Alexander Sell, March 12, 2025, Automobile Industry

EU Parliament, Strasbourg, P10 CRE-REV(2025)03-12(3-0110-0000). 

Frau President. 

Five years ago, Frau von der Leyen presented here the Green Deal; Europe should become the first climate-neutral continent. Greta Thunberg would now say: We are on a good way. For years declines the CO₂ output in Germany. Yet that is primarily due to the regressing industrial production. The steel, chemical and automobile industries are no longer competitive on account of higher duties and much too expensive energy. 

The result is massive profit breakdowns and job cuts. Thirty percent less profit at Mercedes and Volkswagen, 35,000 positions eliminated at Volkswagen, up to 300,000 workplaces in the entire automobile industry. Especially wrong is: As a result of the EU’s arbitrarily set climate goals, European automakers will be forced to buy CO₂ certificates from Chinese competitors so as to avoid penalties from Brussels. We thus finance the rise of China and the sell-out of our industry. 

The Commission is responsible for this industrial policy harakiri of Europe. Frau von der Leyen and her CDU are a danger for the competitiveness and prosperity of Germany and Europe. Here helps no course corrections, here helps only voting out of office.

 

[trans: tem]

Dirk Brandes, December 5, 2024, Aviation and CDU

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/203, p. 26322. 

Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen. 

This motion rather impressively shows what kind of green child the Union has become. The CDU is not only the party of the bungled energy transition, of the ban on combustion engines, and of illegal migration; the CDU as of now is also responsible for the decline of the aviation branch in Germany. 

            Björn Simon (CDU/CSU): That is just nonsense! You propose nothing!                                Zero!

In your motion, you demand more strongly promoting climate-neutral flying. What is climate-neutral flying? I fear some soon fly out of the parliament climate-neutral. Yet we do not thereby bring forward the aviation branch. Your 15 point motion reads like a position paper of the Greens. With money from the aviation tax and the CO₂ pricing, you want to drive forward the de-carbonization. Yet a few weeks ago, you complained that German aviation finds itself in the worst crisis, and now you want to redistribute still more money in climate projects. 

We now have a brief window of time so as to reduce with parliamentary majorities the costs for aviation. 

            Michael Donth (CDU/CSU): For that, there is no majority!

Yet what does the CDU/CSU do out of fear that the AfD could put this thing to a vote? I say to you: Out of pure panic, you form a backroom coalition with the SPD and Greens. 

            Stefan Gelbhaar (Greens): Boring!

You paralyze this parliament and stuff the daily order with alibi motions! 

            Götz Frömming (AfD): Right! Well reckoned!

With your firewall, you continue to prevent a policy for the future. You are not part of the solution for this country but, with your Habeck friend Merz, you are presently the biggest problem for Germany. 

We want no aviation tax, no kerosene tax, and no CO₂ pricing. If you want to ruin the CDU and CSU traditional parties, that is your matter. Nevertheless, stop mimicking the innovation driver. You have already with your e-mobility led the automobile branch into crisis. I believe that suffices. 

The AfD would now drive forward innovation and progress. We Germans were once the pioneers of aviation and automobiles. With you, we are just pioneers of bureaucracy and ideology. That will change, ladies and gentlemen; that, I promise you. The voters will decide wisely. 

I wish you a good night. 

 

[trans: tem]

Thomas Ehrhorn, December 5, 2024, Combustion Engine and CDU

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/203, pp. 26313-26314. 

Frau President. Ladies and gentlemen. 

Those who are committed not without ifs and buts to the continuation of the combustion engine have quite obviously taken leave of all principles of the free market economy. They are the true gravediggers of our erstwhile healthy economy. Who asks, How do the saboteurs of German prosperity appear?, to them I need say: Look around you, they sit everywhere. 

Canan Bayram (Greens): Primarily with you!

They sit on the government bench, they of course sit in the chair of Frau von der Leyen currently under suspicion of corruption in Brussels, and they sit in the ranks of the CDU/CSU with their firewall fetish, who in the future will well represent the interests of BlackRock rather than the interests of  our own country. 

            Michael Roth (CDU/CSU): Just speak for Russia!

