traffic light before trouble?

Union is suing Lindner's supplementary budget

Created: 04/08/2022Updated: 04/08/2022 16:41

By: Linus Prien

CDU chairman Friedrich Merz © Frederic Kern/Imago

The traffic light government wants to transfer 60 billion euros earmarked for dealing with the corona pandemic to the energy and climate fund.

Now the Union is suing.

Berlin - The Union in the Bundestag has filed a constitutional complaint against a supplementary federal budget in favor of investments in climate protection.

This was announced by Union faction leader and CDU chairman Friedrich Merz on Friday (April 8) in Berlin.

With the approval of the Bundestag, the Federal Government is reallocating 60 billion euros in unused credit authorizations in the budget so that they can be used for investments in climate protection in the coming years.

The loans were originally approved to combat the Corona crisis.

Merz criticized: "This is a simple legal circumvention of the debt brake."

Constitutional lawsuit: "No lawsuit against sufficient funds to deal with the climate crisis"

Merz emphasized: "This is not a lawsuit against sufficient funds to deal with the climate crisis." The Union is only opposed to a budgetary measure.

She does not deny the climate and transformation fund itself, but only the financing.

Instead, the funds for climate protection would have to be mobilized via the normal budget.

In the event of financing problems, savings must be made elsewhere.

In view of the current crises, an agreement on new priorities is necessary, said Merz.

The head of the CSU state group, Alexander Dobrindt, said the Union hoped that after the lawsuit there would be indications from the Federal Constitutional Court that the debt brake had been violated before the end of the year.

If the government cannot reconcile this spending with its budget, the government must say that it wants to change the debt brake, Merz said.

In this context, he expressed doubts as to whether this would again be enshrined in the existing form in the Basic Law.

Dobrindt accused the government of not even being clear when and for what purpose the funds transferred to the energy and climate fund should be used at all.

This fund has now been converted into a climate and transformation fund.

Background: Corona loans are to be transferred to energy and climate funds

The background to this is the government's decision to transfer 60 billion euros, which were originally planned to be financed by credit to deal with the consequences of the Corona crisis, to the Energy and Climate Fund (EKF).

"We consider this approach to be unconstitutional," said Merz.

He pointed out that exceeding the limits of the debt brake for these loans had only been expressly approved by the Bundestag in connection with the corona pandemic.

Constitutional lawsuit: SPD relates corona damage to the climate crisis

The budget spokesman for the SPD in the Bundestag, Dennis Rohde, rejected the allegations of the Union.

He argued that from the coalition's point of view there was a connection to the Corona crisis.

"With the supplementary budget, the federal government wants to overcome the economic consequences of the corona pandemic and quickly get back on a growth path," said Rohde in Berlin.

"So that this happens sustainably, we want to invest 60 billion euros in climate protection and thus in significantly more renewable energies, in hydrogen technologies, in the expansion of electromobility and alternative drives," explained the SPD politician.

If the Union questions this with its lawsuit, it is also turning "against Germany's energy independence from Russia," Rohde argued.