Lothar Maier, January 14, 2021, Consumer Protection Co-Regulation

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/204, p. 25638.

Right honorable Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen.

Consumer protection – it shall be dealt with here – can be developed and advanced not only by the ever further differentiation of competition law. This can be done another way which is based to a greater extent on free will, on personal and collective responsibility, and which in some other countries of the world has passed the test with flying colors. This is co-regulation. It occupies itself not so much with clear violations of the current law, but is concerned primarily with legal gray zones, with questions about ethical compliance [Deontologie] which are moreover to be comprehended with difficulty, if at all. It is a procedure which has proven itself, especially in Great Britain for several years; yet also in other case law countries like Australia and, to my knowledge, in Canada.

In our regard, control of the adherence to current consumer law is based not on an authority which surveys it, but on consumer unions or individual persons obtaining legal support.

Commercial associations – general trades associations, chambers of commerce, trades boards – have throughout in the past reacted to this uncertainty, during which they have developed the so-called Wohlverhaltenskodizes, codes of conduct, often with the best and most honest intent. Yet it must also be stated: These codes of conduct in most cases have remained ineffective and in fact for two reasons: For one, there are those who have concluded they do not have the possibility of systematically surveying the adherence to these codes, and for another, they have no sanctions possibilities. Co-regulation seeks to counter this.

Just what is this? The matter is quite simple. It rests for its part on codes of conduct but not on such as those formed by the trade associations alone and in their interests, but on codes of conduct which the trade associations together with recognized consumer unions, like those defined for example in the KaMuG [capital markets model case law], and those to be defined by the respective appropriate state authority. Decisive is that these codes of conduct, as currently in Great Britain and Australia, rely on sanctions. These sanctions will not be imposed by those who have decided on the codes but by appropriate authorities. That, for example in the area of telecommunications, would be the Network Agency, in the area of financial services, the BaFin, etc.

The European Economic and Social Committee has repeatedly committed itself to the introduction of co-regulation in the EU.

            Katharina Dröge (Greens): When do you actually speak on competition law?

This is completely uncontested. Yet the European commission has not pursued it, reasoning that the European Treaties conveyed no sufficient legal basis. We should therefore not wait on the European Union coming up with this at some time or other; we should much more make an advance and regulate on the national level what co-regulation, in the countries into which it has already been introduced, has so successfully accomplished. I am enlisted for this and therefore request that you vote for our proposal [Drucksache 19/25808].

I thank you.

 

 

[trans: tem]

 

Joana Cotar, January 14, 2021, Freedom

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/204, pp. 25693-25694.

Frau President. Esteemed colleagues.

Freedom, freedom of opinion, is our highest good; and to listen to those with whom one is not in agreement, to not forbid them an opinion, to not censor them, to not put them under pressure and thereby silence them – that should be the democratic consensus of us all.

Only that unfortunately is not so, neither in real life, when, for example, innkeepers are threatened because they are prepared to rent their spaces to the AfD, nor on the internet, where users will be denounced, arbitrary and unfounded deletions and shadow bans incomprehensibly occur – naturally only of conservative accounts – and where life-long blockings will be pronounced, as we have seen this last week in regards Donald Trump. That is officially called de-platforming; I call it digital censorship.

And many stand by and applaud, like for example Hessen’s Justice Minister Eva Kühne-Hörmann of the CDU, who has defended the blocking of Trump. Freedom of opinion, ja, ja, but the opinion must, ja, not be unconditionally published. Employees of the ZDF and other journalists express themselves similarly – yet good, in regards these, I am little surprised. Certainly the Linke, who suddenly defend media monopoly and private business, especially amuse me personally: As always, as it just so happens, regardless of just how absurd it is.

Let us look at what has in fact happened in the U.S.A. The digital concerns have proved that they are more powerful than the President of the United States. They have not only deleted a private account, they have deleted the official account of the President.

            Ullii Nissen (SPD): Very good!

The digital giants have thereby set a precedent for which the world’s illegal legal regimes will give thanks with a blown kiss, since apparently it is now okay to mute the political opponent, to bring him to silence. Concerns in the U.S.A. show how it is done, and the so-called Democrats celebrate that – it will be very difficult to subsequently shake a finger at China. 

I find astonishing Angela Merkel’s criticism of the blocking of Trump by Twitter: The freedom of opinion as a basic right of elementary importance cannot be limited according to the standard of a business. Dear Frau Merkel, have you forgotten that it was your government which decided on the internet enforcement law,

            Johann David Wadephul (CDU/CSU): Yet even your yourself demanded that!

which thereby out-sourced the right to speak and which gave to the platforms precisely that power which you now criticize?