In any case, it should be clear that it is also and particularly the CDU/CSU which unperturbed holds fast to the policy of harm for our people. And so the here presented motion of the CDU/CSU is nothing other than the shabby attempt of political con men and fraudsters to give rise to the impression that one still supposedly wants to maintain the combustion engine. Thus is presented to us the idea of creating a new class of vehicles which operates with climate-friendly e-fuels, and which shall technically exclude the use of conventional fuels. Yet from where the new fuel shall come in sufficient quantity, the ladies and gentlemen of the CDU/CSU themselves obviously do not know. The only thing which occurs to them is to demand a new strategy to somehow accelerate the market launch. OK. 

Against the step-by-step transfer to e-fuels, if there were then affordable prices, would basically nothing be opposed. Yet so long as there is not, an operation of combustion engines with conventional fuels would self-evidently need to continue to be possible. Yet precisely that will be technically prevented, as is quite well known, with the new e-fuels only class. And you quite precisely know that. Nevertheless, we will vote for your motion on account of a few correct approaches in your most disingenuous paper. Who however wants to read a clearly formulated acknowledgment of the combustion engine, finds that exclusively in a motion of the AfD – as usual. Therefore I say: Who votes CDU, votes for the decline of the the auto industry. Who votes Merz, votes for BlackRock. Only who votes AfD, votes for a better future. 

            Michael Roth (CDU/CSU): …votes for Russia!

Many thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Tino Chrupalla, October 28, 2024, Electro-mobility

AfD Kompakt, October 28, 2024. 

Politicians and and short-sighted business functionaries have hastily and one-sidedly decided for the electro-mobility. This decision does not correspond to the wish of the consumers and to the well-being of the workers. The economic war against the east leads to high energy prices and harms Germany as a business venue [Standort Deutschland]. So as to save the works, politics and business need to change the strategy. The recipe reads: Openness to technology, realistic limit values and advantageous energy. 

[trans: tem]

Joachim Wundrak, April 11, 2024, Arctic Strategy

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/163, pp. 21013-21014. 

Frau President. Ladies and gentlemen. 

Herr Dr. Stegner, I remain in constructive cooperation and collaboration here in this sovereign house. 

The economic and security policy importance of the Arctic region for Germany and Europe is regularly underestimated – plainly also by the Federal government. So accentuated the Federal government in an answer to a minor inquiry, that Germany’s interests in the Arctic have been primarily directed to climate and environmental policy. Yet the rich reserves of oil and gas of this region can also in the future essentially contribute to a more secure energy supply for Germany. In addition, there are at hand large deposits of valuable metals like copper, nickel and zinc, as well as rare earths, which can make a significant contribution to covering the raw materials needs of our industry. 

The guidelines of the German Arctic policy of 2019 are not fundamentally distinct from those of 2013. There were therein exhibited not any concrete steps in regards the implementation of economic and energy policy interests. Beyond that, Germany as a continental middle power and export nation needs to have a strategic interest in secure and usable maritime routes in the Arctic area. 

It is not to be wondered that competing great power interests in this region again establish an increasing military presence and activity. Thus the U.S.A. for its Thule base in Greenland concluded already in 2018 a new, well-endowed use agreement. Russia also constructs its military support points in the Arctic and carries out large exercises there. The already mentioned Arctic policy guidelines of the Federal government on the contrary reject any militarization of the Arctic. Nevertheless, the Bundeswehr for some years increasingly takes part in military exercises in the region. 

It is obvious that the present geo-strategic developments especially increase the Arctic’s importance for Germany’s security and prosperity. This enormous economic potential of the Arctic is not acknowledged by the Federal government and consequently not sufficiently taken into account in the practical policy. 

We thus demand [Drucksache 20/10972] of the Federal government to develop a new, integrated Arctic strategy which distinctly defines and pursues Germany’s interests, especially the energy policy and economic interests. As an observer at the Arctic Council and in the Arctic Security Forces Roundtable, Germany should moreover use its influence in the region to prevent a further escalation due to the increasing military activities. 

Germany should more intensively contribute to strengthening the Arctic Council and to solving security questions in regards the Arctic by means of dialogue and diplomacy. Beyond that, Germany should actively participate in the international Arctic forums like the Arctic Security Forces Roundtable, the Euro-Arctic Barents Sea Council, the Arctic Circle, the Arctic Economic Council and the Arctic Frontiers. And finally Germany should strengthen its diplomatic engagement in the Arctic by the naming of a German commissioner with rank of ambassador. What is right for the south seas should all the more apply for the far more relevant Arctic. 

I thank you for your attention. 

            Ulrich Lechte (FDP): We’ve understood that!

