Bernd Schattner, October 9, 2024, Mittelstand

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/190, p. 24713. 

Many thanks. Frau President. Ladies and gentlemen. 

For thirty years, I myself was a businessman before I came here to the Bundestag three years ago. And I ever again realize: The German economy is meanwhile at the abyss. And what does this Ampel government do? With open eyes, it lets our country slide into ruin. While the German industry bleeds to death, the Mittelstand fights for survival and the citizens ask themselves how they shall pay for their electrical and heating costs, this government lives in its ideological bubble. Wishful thinking instead of economic policy, that is your sorry balance after three years of Ampel. 

Let’s begin with the energy policy. Germany has the highest electricity prices in all Europe. 

            Reinhard Houben (FDP): Not right! Wrong!

On the average, according to Destatis, private households pay 41 cents per kilowatt-hour, while in France it is just 25 cents. The reason: Your headlong energy transition. 

            Reinhard Houben (FDP): That is still wrong! 

            Lukas Köhler (FDP): Nonsense!       

All of you, from the SPD to the CDU/CSU over there, have taken care that the nuclear power plants in Germany be disconnected, without providing a secure and affordable alternative. Instead, you stuck billions into the construction of renewable energies without regard to the consequences. The result: Energy-intensive business fled to foreign countries. The BASF, for example, once one of our leading businesses here in Germany, shifts a large part of its production to China and the U.S.A.. That means loss of work in Germany by the hundreds of thousands. 

And who bears this burden? The German citizens and the Mittelstand. Since January 2023, the energy costs for many businesses have risen around 80 percent – 80 percent! How shall small firms, manufacturing undertakings and family businesses support that? You speak of a climate-neutral transformation, yet this transformation for many firms simply means ruin. 

The Mittelstand, the backbone of our economy, is completely ignored by you. The numbers speak a clear language: Over 70,000 businesses in the year 2023 have announced insolvency. That is already 17 percent more than in the previous year. Especially affected are small- and mid-sized businesses which for years suffer under rising energy prices, high duties and your bureaucracy entirely distant from reality. Instead of acting here, you ignore this development, and further intensify the situation by means of senseless prescriptions like the supply chain law or the planned CO₂ pricing. 

And now let us speak of your catastrophic debts policy; the new budget needs to come, ja, at some time or other. In the year 2023, we reached a new record: The state indebtedness lies at 2.48 trillion euros. In the next year alone, you plan new debts to the sum of 45 billion euros. These debts will burden our children and grandchildren for decades. Yet instead of finally beginning a change of course, you continue as before and drive the country further into financial ruin. 

The reality which you do not want to see: The German economy finds itself officially in recession. In the year 2023, the gross domestic product shrank around 0.3 percent. For 2024, the Federal government itself now reckons with a further recession of 0.2 percent. And the OECD expects for 2025 a minimal growth of just 0.4 percent – far under the European average. 

Our neighbor countries grow while Germany stagnates or shrinks. You could not entice even Intel to Germany with 10 billion euros more. 

The tax and duties burden in Germany is crushing. Germany has the world’s highest tax quota. 42 percent of income on the average goes to the state. And in regards business, it does not appear better: With an effective tax burden of 29.8 percent, Germany is far above the EU average of 21.7 percent. Countries like Ireland or Estonia pull away economically because they have more favorable business taxes and fewer bureaucratic hurdles. And what do you do? Instead of sinking the tax burden, you introduce still more prescriptions which stifle business. The bureaucracy costs in Germany for the German economy amount each year to around 55 billion euros. 

And now comes the height of absurdity: Your so-called migration policy. While you expend ever more money for uncontrolled immigration, ever less remains left over for the German pensioners, families and employees. In the year 2023, you have levied 36 billions euros alone for the social duties in the migration context. At the same time, German pensioners need to gather deposit bottles so as to make ends meet. That is a bare-faced insult. That is a betrayal of one’s own people. 

My conclusion: Germany needs no utopian transformation which leads to economic catastrophe. We need an authentic economic transition. An end to the ruinous energy transition. An end to the crushing tax and duties burden. And an end to the ideological patronizing of citizens and business. An end to the Ampel economic experiment. Dear colleagues of the FDP, if you want to do something good for the economy: Put an end to the Ampel! What Germany now needs is a policy oriented to reality, a policy for our citizens, for our business and for our future. 

