Thüringer Landtag, Plenarprotokoll 7/53, pp.
48-50.
Right honorable Herr President. Valued colleague members.
Dear viewers on livestream.
More than 150 people have lost their lives as a result of
flooding in Rheinland-Pfalz and Nordrhein-Westfalen [NRW]; many, all of their
worldly goods. Rescuers died in the course of their duties, towns were
destroyed, hospitals, schools, farmhouses washed away. The damages are still
scarcely to be figured and many losses are incalculable. Western Germany is
dramatically affected. Non-bureaucratic, rapid assistance is required, in that
the announced 400 million euro immediate aid is incomprehensibly small and is
brazen in the face of the citizens.
Heavy rains and storms, if not on this scale, have affected
Thüringia and have left behind damages. Here already last year, our delegation
demanded a facilitated requisition of means from the catastrophe funds and an
improved regulation in a case of catastrophe. This was rejected by the
self-named democratic delegations.
An authentic strategy against these results is urgently
necessary, one which extends from renovated wastewater systems, through storage
space, flood defense – in Thüringia introduced – and flow channels, to the
restoration of industrial fields and the maintenance and preparation of siren
systems; which in self-help sees no substitute and which acknowledges that the
channeling of rivers [Flussgradigungen]
presents no concept against flooding.
Yet what needs be witnessed? The instrumentalization of the
harm. Climate terminology will be waved around and Luisa Neubauer stands safe
and sound in Pfalz with a microphone, instead of with a shovel.
Onto this train jump those politicians who want to avert
their responsibility because they have plainly taken no or poor defensive
measures, or not reacted to the warnings; for example, to the European flood
warning systems.
And the public broadcasting speaks of climate- instead of
catastrophe-defense; in connection with which one needs be happy that the WDR
[western German broadcasting] nevertheless then noticed the catastrophe, since
as the still functioning sirens in the communities howled, it broadcast a
sports program. While the first houses and homes went down and the dam in
Wuppertal overflowed, a small, private, regional radio station performed the
duties of the GEZ [fees intake center] empire, heavy with billions.
In the midst of this emergency, in which people’s property
will be washed away underfoot, in which firemen have died in the attempt to
assist, and dead animals propel through the neighborhoods, the Thunberg
adherents have nothing other to do than construe connections which, first,
consist of nothing and, second, help no one.
Since here at hand are massive political and official
failures, not climate.
Facts: The Federal Environmental Office’s 2019 monitoring
report for adaptation to climate change sees no tendency of these occurences,
even so little as does the German Weather Service.
More facts: There were floods in Ahrtal in 1804, 1910 and
2021. That climate change exists is no justification for ideology, for, as if in
the Old Testament, talking people into a bad conscience, whose livelihood in
the truest sense of the word is going down the creek.
If you want to help, valued climate sectarians, grab a
bucket and shovel!
What for decades has happened in Germany is namely the
channeling of rivers, a massive sealing off of acreage – for wind power
installations – a lack of reserve spaces, scarce investments in modern
wastewater systems and dams, and little readiness for restoration – see a
petition from Weimar.
Sensible flood defense measures were neglected, like climate
change adaptation measures – keyword: Forestry reconstruction. Instead, the
money was expended for a climate care mentality for the pacification of
associated interest groups which take the long-time weather statistics of past
decades…as an all-time excuse to now tell tales of climate floods.
Meanwhile, from all over the country, farmers unpack in
Rheinland-Pfalz and NRW and mop up, those who the red-red-green will be, ja, especially happy to make responsible
for all that is possible.
I wish for the affected people in the inundated areas much
power and a rapid assistance. Our compassion for those left behind, a thank you
for all the helpers and for those who show solidarity.
Many thanks for your attention.
[trans: tem]