            Johann David Wadephul (CDU/CSU): Do you notice that you directly contradict                    yourself?

You have made the social networks into prosecutors, judges and executioners. Twitter has thus only implemented what you wanted. And you now happen to speak of freedom of opinion? It does not get more hypocritical, ladies and gentlemen.

Yet certainly not just Trump was blocked. In the wake of this started a regular wave of cleansings on the internet. Countless accounts were deleted. The Parler platform, which in the Apple and Google library stands in first place on the download charts, was first removed from the app store and then tossed out of the Amazon server. Thereby have people been punished and taken in collective liability who had nothing at all to do with the storming of the Capitol. Do you really believe to thus pacify a torn society? The opposite is the case. The people see themselves validated by your reproaches, the distrust grows.

            Daniela De Ridder (SPD): Then how many shall be allowed to incite?

And which firms, which store their data in the clouds of the U.S. internet giants, can still be confident that they are safe there, that they are not to be the next who offends against some standard and suddenly stand before nothing? Digital sovereignty would now be primary, but unfortunately here the government has snoozed for decades.

Ladies and gentlemen, it can and may not be the duty of the digital platforms to define the boundaries of freedom of opinion; they are not allowed to determine how discourse is to be conducted.

            Daniela De Ridder (SPD): Yet neither are you!

We can and may not put our democracy into the hands of techno-oligarchs who thereupon exploit their dominant position in the market. And that must be a lesson of the last week’s events. Here, the law-giver was questioned. It is therefore appropriate to react to such abuse of power. The platforms must be regulated. We need more transparency, a user grievance system [Nutzerbeschwerdesystem]. Freedom of opinion must be safeguarded. In case of necessity, the anti-trust law enables us to take steps according to competitiveness rules so as to end the dominant market position of the tech giants.

We should urgently remind the networks that they are not media; they are platforms which must be neutral. They should make no opinion; they are an instrument of the exchange of opinions. If they want to be media, if they edit, and so-called fact-checkers comment and form opinion, then they should also be treated like media. Yet then are they also responsible for what the user writes, then they are also liable for that, and that becomes expensive.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is all the same how one views Donald Trump.

            Daniela De Ridder (SPD): No, it is not the same! Not at all the same!

What happened last week on the internet platforms should horrify us all. Last week, Trump was blocked. Tomorrow, it could be you, or you, or you,

            Timon Gremmels (SPD): We do not incite!

each according to how the wind turns.

            Steffi Lemke (Greens): There is a reason why he was blocked!

Let us prevent that and in common fight for democracy and freedom, before it is too late, before we no more have a voice.

Many thanks.

 

[trans: tem]

           

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jochen Haug, January 14, 2021, Election Law

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/204, pp. 25715-25716.

Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen.

We here today shall decide that the holding of nominations assemblies for the Bundestag election is at least partially not possible. Yet to that I ask directly back: Why should I and my delegation conform to an incorrect statement? – Assemblies are possible, and indeed without danger to life and limb. We straightforwardly document that here and now. We here are holding an assembly so as to decide that assemblies are not possible. Apparently you of the coalition delegations for once fail to remark the paradox of your motion, a motion which you first yesterday placed in the daily order almost as a surprise, and which would, should it be decided, lead to a complete overthrow of the law of the nomination of candidates.

Why have you not brought in a motion of this important kind with the appropriate preliminaries? That shows already your bad conscience in regards what you are here attempting.

But now to the content of your motion: Why then shall he nominations assemblies not be possible?

Mahmut Özdemir (SPD-Duisburg): It is called right and law. With that, you thus have your problem.

–  I gladly hear that from you. That is funny. –

You base the alleged impossibility before all on that in some Federal States the Corona decrees do not allow nominations assemblies. Aha! First, you order a hard lockdown, with massive limitations on the citizens – you speak in your motion of a resolution of the Chancellor and the chiefs of the State governments and thereby show what our constitutional order is worth to you, since there is no such governing body – 

            Ansgar Heveling (CDU/CSU): Such nonsense!

and then it is said: Because we have the lockdown, we cannot assemble ourselves to choose candidates for the Bundestag election. That is grotesque. You thus refer to an allegedly legal impossibility which you yourselves have brought about. Decisive, however, is whether it actually is impossible to hold assemblies and that is – this you also know; we here are certainly demonstrating it – plainly not the case.

Beyond that, it becomes truly embarrassing,

            Ansgar Heveling (CDU/CSU): Truly embarrassing is what you are doing! 

when the allegedly legal impossibility is in no way presented. You refer in your motion to the situation in Nordrhein-Westfalen, of which you write – I cite with permission of the President - : “In Nordrhein-Westfalen is the holding of nominations assemblies presently in fact excluded.” – For that, you refer to a provision in the NRW Corona protection decree which is not at all pertinent.