Many thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Ulrike Schielke-Ziesing, September 27, 2024, Pensions and Children

German Bundestag, September 27, 2024, Plenarprotokoll 20/189, pp. 24585-24586. 

Frau President. Dear colleagues. Honorable citizens. 

In the Middle Ages, it was common to attempt to heal the sick by draining them of blood by the liter – the sicker, the more and the more often. That, for most, did not turn out well. At some time, one became smarter and abandoned that. Gott sei Dank! 

Yet the Federal government still today thinks of stabilizing the statutory pension by operating on one artery after another. I do not now speak by way of exception of non-insurance benefits, but of the irregular and multiple cutting of the Federal added subsidy within three years until 2027 of a total 10 billion euros. These lopped-off billions will not be invested in, for example, a Generations Capital, but they are simply gone, disappeared into the depths of the Federal government’s budget holes – money which is lacking for the Pension Insurance. 

And thus these cuts lead to that the Pension Insurance’s reserves empty much earlier, and for that the contribution increases earlier and further than planned. The German Pension Insurance Union figures into the reckoning contribution rates of 22.4 percent up to 2040. It is not mentioned that it remains there. The basic reason for that is the limit line for the pension level, which was called up by the SPD only so long as to maintain the shaky construction until the Ampel is history, and a new government of shambles may sweep up. 

In this situation, the government tinkers with a so-called Generations Capital at the pump – beyond the debt brake and with the corresponding subsequent costs. The Federal Audit Authority has calculated that the yield from this Generations Capital can bring by 2039 a relief of the contribution of, believe it or not, 0.4 percentage points, if at all. The German Pension Insurance is rightly concerned that this more likely may not come; which is to say, contribution payments to the account for that will also be ordered. With an authentically funded support for old age insurance, as in, for example, Finland, Canada, Japan or Sweden, this Generations Capital has nothing to do. 

Ja, but why then is it done? Because Herr Scholz has so decided and Herr Lindner so far does not contradict, 

            Hermann Gröhe (CDU/CSU): Where is he, actually?

even when this does not suit colleague Vogel. And precisely that, I do not understand. His colleague Mordhorst said quite openly – cite: “The SPD lies in the face of pensioners and workers.” The Federal Budget Authority expresses it somewhat more finely and figures the added expenditures for the pension package until 2045 at, believe it or not, 507 billion euros, paid by the young people and those yet to be born. 

            Markus Kurth (Greens): But distributed over 20 years!

It is now well established that these generations will not at the outset receive from the pension account what they may pay in; in any event, that the increasing contribution for each employee will soon amount to nearly a year’s vacation. The question is whether these generations can then still at all afford a vacation. 

All of that, dear colleagues, needs not be. It is possible to stabilize the pension system, long-term and prudently. I am thus glad to here today bring in our motion [Drucksache 20/11847] with the title “For a Secure Pension for Our Children”, which does precisely that: Secures the pension long-term, and in fact quite without new debts. 

That will be possible by means of a goal-oriented savings plan for which the state pays in monthly 100 euros for every child of a German citizen, born here and living here permanently up to the age of 18. What is gathered there shall then be administered by a community foundation [Gemenschaftsstiftung]. As a result of the long time period and the compound interest effect, it is possible, with a very reasonable commitment, to save up real wealth specific to a person. We are speaking here of a total 21,600 euros per child, stretched as was said over 18 years. That yields, with a return on capital of four percent, around 214,000 euros. Dear colleagues, that is a generations capital – sensible, feasible and affordable. 

Many thanks.

[trans:tem]

 

Joachim Wundrak, September 27, 2024, Bundeswehr, Iraq and the U.S.A.

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/189, pp. 24644-24645. 

Frau President. Frau Defense Commissioner. Herr Minister. Ladies and gentlemen.   

Again the Federal government puts forward a motion for the prolongation of a mandate which presents an inadmissible mingling of the U.S.-led operation Inherent Resolve for the combatting the “Islamic State” on one side and the NATO Iraq mission for advising and training the Iraqi armed forces on the other. As in previous years, we reject the presented draft mandate. 

