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SPD Chairwoman Saskia Esken
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Felipe Trueba/ EPA-EFE/ Shutterstock
SPD Chairwoman Saskia Esken has openly questioned Finance Minister Christian Lindner's (FDP) plan to comply with the debt brake from next year.
With regard to the financing of possible further relief for citizens because of the high inflation, she told the "Tagesspiegel": "The question of financing is justified and very serious.
I'm telling you: we will have to talk about the debt brake or other ways of financing in the coalition.«
Lindner, on the other hand, has announced that the debt brake enshrined in the Basic Law, which only allows minimal borrowing, is to be complied with again from next year.
In recent years, it had been suspended because of the high loads caused by the corona pandemic and then by the war in Ukraine.
The federal budget for 2022 provides for new borrowing of almost 139 billion euros.
Esken emphasized that the European Union had also made it clear that it would be fundamentally wrong if the public budgets were to forego investments in favor of the debt rules.
»I share this view.« Tasks such as climate change, demographics or social cohesion did not take a break.
"That's why we have to look for ways to continue investing and to be able to finance our social policy projects."
gro/dpa