 

[trans: tem]

 

Dirk Spaniel, December 1, 2023, Auto Industry and Combustion Engine

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/142, pp. 18008-18009. 

Right honorable Frau President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen. 

I also rejoice over this debate. It is always important to remind the Federal Transportation Minister of his public promises and of his presentation that he is the saviour of the combustion engine. I however believe – and here I clearly share your opinion – that this will not happen. This Transportation Minister will enter into the history of the Federal Republic of Germany as the one who not only has taken from the automobile driver the affordable auto, but also the existence foundation from the German auto industry. 

Let us begin with the auto industry. The German auto industry – it cannot be said otherwise – is at the abyss. This leads to citations from Volkswagen, a large German concern, which acknowledges itself to no longer be competitive in the supplier industry, and to a raising of eyebrows in the populace. Yet it is in fact a public confession of the failure that your policy of subvention of electro-mobility obviously does not matter to the manufacturers. The production of vehicles in Germany has receded in this year from five million to 3.5 million vehicles. That is a failure of this government. You have not managed to bring about the transformation. 

It is however not only a failure of this government, it is also a slap against the auto driver himself. We have the problem in this country that the people buy no electro-autos because they are plainly impractical as a first vehicle and are not useful. That means, electro-mobility occurs where there are two or three vehicles in the parking lot, or simply in the small car sector as a third vehicle. That is the reality; all of the experts say it to you. 

It is an affront to demand at an auto summit of the auto industry that one should now please manufacture small cars and cheap electro-vehicles. Are we here in socialism? Nein, we are not; we have overcome that, even if you again want to go back to it. It’s bad that you participate in that. It is really bad. 

What then is the result when we in Germany promote cheap electro-mobility? What will that then cause? It will bring about, exactly so as in regards the solar industry, that we will promote Chinese and other foreign concerns with German tax money. German taxpayers, German employees, support with these subventions the abolition of their own workplaces. That is your policy. We are against that; we do not participate in that. 

Now I come just briefly to your motion. Your motion basically means the same thing as we brought in here to the Bundestag five years ago. Five years ago, we pushed for that there be a credit on the fleet limit values. The Transportation Minister was then Herr Scheuer from your delegation. He however did not commit himself in Europe that it happen. That unfortunately needs be said. Today, you join in, five years too late. The principal problem with your motion is: It comes five years too late. And because you thus come too late, what you here demand will thus no longer be feasible on the timeline where it may take effect. 

We have now in Europe a situation in which industry requires planning security. We know that electro-mobility is a chimera, at least in general. That, we all know; at least the reasonable side of the plenum knows that. The fact is that we now require a solution. The solution however cannot be to now again start up the synthetic fuels as you demand it. Nein, the solution must be to set aside this senseless ban on the combustion engine on the European level, or at least postpone it for ten years. Otherwise, we have a disaster for our industry and for the people in this country. All else is an irresponsible policy. And I expect from you of the government that you finally accept this and that you go this way at the European level. 

Many thanks.

 

[trans: tem]

Dirk Spaniel, October 19, 2023, Electric Vehicle Subvention

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/131, p. 16445. 

Frau President. Right honorable viewers and listeners. Right honorable colleagues. 

As I read the motion, dear colleagues of the Union, I needed to look twice, whether it really came from you. 

            Klaus Wiener (CDU/CSU): It is printed on the upper left 

This is at the least an open coalition offer to the Greens. Here you want to maintain or again introduce the subventions for electro-mobility. 

Tilman Kuban (CDU/CSU, turned to the Greens delegation): You could just vote in favor!

Now you certainly know – you have already written it in your motion – that these subventions so far have indeed not worked. How then do you actually want to introduce with a motion something which has not worked? You yourselves write in this motion that there is mis-use, that we have promoted vehicles which were sold off in foreign countries, which we here in this country do not have in our fleet of vehicles. You write this in your motion. 

When we since 2016 so far promote electro-mobility with 10 billion euros

            Stephan Brandner (AfD): Madness!

and have just 1.2 million vehicles in this country, then it needs for once be asked: What actually is awry here? And then you want to knock out by 2026 six billion euros for the charging infrastructure. I want to say to you here: It can be believed that climate change is hindered with German tax money; you do that. We do not believe that German tax money hinders, stops or in some way influences the climate change. Yet you believe it. Yet if it is believed, then one cannot nevertheless proceed and senselessly incinerate so much money. Electro-mobility’s CO₂ avoidance costs per ton of CO₂ – the Scientific Service of the German Bundestag says this – are from 800 to 1,000 euros per ton of CO₂ – 800 to 1,000 euros! In European emissions trading we are at approximately 80, 90 euros per ton. That is to say: You buy the ton of CO₂ avoidance at ten times the expense that it actually needs to be. For that, you can easily do away with the coal power plant CO₂, and indeed ten times as much. There, we are at 65 euros per tons of CO₂. You want the dumbest thing that can be  done with German tax money: You want the promotion of electro-mobility. 