First, since 2019 the IS has been militarily defeated. The further and long-term containment [Eindämmung] of IS is the duty of the sovereign states of Syria and Iraq. The continuing presence of foreign armed forces in Syria, without the agreement of Syria and without a UN mandate, merely on the basis of an explanation of the right to self-defense according to Article 51 of the UN Charter, is to be increasingly evaluated as counter to international law. This applies in especial measure to the presence of NATO partners U.S.A. and Turkey, as also the German Bundestag’s experts indicate. 

The Federal government has shown itself to be thoroughly aware of this problematic and thus two years ago withdrew from the mandate the mission of German aircraft in Syrian airspace. Yet support of violations of Syrian airspace by the allies with German contributions of air refueling and radar surveillance is also in our view illegal. 

The U.S.A. continues to maintain around two dozen support points with nearly 1,000 soldiers in Syria, against the will of the government in Damascus and for the withholding of the output of Syria’s rich oil fields. 

And the Iraqi government – we have just heard it – has since 2020 raised an objection to the presence of 2,500 American soldiers in its country. The Iraqi Defense Minister Thabat Al-Abbas has now publicly announced that the Iraqi and U.S. governments have agreed to a step-wise withdrawal of U.S. troops and their allies. The withdrawal of the soldiers of the U.S.-led counter Daesh coalition shall follow in two stages. The coalition wants to give up by September 2025 its support points in Bagdad and other parts of Iraq. By September 2026, the coalition shall also leave the autonomous Kurdish area in northern Iraq. This plan is still not confirmed by the U.S. government, yet nevertheless indicates the direction of the foreseeable development. 

What the withdrawal of U.S. armed forces along with allies from Iraq announced by the Iraqi government means for the continued presence of NATO in Iraq presently remains unclear. Nevertheless, the abrupt and chaotic termination of the missions in Afghanistan and Mali should be a warning for Germany and the Bundeswehr. For the signals in the Near and Middle East are stormy. An involvement of NATO and thus also of the Bundeswehr in armed conflict in Iraq is not acceptable. The constitutional core duty of the Bundeswehr is the defense of the country. And Germany is defended neither in the Hindukush nor in Iraq. The NATO mission outside of the alliance area we fundamentally reject. NATO should be consistently directed defensively [Die NATO sollte konsequent defensiv ausgerichtet werden]. 

For the named reasons, we therefore reject the presented motion. 

I thank you for your attention. 

 

[trans: tem]

Matthias Moosdorf, September 11, 2024, Foreign Office

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/184, p. 23905. 

Herr President. Ladies and gentlemen. 

It would be difficult to find differing highpoints in the Ampel’s comprehensive failures. Nothing however exceeds the incompetence of the German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock. Never before has the Republic lost so quickly and so much in reputation and influence. 

You have managed to trample underfoot German interests, to bend the law and deliver over your Ministry to a green nepotism business. Open-handed gifts of passports, even to presumed terrorists: Does that actually belong to a feminist foreign policy, or is it merely normal, Green, anti-German policy? Who demands of embassies and consulates to agree to visa applications despite incomplete or obviously falsified papers, would long since no more be minister in a country with a functioning fourth estate. 

The embarrassing return of the Benin Bronzes, the routine failure of flight readiness, the much too late and poorly organized departure of Germans from Israel, consolidates the picture of an amateurish office. With rhetorical slapstick, 360 degree turns, the “Bacon of Hope” in South Africa, panzer wars in the 19^th Century, or the SPD as the inventor of the social market economy, you moreover daily send signals of a lack of education in the land of Dichter und Denker. Your blot at the European Council, “We are fighting a war against Russia”, unleashed an outcry precisely because your Chancellor took care not to make us a warring party. 

Bruno Hönel (Greens): How was it with your delegation chairman and the German poets? Do you want to tell me what that was about?

Thank God no one anymore takes you seriously! 

Foreign countries look with increasing alienation at Germany; our diplomatic relations with the most important neighbors have been destroyed. In that regard, ntv says: 

“The relations with China and Turkey are…clearly stressed; important developing countries…are alienated.”

