Alexander Gauland, March 21,2019, Brexit

Alexander Gauland

Brexit

German Bundestag, March 21,  2019, Plenarprotokoll 19/89, pp. 10484-10485

[Alexander Gauland is a national chairman of the Alternative für Deutschland as well as a chairman of the AfD delegation in the German Bundestag. He here responds to the German government’s latest statement concerning Brexit.]

Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen.

Each change in the Brexit drama need not be taken as a demonstration of London’s centuries-old statecraft to feel, for all that, high respect for a nation wrestling with a fundamental issue. England was always equally in and out, half European, half Indian, equally European power and world power. Face to face with de Gaulle, what was Churchill’s inimitably literary expression? When I must decide between you and America, between you and the high seas, I decide always for the high seas. And it would truly be an ironic twist should a rule of Parliament going back to 1604 hinder a third and perhaps this time successful vote on the deal.

May I remind this house thereof that the Brexit decision was the result of a democratic process? The majority of the British had concluded to leave the EU. Yes, that was a bare majority; yet this arrangement is today normal and historically significant decisions are often brought about by bare majorities. It was a democratic decision and thus something which until now seldom occurred in the EU. What we are presently experiencing is the attempt to perhaps yet render the undesired results of a democratic decision null and void.

Ladies and gentlemen, mockery is hardly fitting when one of our oldest and worthiest allies is writhing in political fits. It is plainly not the faulty information of the Brexit advocates which has led to this situation; it is the two souls in the breast of every Englishman which has brought about this dilemma. It would therefore be the duty of the federal government not to stand by and let the Shakespearean drama run its course, but bravely engage, Frau Chancellor –

            Carsten Schneider (SPD-Erfurt): In England?

- to again untie the package or at least provide additional clarification. It cannot be difficult to enable the British to unilaterally get out of the backstop and it is, by God, no lèse majesté for the 27 to suspend freedom of settlement during a brief transition period.

“Cherry-picking” is therefore the wrong word in regards a drama that determines the future of our continent and besides will decide whether Great Britain, which for years defended us in Berlin, will remain united in friendship with us in the future. Since the wounds on the souls of a people are as difficult to heal as material damage. We Germans can certainly sing a song of that.

Rule-based multilateralism, again put forward by you, Frau Chancellor, is a fine-sounding abstraction –

            Annalena Baerbock (Bündnis90/Grünen): That is the lesson of our history!

- which induces spiritual effort from no one and, as represented by Herr Barnier, frightens and divides rather that brings together. An appeal by the Chancellor to the negotiators to take a small step toward one another could perhaps work wonders.

Certainly one must therefore abstain from the thought which in Brussels is always borne in mind: The British are to be punished for wanting to go a way which in many capitals of the continent is held to be politically incorrect –

            Barbara Hendricks (SPD): That corresponds with nothing!

            Christian Petry (SPD): Dumb stuff!

            Franziska Brantner (Bündnis90/Grünen): That was never at all the case!

            Annalena Baerbock (Bündnis90/Grünen): Such baloney!

- and never be allowed to manage in a free way which could provoke imitation.

Yet the strength of the European Union must be herein proven: That no one is held against his will. It is un-sovereign and a sign of lack of confidence of one’s own appeal to conduct oneself during a separation as the EU presently does in regards the British. According to its ardent supporters, the European Union is no compulsory union but a voluntary pact which each people, each state at any time can dissolve when they hold it to be necessary.

            Martin Schulz (SPD): Yes, then they should do it!

It is time that the European governments prove that and give Great Britain a fair and intelligent chance, Frau Merkel. I appeal to you, make a start of it!

The impression is not to be given that the EU, other than for the sake of peace in Ireland, will hinder Great Britain from becoming a de-regulated, low wage, low tax competitor of the EU. Their quid pro quo: Should Great Britain want continued full access to the EU market, then must it continue to adhere to EU standards of taxation, employment, competition and environment -  thus, practically a membership without speaking rights. Dainty souls would call that extortion.

            (Laughter from member Martin Schulz (SPD)).

When we open up the newspapers, we always read of the economic damage that will arise for the British as a result of Brexit. We however read nothing of the damage to the EU. Since we also lose, ladies and gentlemen: Germany foremost.

Let us give the British some more time but not the feeling that they must break out of prison. For that, there must be a return to reason, free from the emotional anxieties which lead to a dirty divorce. I can only once more reiterate, Frau Merkel: Make a start of it! Since that is policy in the German interest.

I am grateful.

[Translated by Todd Martin]

Alice Weidel, March 21, 2019, Brexit

Alice Weidel

Brexit

German Bundestag, March 21, 2019, Plenarprotokoll 19/89, pp. 10495-10496

[Alice Weidel is a chairman of the Alternative für Deutschland Bundestag delegation. She here responds to the German government’s latest statement concerning Brexit.]