The FDP besides ought to know better. They commissioned an estimation according to which it is even 2,300 euros per ton. That is to say: All of you here know: What you are doing here does not serve CO₂ reduction, does not serve the climate change. What you are doing serves for the impoverishment of the German population. 

The employment of your methods is absolutely unsuitable for reducing the CO₂ emissions, and it is absolutely unsuitable for making the population accustomed to electro-mobility. Most, 70 percent of users of electric vehicles, use this vehicle as a second vehicle. What you are doing is socially unjust. You redistribute tax money so that people who gladly want to have an electric auto as a second or third auto will have it in the future. 

That also applies to business. The well-to-do business can do it, and the poor, the not so well-to-do business cannot do it. All essentially use the electric vehicle not as a first vehicle but essentially as a second vehicle. Thus the method which you employ here is completely wrong. 

Ladies and gentlemen, when one is headed in the wrong direction, then one does not go faster – which you here want – but turns around. Electro-mobility is a wrong way. We are of the opinion that here you should rationally use the tax money. Preferably exert yourselves to achieve the CO₂ avoidance, when we at all do it in this country, with synthetic fuels, with openness to technology, which you besides are always preaching, dear colleagues. That should be our way. I can assure you of one thing: There will still be the combustion engine when your policy long since no more exists. 

Many thanks.

  

[trans: tem]

 

 

 

Wolfgang Wiehle, September 21, 2023, Railways Administration

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/122, pp. 15143-15144. 

Right honorable Frau President. Valued colleagues. 

There are almost 200 ways how the Bund finances the Bahn. That was computed for us in the last months. I have understood that as a warning, that this complexity is a problem. A good Bahn reform should drastically simplify that. And now the government lays on the table before us a law which makes of these 200 ways probably 250 or 300. If you want to demonstrate that you cannot do Bahn reform, then you have thereby really succeeded. 

Yes, all of that will be later improved, you will say. Yet on a bad foundation you can build no good house and this fatal failure you clearly make again – colleague Donth just now used the same image. The analysis thus needs to agree. Decisive for an effective and transparent direction of the Bahn is the legal form of the Bahn undertakings. The new infrastructure company shall now again be a joint-stock company. That is a legacy from the time of the Bahn stock market plan, and that is the worst of all possibilities for control by the owners. 

Today the Federal railways construction law is on the daily order. By means of this law, the Bahn shall in the future receive money not only for the construction of the Bahn sections but also for their maintenance and repair. Yet that does not always apply, but only when there is an extra contract between Bund and Bahn. Otherwise, you apparently do not manage control of the Bahn. If you now make a new contract for each new measure, then we are soon at 300 ways of financing. 

The Audit Authority moreover sounds the alarm because the Transportation Ministry in another contract proposes hectic changes which could result in a disadvantage to the Bund. Here, it is about the performance and financing agreement which with an authentic Bahn reform will necessarily be, plain and simply, superfluous. 

A couple of new Bahn billions in the Transportation budget, then still a couple of billions from the shadow budget “climate and transformation fund”, additional billions as equity of the Deutschen Bahn: What you tie up here crowns the financial chaos. 

Because the money still does not suffice, you get it from the citizens, all the same whether the trains run or not. Yes, from the citizens; since we all must pay for the billions of your brutal increase of the trucking fee. Everything that we buy in the supermarket ultimately comes by truck. 

            Matthais Gastel (Greens): What?

One already reads in the media how thereby the prices of foodstuffs climb. The inflation will be still higher and the citizens still poorer. 

We require an authentic Bahn reform and that is something other than your bungled job. Who does it fundamentally, gives the Bahn and its subsidiaries a new legal form. Yet you need to enforce it against the great red union at the Bahn. The Bund as owner needs to take in hand the direction of the railway networks. The Politik is responsible for the infrastructure. Period. And for that, the Bund needs to clearly command the firms’ rail network, not by umpteen contracts, but by one, unequivocal structure. 