Our

“values-led Twitter diplomacy…along with an instruction and confrontation potential, leads to that ever more of the world’s doors are closed to you. When then they…are used, as presently in the case of Qatar/Hamas, Germany has scarcely anymore possibilities of influence.” 

Deborah Düring (Greens): Say for once, you also sit in the committee! Do you actually listen? Or another to you?

And ntv further says: 

            “Not Realpolitik, but attitude and media effect”

are at Baerbock’s central point. Instead of substance, make-up and stumbling. 

            Deborah Düring (Greens): Oh! 

Bruno Hönel (Greens): Does anything substantial come here, Herr Moosdorf?

Dear colleagues, the former Ukrainian Foreign Minister Melnyk has this week demanded of Olaf Scholz to make way for peace talks with Putin. That was and is the position of the AfD from the beginning: Diplomacy, de-escalation, the search for a settlement of interests and an understanding. And that applies for all parts of this world. 

            Boris Mijatović (Greens): That is noted, ja, in your speeches!

Germany thereby of course requires no further NATO expansion to all the world, no additional color revolutions, no compulsion of woke nonsense in countries which – in a picture of the Minister’s – are “hundreds of thousands of kilometers” distant from us. 

            Boris Mijatović (Greens): Hundreds of thousands!

The immediate limitation of illegal migration, the comprehensive deportation of all those obliged to depart, a return to a definition of German interests: That, we require. Away with the sanctions which harm only us! Back to peace and sovereignty for the nations of Europe! You who are not capable of that, who disdain Germany and sell its assets dirt cheap, should finally make free the way, you and your unspeakable dilettante government. Please finally resign! 

Many thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Peter Boehringer, September 13, 2024, Delayed Bankruptcy

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/186, p. 24196. 

Frau President. 

Following this week’s debates, it is increasingly confirmed: The government attempts everything to drag itself through to the autumn of 2025. And furthermore, no clarity is created for the central questions of the draft budget. 

How perchance should one deal with the giant gaps in the two fully distinct military estimates? For one with the regular costs for a Bundeswehr for the defense of Germany: Legitimate expenditures, yet even today and first of all, quite unclearly financed in the finance planning time frame. For another with the expenditures for misguided foreign missions, primarily for the Ukraine war which in addition is not our war. Billions in costs for direct and indirect German participation in war, concealed by an EU peace facility, a 50 billion EU Ukraine facility and in a Federal budget by the so-called post-procurement [Nachbeschaffung] of material, which however means nothing other than the physical donation of Bundeswehr material for use at a foreign front. German weapons will be given to Zalenskyi and then post-procured; that is in x places in the budget: Pro forma for the Bundeswehr. Here, the Bundeswehr is misused as a transshipment warehouse for an unfortunate and lost war which needs to be solved diplomatically. 

Then your sustainability budget for 2024. That the Ampel on account of the fully “unexpected” worsened business cycle still brings in the autumn of the current year a sustainability budget is a novelty in the history of budgets. Thereby will now be obtained the indebtedness margin, increased 11 billion euros by purely technical formula, ten months after the issuance of the original budget. That is not serious, particularly as the Ampel embezzles transaction proceeds from the sale of the Bund’s silverware – over 4.1 billion euros –, simply illegal in the accounting, so that then the debt brake will no longer be observed for the fifth year in a row. 

Colleague Bury plainly said something correct, and for another reason is this budget again not constitutional. 

The Ampel here besides profits from the evil fruits of its own policy. Since of course the origins of the worsened economic activity were the years-long oppressive and fraudulent Corona preventive measures, the world’s dumbest energy policy, and the omnipresent, false incentive which you set above all with the planned economy CO₂ religion. Only that allowed you, on the basis of the somewhat questionable debts logic of Article 115 of the Basic Law, to today also obtain an extra 11 billion. 

There still continues to be some billions in risks in the budget which you yourselves have created. The risk of still further excess EEG compensations due to the planned economic guaranty price, the risk of a further exploding citizens’ wage [Bürgergeld], the risk of an abolition of the solidarity surtax, soon to be prescribed by the Constitutional Court, of course also the risk of a dramatically broken down economy. In the auto industry, that risk is already a reality. In July 2024, an orders breakdown of minus 29 percent vis-à-vis the previous year was to be written down; in regards E-autos, even a minus 69 percent in comparison with the previous year’s month. 

