Budget: Lindner promises relief - opposition accuses him of "trickery".

Created: 2022-03-22Updated: 2022-03-22 13:04

Finance Minister Christian Lindner presents the budget for 2022 in the Bundestag.

© Kay Nietfeld / dpa

At the beginning of the budget week in the Bundestag, Finance Minister Lindner presented his budget planning.

Among other things, he pleaded for further help for recipients of basic security.

Berlin - At the beginning of the budget week in the Bundestag, Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) explained his budget planning, which is fraught with imponderables.

In view of the war in Ukraine and its consequences, economic development in Germany was "characterized by great uncertainty," he said on Tuesday (March 22).

All the more important is “an appropriate response from government fiscal policy”.

The aim of the federal government is to strengthen growth and at the same time "counteract the risks of inflation".

Budget week: Lindner plans supplementary budget – help for recipients of basic security

So far, Lindner is planning new debt of 99.7 billion euros for 2022.

However, this is likely to increase significantly: The finance minister confirmed his plan in the Bundestag to present a supplementary budget “as soon as possible”, in which further state reactions to the Russian war of aggression in Ukraine are to be reflected.

"Only measures that are directly related to the consequences of the Ukraine war will be added," emphasized Lindner, with a view to possible further budget requests from the various ministries.

Because of the Ukraine conflict, Lindner wants a moratorium on the burden on the German economy.

Everything must be avoided “that could further burden people and companies in this situation”.

Bureaucratic burdens should take second place to securing economic development.

He also pleaded for further help for those receiving basic security in view of the rising food costs.

The broad middle of society is also burdened with mobility.

Different exemptions are conceivable here.

Previously, Lindner had suggested a subsidy when refueling.

After that, funding “with the watering can” without a social component was often criticized.

Ultimately, it is the goal that is important, not the individual measure, emphasized Lindner.

Lindner presents budget plan: compliance with the school brake from 2023

At the same time, he emphasized that the budget also initiates a number of priorities for the traffic light coalition.

The alliance has set itself the goal of making the 2020s a “decade of investing in the future”.

"This draft budget can also be measured against that." It is "the first step in making our country more modern, more sustainable, more digital and more free".

The FDP chairman also confirmed his intention to comply with the debt brake again from 2023.

He is counting on "that in the coming year there will no longer be an emergency", which will allow an exception to the debt rule in the Basic Law.

Compliance with the debt brake is then a "command of our constitution," emphasized Lindner.

State finances would "not be ruined in the crisis," he said.

Rather, they would be damaged if the return to normal budgetary policy after a crisis did not succeed.

"This return to normality is the budgetary goal of this federal government."

Christian Lindner: Special assets for the Bundeswehr

Outside of the federal budget, the Bundeswehr special fund is to be set up in the current year.

It is said to have a volume of 100 billion euros, financed by loans.

The aim here is to "reinforce the Bundeswehr, which has been neglected for many years".

He defended the chosen construction of a special fund enshrined in the Basic Law.

The alternatives - namely tax increases or a "permanent softening of the debt brake" - would have been "disadvantageous".

The Bundestag discusses the budget draft for the rest of the week.

All individual plans of the ministries are taken into account.

On Wednesday morning, the general debate, the traditional exchange of blows between the government and the opposition, will take place during the discussion of the budget plan for the Federal Chancellery.

Opposition accuses Lindner of unsound budgetary policy

The opposition factions in the Bundestag have sharply criticized the budget draft of the traffic light coalition as unsound.

Speakers from the CDU/CSU, AfD and left faction accused Finance Minister Lindner (FDP) of budgetary trickery to cover up the high level of new debt.

"The federal government is trying to circumvent the debt brake with every conceivable trick," said the CDU budget expert Christian Haase.

The coalition should "not always try to circumvent the debt brake with ever new special funds".

Haase was alluding to the coalition's sub-budgets - the fund for climate investments, which was recently increased by 60 billion euros, but which has been around for years, and the planned 100 billion euro special fund for the Bundeswehr.

“We are all witnessing the end of the debt brake,” Haase summed up.

Lindner's draft is also based on overly optimistic expectations with regard to tax revenue and the labor market, he criticized: "This budget bursts as quickly as a soap bubble."

Criticism of Lindner's budget as a "budget puzzle"

CSU regional group chief Alexander Dobrindt accused Lindner of having presented a draft budget with large gaps for this year.

For the Bundestag, this is "not a budget to be discussed, but a budget riddle that has to be guessed at," said Dobrindt.

Funding is lacking in three major areas: defense, lowering energy prices, and the cost to Ukraine refugees.

AfD budget expert Kay Gottschalk accused Lindner of an "accumulation of government debt" that "is unconstitutional in our view."

Gottschalk accused the minister of abandoning his earlier regulatory ideas.

"Your commitment to going back to black sounds like mockery," he said to Linder.

"Actually, you should be observed by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution as far as the quality of your household is concerned."

The left householder Christian Görke also accused Lindner of dubious methods.

"The first traffic light household can hardly be surpassed in terms of trickery," he complained.

The coalition wants to "smuggle 100 billion euros past the debt brake" for the Bundeswehr, he said - and called for the debt brake anchored in the Basic Law to be completely abandoned.

Görke also sharply criticized the spending priorities: "You spend twice as much on defense as on climate protection."