Enlarge image
Finance Minister Christian Lindner: »My position on synthetic fuels has been known for years«
Photo: Britta Pedersen / dpa
Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner has once again rejected the accusation that he was in close contact with the Porsche automobile group during the coalition negotiations.
At the same time, however, he admitted to having spoken to Porsche boss Oliver Blume on the phone.
The FDP politician told the RTL/ntv broadcasters: "There was a phone call with Mr. Blume in October 2021." The coalition negotiations between the SPD, the Greens and the FDP began on October 21, 2021.
Otherwise, Lindner played down: "My position on so-called synthetic fuels, i.e. climate-friendly liquid fuels in combustion engines, has been known for years."
The background is a report by the ZDF satirical magazine "Die Anstalt" from last Tuesday.
According to this, Porsche boss Oliver Blume is said to have said to employees at a works meeting at the end of June that Porsche had “a very large part” in the further use of synthetically produced e-fuels for combustion engines “being included in the coalition agreement”.
After the report had caused some excitement, a Porsche spokesman told SPIEGEL on Friday that the exchange in question "didn't happen like that."
Blume apologized over the weekend.
He chose "wrong words," said the 54-year-old.
A phone call is not a phone call?
Lindner also rejected the ZDF allegations via his team on Twitter on Friday.
There had been "no previous contact with Mr. Blume and no other influence".
Lindner now emphasized that there had been "a single telephone call with Mr. Blume".
The Porsche boss also spoke to the Greens.
At the end of June, there was a dispute within the traffic light coalition about a ban on new registrations of combustion cars from 2035 at EU level.
Lindner had rejected the ban plans.
In the coalition negotiations in autumn 2021, the traffic light had agreed to ban new registrations for combustion engines from 2035 - but there should be an exception for cars that can only be operated with e-fuels.
mgo/dpa