The Ampel apparently just plans precisely until the election date in September 2025. With you, it is therein clear, even if you deny it, that at the precise point after September 2025 there will be no more money. Any new Finance Minister will need to immediately order a budget embargo. Or then the Ampel or a successor perhaps proclaims yet again an emergency situation, so as to be able to conceal and compensate their own self-made budget emergency yet again by means of an ostensible external catastrophe? That is not academic. The coalition’s speakers in this week have explicitly not denied a new budget emergency on the basis of – cite Habeck – a historical struggle in the Ukraine. Whenever those governing trouble themselves over the pathos of endurance and historical dimensions, it becomes dangerous and expensive for the citizens. 

Yet then Herr Habeck also says what for an Economy Minister is a legendary sentence: The “Budget is not the center of the world”. Indecent numbers are thus to the Economy Minister all the same, – unbelievable! – all the same to him also is presence at this budget debate. 

The Ampel in any case is from the summer of 2025 no longer interested in the entire misery; Germany unfortunately still needs to be interested. In business, delayed bankruptcy is a criminal act; in this government, a common practice. 

Many thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]

Tino Chrupalla, September 11, 2024, Government without a People

German Bundestag, Plenarprotokoll 20/184, pp. 23875-23876. 

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

75 years Basic Law, 75 years German Bundestag – with the attempt of a celebration yesterday – and 75 years Federal Republic of Germany. The year of jubilees following the straining, successful years of construction in west and in east, after years of Cold War, the east-west conflict – and now 35 years after the fall of the Wall, the Ampel Federal government fights only for the hold on power, we again have war in Europe, and the people’s trust in the political leadership sinks incessantly. You can now again say: The AfD only pushes doom-saying and has no concept. – With that however, you would fall short of the necessary self-criticism. For I want to yet again state one thing: For the desolate situation in Germany, you alone on the government bench bear the responsibility. 

For a re-appraisal of the election results, let us take a look at the east of the Republic. In the 35^th year after the fall of the Wall, the  portion of the eastern Germans amounts to 19 percent, and the portion of eastern Germans in top positions in business, administration, science and media is presently at 1.7 percent. The economic situation still differs immensely, as well in regards to  pensions and incomes – and for women and men – as in regards investments in the economic area. That the lives of eastern Germans differ from those in the west, we know. Therefore has this Federal government again called upon an eastern commissioner, Herr Schneider. And here I ask myself, Herr Schneider – in this debate, it’s certainly about eastern Germany: What actually do you contribute to this debate? The citizens in the east are continually denigrated, tutored and not taken seriously. Herr Merz thinks more needs be explained in the east than in the west, and he gladly does this. Frau Esken does that every day on the television. You treat the people in the east like difficult to teach citizens, and actually understand nothing. 

The elections in the east thus have shown – and this you really should take seriously – eastern Germany is the thermometer of the Federal Republic. The denigration besides is related to the Green system. Massively punished by the voters in eastern Germany, you overtook not the least responsibility, but denigrate the opposition. Proposals even so as persons and parties are defamed and placed in the extremist corner. You also denigrate the voters and sympathizers. You thereby damage democracy. 

You no longer at all want to take up with or win over the people. What then are your goals? For you, what actually should Germany be in 10, 20 or 50 years? The current legislature still has exactly twelve months. Three-quarters of your time you have consumed so to drive our country into the wall and de-industrialize it with your mal-economic climate change policy. Your overflowing ideology intervenes in everyone’s private sphere, even when it is certainly not wanted. Your policy wants that we should all bathe less, heat less, eat less meat and drive less with combustion autos. 

            Anja Reinalter (Green): Perhaps more education!

You want to regulate with whom we meet – see the Corona times – and what we think. And when we do not obey, we are divided into good and evil. 

Your concept for the budget deficit is non-existent. Despite that, non-work and feedings will be ramped up. I ask myself: Why actually should the citizens still pay for all that? Moreover arrives a zero growth economy and special debts – in regards, named by you, “special assets” – inflation, price increases for consumer goods and for energy; end consumer prices decrease, if at all, slowly. The citizens are bound by contracts, and need for long to bear the high costs. Not to forget: There is an energy deficit as a result of a deficient supply of nuclear energy and advantageous gas from Russia. 

