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Federal Health Minister Jens Spahn (left) and Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil in the current hour in the Bundestag
Photo: Kay Nietfeld / dpa
In the end, it is the silence of two men that appears loudest in the Bundestag among all the shouting.
Federal Minister of Health Jens Spahn (CDU) and Federal Minister of Labor Hubertus Heil (SPD), sit next to each other, they have left one seat between them, due to corona, and listen to the arguments about them.
They do not want to speak publicly about the topic on this day.
The left has requested a current hour in parliament. It's - once again - about the mask shops. Once again it is the Federal Minister of Health who is under criticism. As SPIEGEL revealed, he is said to have intended to distribute masks imported from China, which were only tested for effectiveness in a fast-track process, to facilities for the disabled and the unemployed. The Ministry of Labor took a stand, insisted on further testing of the quality of the protective masks.
The SPD and the Union have been giving each other the buck on the matter for days. The SPD leadership accuses Spahn of "inhuman" behavior. Spahn's Ministry replies that the masks are fully functional in terms of infection protection. Both sides attacked each other so vigorously that day in parliament that a television commentator felt compelled to emphasize that both groups are still part of a governing coalition.
But the opposition starts the game: Jan Korte from the Left calls out: “Who is actually telling the truth here?
My guess is that Jens Spahn won't do it! «In Baden-Württemberg, the Spahn masks were checked and it was found that 13 of the 27 tested did not meet the EU standard.
From now on there will be a lot of controversy about the various stripped-down test procedures - CPA (labor product law) and CPI (medical product law) - and who decided and who approved them.
The fronts in the coalition are clear: Members of the Union accused the SPD of tactical electoral maneuvers.
The coalition would have jointly decided on the reduced test standard, the Greens and the FDP would have agreed.
If anyone had made mistakes, it would be everyone together.
The SPD etches back that it is not about the personnel issue of the health minister, but simply about protecting all people in the country to the same extent.
"There is one thing I do not accept from them," says parliamentary group deputy Katja Mast, "the accusation that this is a party-political debate."
Instead, the Federal Minister of Health wanted to lower the standards for masks further.
She wanted to know from him why he had not responded to information from countries such as Baden-Württemberg, which had pointed out the shortage to him.
"You are lying!" Someone calls Mast at this point from the plenum.
"Your screaming confirms I'm right," she replied.
SPD General Secretary Lars Klingbeil told SPIEGEL: "The fact that the Union is now throwing smoke candles and attacking the SPD is a transparent diversionary maneuver." The allegations against Spahn and his ministry are "very serious" and urgently need to be clarified.
Much argument, hardly any knowledge gained
However, as the debate shows, it is precisely the information that is lacking, as a member of the Greens rightly remarked.
Health expert Maria Klein-Schmeink finds the right title for the whole event: SPD and Union would show "scenes of a broken marriage".
She is right, there is a lot of arguing, but without gaining knowledge.
There was no such thing behind closed doors in the morning in the health committee, participants reported to SPIEGEL.
Spahn initially promised to give the test reports of the masks for inspection.
But then, according to participants, he noticed that reading all of them would not have time anyway.
At the insistence of the MPs, he rowed back later.
There were 71 legal disputes in mask matters, Spahn said that he did not want to weaken the German legal position by disclosing the test procedures during ongoing processes.
Of course, Spahn feeds speculation with it.
But the SPD sometimes seems a bit over the top with its allegations.
Towards the end of the debate in the Bundestag, a specialist politician from the Social Democrats brought a little calm into the room.
The MP Martina Stamm-Fiebich stated at the beginning of her speech that she did not blame Spahn for ordering large quantities of masks, some of which were bad, during a stressful phase at the beginning of the pandemic.
Today it is not about the fact that the certification of the masks was simplified at the beginning of the pandemic.
Instead, there are three other questions that the Ministry of Health has to answer:
Why did
Spahn, the less sharp tested masks in the fall of 2020
to distribute
, at a time when, as well as
masks with higher standards
were?
The Federal Ministry of Labor prevented that.
Is the simplified CPI testing process agreed upon at the start of the pandemic
either not appropriate or was it not being used correctly?
Has the Federal Ministry of Health
investigated
the
reports on defective masks from the
federal
states and what are the consequences?
A check of the masks has so far been prevented.
CDU General Secretary Paul Ziemiak is following the whole debate with increasing excitement, restlessly rolling his chair back and forth.
At the end, Ziemiak himself steps up to the desk - and gets loud again.
He was shocked when he read about the allegations against Spahn shortly before the election in Saxony-Anhalt.
In the meantime everything has been cleared up.
It is clear today that no masks that do not protect against Corona have been delivered to disabled facilities, welfare recipients or Hartz IV recipients.
And that there were no plans for it either.
He expects an apology for the false claims of the SPD and recommends a book: "Freddie Flunkert," a book that educates children about lying.