Right honorable Herr President. Right honorable ladies and gentlemen. Worthy colleagues.

Frau Chancellor, you have spoken of the insecurity which Brexit will bring. We have thereby learned nothing new. It was your tested brew of boilerplate and sedatives. One thing is clear: This Brexit will be expensive – expensive for the EU and thus by definition expensive for the German taxpayer: Expensive like the banks bail-out, the Greek rescue, the energy change, the border opening, the destruction of the German automobile industry and key industries and the gigantic inflation of our common currency. Future-oriented policy appears otherwise, right honorable ladies and gentlemen.

Thus now the part you had in Brexit, which, in the best case, was one of negligence, though it was a rather intermittent assistance. In this way are the historically good relations with the United Kingdom endangered. Since what frightfulness had David Cameron demanded? No social assistance instantly for all, stronger national parliaments, less EU bureaucracy. Yet for that he bit granite in Brussels. It would have been a great opportunity to make and maintain a trimmer community, recollecting the core proposition of a common market. But no, no way. You prefer to put in play the cohesion of the EU member states.

Now we struggle with the reckoning: In the future, the 15 billion euro British contribution will be missing from the budget. Every family indeed knows when the income shrinks to more tightly fasten the belt, but not the EU. It does not have to, not when the German taxpayer is the paymaster. Greater than the hole in the EU balance sheet are the costs to the German economy. The United Kingdom is the second largest economy in the EU, as great as the 19 smallest combined. From the economic viewpoint, the EU thus shrinks not to 27 but to a total of 9. The unconcern and indifference of Brussels and Berlin regarding this matter, manifestly of the greatest magnitude, borders on a pathological denial of reality, right honorable ladies and gentlemen.

The United Kingdom is Germany’s largest trading partner in the EU. With no other country are the economic interweavings so close. Unhindered conduct of trade and investment clearly lies in the German interest. German prosperity, German jobs are here in play. You however place yourselves with unquestioning loyalty [Nibelungentreue] behind France which wishes even to deny to the British access to the common internal market. You are even weighing the possibility of not conceding British access to the European economic area because Paris rejects it. That would also be much too much: Much too much free trade, too much fresh air in the market, too much competition and contention over the best economic site. Of self-sufficiency is there nothing in your ratified Aachen Treaty which is extolled as the crowning of the Élysée Treaty. What a conceit! The Aachen Treaty from front to back bears a French handwriting. This “Europa”, for which centrally organized France with its failed industry and economic policy serves as a blueprint, is coming sooner than one thinks.

At the latest then, when the European Council next votes, will we see it quite precisely: The costliest consequence of Brexit is that Germany can no longer muster a blocking minority in the Council. In the present EU of 28, Germany represents 16 percent of the population, Great Britain 13 percent, making a total of 30 percent. With some of the smaller countries – Denmark, the Netherlands, Austria – was a blocking minority always secure. Thereby one could defend against a grab at the common till by the crisis-shaken “Club Med” states as well as by France. With Great Britain’s exit, that will now soon be history. And it is becoming clear: Without reform, the European Union cannot go on. Where is your strategy? You generally have none at all.

We begin with Article 50, which regulates exit. It is as bloated as a sponge. The only concrete instructions therein are how desertions and betrayals are to be dealt with: According to Article 218, thus as with any Choice-X third party. For a partner with whom one has lived together, in good times and bad, for 40 years can one not really find a modus other than that for Paraguay and Papua New Guinea, right honorable ladies and gentlemen?

That is just bare-faced scorn. Is it to be wondered that the British suspect ill will behind any maneuver out of Brussels? Brexit negotiator Barnier should have trusted his erstwhile friends. I cite:

            My mission will be a success when…the conditions…

            for the British are so brutal that they prefer…to remain in the European 

            Union.          

            Alexander Lambsdorff (FDP): Nonsense!

Who has such friends, needs no enemies, right honorable ladies and gentlemen.

           

            Alexander Lambsdorff (FDP): Unproven nonsense!

There is not a word of self-criticism on the continent, none in Brussels, none in Berlin, certainly none in Paris. The contrasts of those in Brussels are made distinct by Brexit. It also shows where Europe’s true enemies sit: among others, here on the government bench, right honorable ladies and gentlemen. Europe is too important to abandon it to them. Looking away is not worthy, nor is running away. The EU must be reformed from within. To that belongs the national states’ right of veto against the proposals of Brussels, as exactly so does a reform of exit Article 50 to maintain the internal market, even for the exiting country, and the securing of the EU external borders, which we for years have required. And to Europe belong our British friends, right honorable ladies and gentlemen.

Many thanks.

            Martin Schulz (SDP): European party spending regulation! Including 

            Switzerland!