The Federal railways construction law now goes to committee. The AfD delegation clearly names the problem. Because the wrangling in the Ampel is not less than the chaos at the Bahn, hopes for an improvement are however limited. We will in no case vote for your adventurous cobbling [abenteuerlichen Flickschusterei] as it now stands in the draft law.

 

[trans: tem]

 

 

Alice Weidel, August 16, 2023, Olaf Scholz

AfD Kompakt, August 16, 2023. 

In Germany, failure of the state has a name: Olaf Scholz! The result of the latest survey of the German people’s trust in the state is a ringing slap in the face for Chancellor Scholz and the Ampel government. These office-holding failures of the state ultimately bear the responsibility for that ever more people are losing their trust in our state. All state services and institutions in comparison to last year were evaluated as worse and on the whole miserable. That can and may not so continue! We of the AfD are doing all to reverse these fatal mis-developments. We are putting an end to open borders, escalating criminality, a desolate transport infrastructure and the destruction of Germany as a business venue. 

 

[trans: tem]

Dirk Brandes, April 27, 2023, Trucking Regulations

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/100, p. 12114.

Frau President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen.

Who hoped in regards the draft law put forward that the Federal government finally more resolutely defends German logistics companies from the price and wage dumping, he is bitterly disillusioned. 

Beate Müller-Gemmeke (Greens): You yourself do that in part by means of mail box firms. Do not forget!

The backdoors for sozial dumping by means of foreign transportation companies continue to remain open because there is neither control nor a concrete applications area for the new dispatch regulations.

Despite various hearings with those affected, you have still not recognized why our transportation businesses throw in the towel and many livelihoods are threatened and why 80,000 professional truckers are lacking in Germany, a growing tendency, even though it is thus actually logical: The pay of our freight drivers is exactly as bad as the hygiene and supply situation at many autobahn rest stations.

A German freight driver in the 90s could still earn 5,000 marks net and thereon feed a family; the pay today is scarcely sufficient to live on. That is a shame! Due to your energy and tax policy and your trucking fee increase, German transport costs are at a record level! At the same time, you foist aggressive wage and price dumping from eastern Europe on our truckers.

The mobility package’s amendment of the dispatch regulations is in fact a correct step, yet remains ineffective when regulation violations are not effectively prosecuted and punished as my preceding speaker has also plainly stated. Only 2.6 percent of domestic hauls [Kabotage-Fahrten] in German territory are in any way controlled. The police confirm: Our control authorities are not noticeable on our autobahns.

German money fines for illegal conduct of foreign shippers are laughable in comparison with other European countries. At the same time, the BALM [Federal Logistics and Mobility Office] guarantees large-scale rebates for eastern European domestic haul violators and indeed up to 50 percent according to the Deutschen Verkehrs-Zeitung. An insanity, ladies and gentlemen! Exactly that leads to that foreign firms become ever more blatant and ever more shamelessly exploit their drivers.

For fair competition conditions, we simply need more control. In our motion [Drucksache 20/6534], we make quite concrete proposals for that:

First. The BALM needs to be outfitted with additional positions in the roads control service.

Second. Money fine provisions need to be sharpened. That also means not to shrink from expelling for a time foreign transportation firms notable for unfair competition.

Third. Rebates of money fines for foreign shippers are no more to be allowed.

And fourth – the most important which needs to be implemented: The fees data need to be finally made available to our regulatory authorities, ladies and gentlemen. Thereby only do we effectively thwart fraud in regards domestic haul and sozial provisions.

Let us therefore concern ourselves that German shippers do not stand there with empty pockets and German professional drivers without a pay check. With our motion, you receive a tool that gives German logistics a future. Vote in favor of our motion, or no longer discuss with logisticians and drivers at the next hearings!

Many thanks.

 

[trans: tem]

  

 

 

 

 

Dirk Spaniel, March 28, 2023, EU Synthetic Fuel Taxation

AfD Kompakt, March 28, 2023.

Energy taxes on synthetic fuels ought only be raised to the level equivalent to that for electric current.

The AfD delegation will look precisely at the plan as soon as it is concretely put forward. From the view of the AfD delegation, it would be right to dedicate ourselves in this relation to the entire taxation of motor vehicles and eliminate one-sided subvention measures by tax mechanisms and instead find complete solutions. Today already more than half of the diesel and benzene prices consist of taxes and duties.

 

[trans: tem]