Peter Boehringer, May 5, 2020, European Central Bank Loan Purchases

Peter Boehringer

European Central Bank Loan Purchases

AfD Kompakt, May 5, 2020

[Peter Boehringer is an Alternative für Deutschland Bundestag member from Bavaria and is chairman of the Bundestag’s budget committee. He here comments on a recent decision by the German constitutional court concerning the European Central Bank’s purchases of state loans. Article 123 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union reads in part: “Overdraft facilities or any other type of credit facility with the European Central Bank or with the central banks of the Member States…in favour of Union institutions, bodies, offices or agencies, central governments, regional, local or other public authorities, other bodies governed by public law, or public undertakings of Member States shall be prohibited, as shall the purchase directly from them by the European Central Bank or national central banks of debt instruments.”]

This is an important decision. The Federal Constitutional Court hereby confirms the AfD delegation’s legal interpretation that the ECB for years has acted in ways that exceed its competence, are counter to the constitution and are irreconcilable with EU treaty law. At the same time, the court reprimands the Federal government and the Bundestag for not fulfilling their constitutional mandate to examine the decisions of the EU Council for their legal compliance. Thus is confirmed by the highest court what the AfD has argued all along in reference to the rescue of the euro – and that the Federal government has long since been obliged to oppose.

With the demand for a description of proportionality, the Constitutional Court presents the ECB council with an indissoluble order. The purchase of state loans obviously serves economic and fiscal policy goals. The mandate of the ECB is however limited to pure monetary policy. Any attempt to subsequently supply a basis for the purchase of loans is here condemned to failure.

The Federal Constitutional Court has today made clear that a continued frustration of the law by the European High Court will not be accepted. Thereby the [Federal Constitutional] Court strengthens in welcome ways the nation states in their relation to the EU. Nevertheless, the judges have avoided determining and censuring the obvious violation of the ban on monetary state financing by the purchase of loans.

On the basis of this decision, the AfD now demands:

1. The cessation and winding down of the loan purchases of the PSPP [Public Sector Purchase Program] (2015 to 2020) to which in no way can be attributed a basis for proportionality at that time.
2. Also the cessation of the ECB’s new loan purchase program (PEPP [Pandemic Emergency Purchase Program]) on the same grounds.
3. A more unequivocal formulation of Article 123 AEUV on the ban on monetary state financing so as to here limit the latitude of interpretation.

[Translated by Todd Martin]

    

Joachim Kuhs, May 3, 2020, Church Tax Revenues

Joachim Kuhs

Church Tax Revenues

AfD Kompakt, May 3, 2020

[Joachim Kuhs is an Alternative für Deutschland member of the European Parliament where he is the AfD’s budget policy spokesman. He is also head of the Christians in the AfD organization.]

The German Amtskirchen [official churches] have made themselves much too dependent on the church tax. Instead of growing living communities true to the confession, they have developed into welfare businesses with quasi civil service personnel. The sad consequence is each worldly crisis hits the secularized church with full force. We see that now in the Corona crisis. The German church princelings should grasp the Corona crisis as an opportunity to lead the Church back to its Christian core. In that regard, it may be helpful to completely renounce for many months the church tax and state benefits. That would be good for the churches and the taxpayer.  

[Translated by Todd Martin]

Alexander Gauland, May 2, 2020, Church and State

Alexander Gauland

Church and State

AfD Kompakt, May 2, 2020

[Alexander Gauland is honorary national chairman of the Alternative für Deutschland and a chairman of the AfD delegation in the Bundestag. He here responds to a recent court ruling concerning the government’s regulation of public gatherings during the Corona pandemic.]

The decision of the Federal Constitutional Court is very welcome. However, the Christian Amtskirchen [official churches] ought to be ashamed that it required a Moslem mosque association to sue for this basic right in Germany. The former, essentially with a shrug, accepted the total suspension of the basic right to undisturbed religious practice. Not even Christian funerals were regularly performed.

For long have both Christian Amtskirchen neglected their core duty of the cure of souls in favor of a biased involvement in daily politics. Now, when it comes to the elementary concerns of Christians, the Church hierarchy takes a dive. It is quite clear that the membership decline of the churches will not be thusly halted.

[Translated by Todd Martin]