[Translated by Todd Martin]

Peter Boehringer, March 20, 2019, Bank Merger

Peter Boehringer

Bank Merger

German Bundestag, March 20, 2019, Plenarprotokoll 19/88, pp. 10434-10435

[Peter Boehringer is an Alternative für Deutschland Bundestag member from the southern German state of Bavaria. He is a businessman, investor and author and is currently chairman of the Bundestag budget committee. He here comments on the proposed merger of the Deutsche Bank and the Commerzbank.]

Some things were said, and some were also right. Yes, here once again threatens a violation of the, since 2010, ostensibly ironclad ordnungspolitischen principles “Never again bail-outs with tax money” and “Never again banks that are ‘Too Big to Fail’”. Yes, it’s about up to 30,000 jobs. And yet the federal government and officials of the Union delegation stonewall information even though on the exchange and generally in the media it is completely clear that the Finance Ministry is the active driver of the merger talks.

Today in the budget committee Minister Scholz earnestly maintained that the Commerzbank is regarded only as a financial investment, which is laughable. This line is followed in the media even though the opposite is piped from the rooftops by the sparrows. Only two mentions in the media: Scholz Applies Pressure, State Secretary Kukies Drives Merger Talks Forward. It has even been officially stated that there have been 23 meetings between the referred to banks and the BMF. The issue cries out for review by the Bundestag. For all that, the Commerzbank is already partly nationalized with the Ankeraktionär Bund.

I however now focus on what has been too little spoken of in the media, though which in my opinion are the decisive points: First, the true origin of these talks, the rosey-red elephant in the room, is the EU-ropean prime rate, squeezed to nearly zero by the manipulations of the EZB. This zero interest rate is the principle origin of the banks’ earnings problems. It has in fact been acknowledged that the banks expect an earnings decline from interest revenue in 2019 of 13 percent compared with 2018. This revenue contributes to over 70 percent of the banks’ profits. A bank in this situation can no longer earn. Given these EU-made problems, a merger generally changes nothing.

Second: There is here the threat of a backdoor, partial nationalization of the Deutsche Bank – and even one by means of a double backdoor. Through one will be tossed an indirect and inconspicuous line of liquidity and, ultimately, liablity and rescue to the Deutsche Bank by the merger with the already nationalized Commerzbank. Through the other, the government’s share  of the banks shall be held in the future by the KfW – and thus chiefly by the German state  household, beyond parliamentary control. This is parallel to the permanent rescue of the euro which always again uses precisely this same principle: by means of a special vehicle, sufficient funds will be raised, always again to be in fact guaranteed by German credit. And because the KfW is one of the very few banks in Germany that still has much money and, thanks to the liablity of the German taxpayer, a AAA rating, shall it now stand in the breach. Thereby shall be secured the new Great Bank’s future capital increases, which are coming as surely as the next EZB euro rescue installment, and which will be a burden of billions. I cannot yet prove this but we here will again be speaking.

The BMF must no longer stonewall the following quite justified questions. They do not concern the negotiating positions of the referred to banks and they do not disturb any ad hoc reporting duties – to forestall the argument, Frau State Secretary, that is presumably coming.

First: Shall public funds be newly appropriated? We must be allowed to put these questions and we are indeed quite presumptuous. The [Ankeraktionär] Bund presumably must secure all the risks of this merger with billions in tax money. Just as the permanent euro rescue has functioned for years with German credit, shall it also here become the royal way. Otherwise, nothing works. The capital markets implicitly acknowledge this state guarantee. You know that, everyone at the exchange knows it. Yet the German taxpayer will not be informed…

Second: Why should a partly nationalized champion be more economic? That has always gone awry. I reference the French experiences of the 1980s and naturally the many unspeakable disasters of the Landesbanken. Surely the BMF with Minister Scholz at the helm should properly know – HSH Nordbank with its 14 billion euro tax disaster – how state intervention in the banking sector works; namely, it doesn’t. It always goes awry. Herr Müller – you preceded me as speaker – it is not over; it is only beginning! This is pure state interventionism. We shall witness it.

This merger will be too complex, too opaque and too expensive. That is even the view of colleagues in your own ranks. Herr Michelbach, Herr Rehberg and Herr Jäger of the Union are sceptical and also the ranking SPD member on the finance committee, colleague Binding, has expressed scepticism.

            Hans Michelbach (CDU/CSU): The economic wise men!

I have only said “sceptical”. What you are actually saying, Herr Michelbach, I naturally do not know. But you have expressed yourself as sceptical, as some of the other colleagues have done.

Lastly, there is yet a ceterum censeo – nothing new, but to this context, well suited: Finally fill the positions, crying out to be filled, on the banking and finances commission [gremium] with officials of the AfD. The information pertinent to these mergers will be discussed there and be made accessible and known to this house. It is a scandal for democracy that the colleagues Münz and Glaser have still not been elected to this commission.

            Stephan Brandner (AfD): Tomorrow!

We give you an opportunity to do so tomorrow.

            Stephan Brandner (AfD): Ja!

Hearty thanks.

[Translated by Todd Martin]