The infrastructure is exhausted for transportation – we’ve seen it early today in Dresden where bridges collapse – for education, for example in regards the lack of teachers, or for the healthcare system. The hospital reform shall be brought underway with all ministerial power, and be borne on the backs of the citizens, the contribution payers. Doctors continue to be missing. Contributions to the statutory sickness insurance, and also the added costs of wages, continue to rise incessantly. 

Lamya Kaddor (Green): Ask yourself why doctors are missing!

The reappraisal of the Corona time is for long not at all pursued; and, if so, then insufficiently. All of that is unacceptable. On the other hand, only our delegation and party concerns itself across parliaments. 

And I ask again: When finally will an audit be made? Since the beginning of this legislature, I remind for examination how much money we actually, concretely make available for which expenditures. Since we definitely have sufficient state income. Let us look at the numbers: In the year 2014, thus just ten years ago, tax income contributed 296 billion euros to state income. Just ten years later, we are meanwhile at 489 billion euros of state income. And nevertheless the money does not suffice: We nevertheless need to take up 50 billion euros in new debt, at the cost of our children and grandchildren. That is an absolutely irresponsible policy of this Ampel government. 

In addition to that, since 2015 around 300,000 people – good, well-educated skilled labor, Germans – have left our country; Herr Merz has correctly addressed it, he has nevertheless scarcely described the causes. Those are meanwhile almost three million people who in the last nearly ten years have gone. In this time, the CDU and CSU besides also governed. Immigration can never compensate for that. 

In addition, the costs for the state and taxpayer are higher when the immigrant persons initially need to be educated in language, culture and expertise. Primarily, I ask: By whom then? A successful and for both sides well done migration is of course not in the interest of the Ampel government. Your hyper-morality and your values compass have led you completely into error. Go into the States, simply speak with your party friends at the basis. Form a comprehensive opinion, and finally correct the expensive failures of your policy. 

It’s about Germany, our Heimat, and our citizens. We pursue a goal-directed immigration, but no immigration into the social system. The presently active, arbitrary and purposeless policy has not helped the German economy. On the contrary: You have even set and raised false expectations. 

Yet even to the people who come to Germany, the real skilled labor, you offer no perspective at all. In that regard, we certainly do not speak of asylum themes. Your policy enjoins violence and death. You have managed that migration not only has become the theme of the summer of 2024; much more, migration is connected with nearly all political fields: Domestic security and foreign policy, diplomatic relations, labor and social policy, economic and financial policy, etc. etc. 

In all named political fields, you can show since 2021 as good as nothing, no success. Germany and thereby the German Bundestag are after three years of Ampel government ridiculed in foreign countries, and in the country treated by our own people with more than great doubts. You are a government without a people. 

Nevertheless, humility and insight belong exactly as little to the great ones of this Federal government as does the honest dealing with Germany’s difficult situation. From economic leaders, Herr Habeck has made us into economic losers. Your attempts at policy have failed, Herr Habeck. The businesses run away and close the plants in Germany. 

You have overburdened this country, the businesses and the tradesmen. Obvious losses you take without further ado. Obvious gaps will be stopped up and plastered over with tax money, subventions, special debts. You and your policy offer the citizens in Germany no perspective. We require a conscientious dealing with all resources, with the people even so as with Nature. Your absolute and narrow-minded approaches and bans split the society, drive the citizens (those who can afford it) out of the country, and thereby destroy the social peace in your own country. 

It is the same with the Ukraine theme: Weapons deliveries, construction assistance, and no investments in a rapid end of the war, further escalation and a rhetorical fight for war and against peace. I therefore say to you: Continue to do it exactly so. Try to continue so indecently to hold fast to your power, and defame the opposition. Continue to play the master teacher, and denigrate the citizens in the east. Your credibility will further dwindle, day by day. You thus simulate policy for its own sake and against the citizens’ interests. We want in common to make policy for the citizens at home and for Germany’s interests. For we, the AfD, are the future. 

Many thanks. 

 

[trans: tem]