amok. This mountain of debt is not without an alternative. 

Yes, the problems in this country are great: A decaying infrastructure, a healthcare system on the verge of collapse, ever further climbing costs of the social security system. And the economy finds itself, despite well-tempered, kiss-kiss summer selfies, ever still in decline. Yet all of this need be no permanent situation. What we now require is a clear analysis of our spending policy. For what do we spend money? Which purpose does this thus pursue? Do we thereby at all achieve this purpose? Is there not also another way? We need thus to ask ourselves in regards each, single budget item: Is it required? Need that really be? And then we of course need the courage to say: That can go, that we no longer do; since we are simply no longer able to manage that. We can thus arrive at an authentic budget consolidation and thus again enable the state to effectively concentrate itself on its core duties. 

We require fundamental structural reforms, and need to finally stop just talking about deconstruction of bureaucracy, and finally do it. Our economy, our doctors, our teachers, all are oppressed by a flood of prescripts which take from them the joy in their work. The work ethic [Arbeitsmoral] in Germany is grounded. 

            Kathrin Michel (SPD): By you!

It is aground due to the daily, massive, bureaucratic tutelage with which the people need to struggle, and which costs our economy billions, and brings purely nothing. 

Although everyone knows this, continually come new prescripts and regulations. Why actually did not the government for once get started with that before it started the debts torpedo? Instead, Friedrich Merz travels through world history and devotes himself to the pet projects of all the other parties: Give away billions in tax money to foreign countries and the EU. And the finishing touch on that is the Chancellor wants to buy with the new mega-debts 43 billion euros worth of weapons for the Ukraine, while in this country the promised electricity tax reduction still does not yet come for the citizens. That is an absolute insolence against the working middle of this country, and it is evidence of an incapability that you here again have broken your word. 

Still more: It is a fatal signal that the seriousness of the situation in Germany and the signs of the time are ever still not acknowledged. If we want to get our economy underway, then we need to really unchain it. We need to reduce the taxes for citizens and business, and that permanently. Every euro which the state loosens from the citizen in excess taxes reduces the motivation [Leitsungsbereitschaft] of every, single individual. Why should one strain himself if from his own work so little remains; that one asks himself whether work at all still pays? And should one do overtime when the state withholds half the pay, and then spends it for dubious NGOs, or the clothing worn by Georgine Kellermann? 

The worst is: A large part of the Union quite precisely knows all of this. Presumably, many even agree with me – secretly, of course. Yet as a result of the decision to enter into a coalition with the SPD, Germany now receives a red-red-green Politik. That looks very nice to the Greens’ present lack of concepts. All that they have imagined in their most daring dreams will now be implemented by black-red. 

They certainly no longer know what they still should say all day long. Yet this red-red-green socialism, the people in the country have voted out. The German have voted for a fundamental change of course. They have voted for financial policy stability, and issued a refusal to the further-so of the downfall. 

The Union basically misplayed it. Yet we will well set it right. We rejoice at the pending budget consultations, and once again stand ready with many good proposals for making Germany better. 

Many thanks for the attention. 

 

[trans: tem]