As of: April 1, 2024, 9:07 a.m
By: Felix Durach
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Jens Teutrine (FDP), spokesman for citizens' money, does not believe the introduction of a payment card for people who receive citizens' money is expedient. © Montage/imago-images/dpa/Sven Hoppe
Is a payment card model also a possible sanction model for recipients of citizens’ money? The FDP's citizens' money spokesman is reserved towards IPPEN.MEDIA.
Berlin - While the traffic light government is still in a tussle over the introduction of a payment card for asylum seekers in Germany, the first voices are already being heard from the opposition that would like a similar model for those receiving citizens' benefit. The CDU MP Maximilian Mörseburg recently ventured forward with a corresponding idea.
“There is nothing that speaks against discussing the expansion of payment cards to recipients of citizens’ benefit,” the CDU politician told Bild. With the initiative, Mörseburg addressed the group of so-called “total refusers”. This refers to citizens' benefit recipients who have rejected job offers without any objective reasons.
Payment card also for citizens’ benefit recipients? FDP criticizes incorrect focus
For Jens Teutrine, spokesman for the issue of citizens' money in the FDP parliamentary group in the Bundestag, the initiative misses the core of the problem. “The purpose of the payment card for asylum seekers is to make payments abroad and payments to smugglers more difficult,” said Teutrine in an interview with
IPPEN.MEDIA
. However, these grievances in the area of migration policy, which the FDP wants to counteract with the introduction of a payment card, do not exist for citizens' benefit recipients.
The FDP politician wants to focus social policy more on job placement and less on increasingly tough sanctions and restrictions. “My focus is on getting employable people into work and not on distributing payment cards,” Teutrine continued.
Sanctions for those who refuse to pay citizens’ money – payment cards as a conceivable model?
However, the FDP politician also pointed out that politicians only have limited scope for action when it comes to sanctions against the so-called “total objectors”. The Federal Constitutional Court ruled in 2019 that benefit cuts for Harz IV recipients of more than 30 percent were unconstitutional. The highest judges based their decision on the subsistence minimum protected by the Basic Law.
“I don’t want to categorically rule it out as an additional sanction option, for example in the case of social abuse or total refusers, but before that I support reductions in benefits and total sanctions,” said Teutrine, referring to the payment card.
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Traffic light coalition disagrees on payment card for asylum seekers
14 of the 16 countries had already agreed in January to develop common standards for the introduction of a payment card for asylum seekers. Bavaria and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania are taking a special path. The card has already been introduced in the first municipalities as part of pilot projects. The main purpose of the card is to prevent payments abroad - for example by restricting cash withdrawals. However, refugee organizations criticize the plans as discriminatory.
However, the nationwide introduction of the model is still causing disagreements within the traffic light coalition. While the SPD and FDP consider a change in the law to be necessary in order to provide the states with the necessary legal certainty when introducing payment cards, the Greens reject this. The members of the Green parliamentary group see no need for a change in the law. In their justification, the Greens refer to the pilot projects that are already underway.
(fd)