            Ansgar Heveling (CDU/CSU): Certainly!

No, it is not.

            Ansgar Heveling (CDU/CSU): Certainly! Read §13!

We can later speak over the norm. You have cited a wrong number.

Actually in Nordrhein-Westfalen, assemblies are currently taking place – in conformity with the there applicable decree. Go to Nordrhein-Westfalen! This was held without a problem, in keeping with the hygiene provisions.

            Ansgar Heveling (CDU/CSU): Probably an old Corona decree!

There are only two possibilities: Either you do not at all know of what you are speaking,

           Albrecht Glaser (AfD): Ja, that is always so with Helveling!

or you wish to lead us behind the lights. 

Your reason in no case provides a sustainable basis for determining the impossibility of the holding of assemblies.  

Yet it is not only that the impossibility, which according to your wishes the Bundestag shall determine, is certainly not presented – your request on substantive grounds is to be vehemently contradicted. You here honestly want, without necessity, to surrender an important principle of democracy, the principle of in person assembly. For democracy however, the exchange of arguments and opinions among those present is fundamentally important. It cannot not and ought not here be a matter of playing the protection of health against the maintenance of democratic processes which have been established over decades.

It is thus under present conditions possible to hold assemblies in established ways in keeping with appropriate protective measures, and you know that.

            Vice-presdient Wolfgang Kubicki: Herr colleague, come to a conclusion.

Self-evidently, we reject your motion.

           Ansgar Heveling (CDU/CSU): Gott sei dank!

           Anton Friesen (AfD): Gott sei dank!

Thank you.

           Ansgar Heveling (CDU/CSU): Such nonsense!

 

[trans: tem]

           

 

 

 

 

Bernd Baumann, January 14, 2021, Elections

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 19/201, pp. 25619-25620.

Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen.

We stand at the beginning of a super election year: Six state legislature elections, one Bundestag election. Without announcement, the government delegations yesterday entered a motion for today’s debate. It comprehensively empowers the government: With a kind of emergency decree, it can intervene in all elections procedures in which the parties nominate their candidates for the Bundestag.

Elections are the heart of democracy. This proceeding today is an open heart operation. Yet we must speak on it sufficiently before declaring in the Bundestag such a democratic emergency.

We must debate this in committee. Remove this over-hasty motion from the daily order, ladies and gentlemen.

With the motion put forward today, such things as election by mail and digital voting suddenly return to the foreground. They are, as you know, subject to manipulation. No one can control who at home sends a letter or votes on a computer; at party meetings, that can be done by personal identification.

Even the director of Federal elections in principle views the expansion of election by mail critically: Verbatim: With election by mail there always remains “a residue of risk”. “An election,” he says verbatim, can “be held under pandemic conditions without problem and with adherence to all hygiene prescriptions.” That must also pertain to nominations assemblies.

            Katrin Göring-Eckardt (Greens): That is the topic?

            Britta Haßelmann (Greens): That is certainly not the topic! 

You cannot thus over-night give such wide-ranging authority to the government and drive all that through the parliament – without prior announcement, without prior discussion, without consultation.

            Britta Haßelmann (Greens): Have you read the motion?

            Katrin Göring-Eckardt (Greens): It is not pertinent!

That cannot be, ladies and gentlemen.

 There is also certainly no necessity.

The pandemic situation has not at all changed in recent hours. In Nordrhein-Westfalen, the AfD has already held over 30 nominations assemblies: With hygiene conditions, without problems – it works.

As members, we also gather together here in plenary session, physically on site; just so as in all committees of parliament. That should not be possible for party nominations assemblies? There is no reason to flog your plan so surprisingly through parliament. That cannot be, ladies and gentlemen. 

Before all, the Bundestag delegations have given themselves rules, as occurs in a daily order. The government delegations announced their motion submitted today – important and central to politics – yet not in the Ältestenrat. Nothing of it! Why not? You have announced nothing of the matter in the round of first parliamentary floor leaders. The day before yesterday, on Tuesday: Not a word! Why not? That is what we are objecting to. That is the problem here, ladies and gentlemen.  

Where does the pressure come from? Does it come from the Chancellor’s office? What is the calculation behind it? We must speak of all of this, before we empower the government with sweeping legal decrees. Take this motion from the daily order.

            Michael Grosse-Brömer (CDU/CSU): Man, man, man.

            Josephine Ortleb (SPD): What’s with the mask?

 

[trans: tem]