Securing gas supplies would therefore be the top priority. If the winter turns cold, price-driving purchases at astronomical prices or rationing threaten to take the last remaining strength from our economy and private households. And in this situation...
Mrs. Reiche knows this, by the way; she has to know it. I would be surprised if she didn't. Listen to your colleague, Mrs. Reiche. In this situation, gas would have to be stored now for the winter. But there is no sign of the strategic foresight that relies on resilience and diversification of Germany's energy supply, and you are truly steering us with open eyes into a catastrophic supply crisis in winter. Another total failure of this government.
Anyone who works, pays taxes, and provides for themselves and their family is being plundered and taken for a fool. The person who drives to work every morning is bleeding at the gas station because of the far too high taxes at the pump. Anyone who instead migrates into the social systems and lives at the expense of the general public is pampered, fully provided for, even if they are wanted on an arrest warrant. The Syrian who annoys people day after day in Witten with Islamist songs is financed by the job center without any questions. The same goes for the Syrian clan chief with his 32 children, some of whom are serious offenders. But what if an ordinary citizen, an unemployed ordinary citizen, misses an appointment at the job center? Then all hell breaks loose. Around three-quarters of the citizens' benefit recipients are foreigners or have a migration background. The costs are rising to astronomical heights. The shrinking, working, and tax-paying population, that is, the Einheitsbraunen, as your social minister, the SPD social minister, likes to call them, should pay for this without limit and work themselves to the bone, while others live it up at their expense and enjoy a comfortable life.
Yes, the truth hurts. The truth hurts. I can imagine that. Mr. Merz, the Germans are not too lazy to work more. They see that effort does not pay off because an unfair tax system takes everything away from them. Out of one earned euro, only 46 cents remain, and that is robbery. But above all, people notice when they are being taken for a ride and cheated left and right. In Saxony-Anhalt, the citizens did not just punish you, but pulverized your party, the CDU. In Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, you are already a small party, and at the federal level, you are well on your way to becoming one. And rightly so.
Because a political change that has been refused for a long time is overdue, and it is possible. We must ruthlessly abolish unnecessary state spending and subsidies. By cutting unnecessary climate protection and transformation programs as well as payments to politically promoted NGOs alone, double-digit billions can be saved. We must immediately and drastically cut development aid and payments for global climate protection. Germany, with a total of 26 billion euros in development aid, is still ahead of the USA. I ask myself, why is that? For the world, all the money is there, but not for our own people and citizens.
We must clearly limit payments to the EU. Almost a billion flows to Brussels every week, but only a fraction of it comes back. We want our money back, dear friends.
We must rigorously rebuild the state apparatus and the public sector, which you have so brazenly inflated. And we must stop mass migration into the social systems, put a stop to the systematic abuse of social benefits, and above all, deport illegal immigrants and criminal offenders. They have no place in our country.
We must end the failed energy transition and tackle the return to nuclear power. The key word is the resilience of our energy supply. The SPD is laughing again. But for that, we also need cheap natural gas from Russia. We will work towards that for the German economy.
We must use the leeway we have gained to lower the far too high energy prices and abolish the CO2 levy. Lower energy taxes and push through a reform of corporate and income taxes that brings real relief, and above all, drastically reduce taxes on petrol and diesel. That would be a sensible government program for the people in this country. Mr. Merz, you have made it clear that you did not understand the message in your tragic, bizarre press conference on Monday. You did not understand the message that the voters in Saxony-Anhalt sent you last Sunday. That is no longer relevant because your time has run out. The citizens want a political change, and they will get it. In the next elections, the people will give the AfD, that is us, the Alternative for Germany, a clear mandate to make different politics possible. And we will take this mandate seriously and accept it to lead this country into a better future. Because Germany deserves it, the Germans deserve to be well governed. Thank you very much.
For the Federal Government, the Chancellor now has the floor, Mr. Friedrich Merz. Please go ahead.
Madam President, dear colleagues, yes, Ms. Weidel, today you can barely walk for joy, but you have achieved a remarkable election result in Saxony-Anhalt in every respect, and no one can accuse you of hiding the intentions you attach to it. But I would like to point out that your actual electoral goal in Saxony-Anhalt was to achieve the majority of the mandates. You did not achieve that. 56% of the voters in Saxony did not choose you, ladies and gentlemen. And the polling stations had not even been closed for six hours when you urged your top candidate in Saxony-Anhalt to commit the first electoral fraud by telling him to look for a majority, even though he had made the election promise to govern only with the absolute majority of the mandates. Ms. Weidel, it could even be more than just a happy coincidence that you did not achieve exactly this electoral goal. The voters have spoken quite clearly. They have also given us, and me, a clear message. But you do not have the absolute majority, and you will not achieve it in Germany either. Nowhere in Germany will you get the majorities with this policy.
You are and you remain, Ms. Weidel, a destructive force. And how far that goes, you have just made clear again in your contribution on Ukraine. Ladies and gentlemen, for four and a half years, this country has been fighting for survival, and no one, no one, no one has threatened Russia...
Excuse me, Mr. Chancellor, that I interrupt you briefly, but this is directed at the AfD. Their chairwoman has just spoken, and everyone listened. And I also ask, one has to endure that when one is shown the mirror. It will also be expected of you to listen to others. Opinions can differ here, and it is part of the rules to listen. The AfD will have speaking time later. You can put in everything you are now calling out. Mr. Chancellor, please.
Thank you very much, Madam President. Let me say this once again in all calm. We support Ukraine and we will continue to support it because it is also defending our freedom, here in the middle of our European continent. And your reactions, ladies and gentlemen, your reactions only show that you obviously intend to continue the grotesque reversal of perpetrator and victim. It is a grotesque reversal of perpetrator and victim. No one, no one has threatened Russia. Not NATO, not the European Union, not Germany, and your reactions show exactly how you think. Ladies and gentlemen, the only thing that really threatens Russia and Putin is the radiance of democracy. Ukraine was on its way into the European democratic family, and that is exactly the real danger for Putin's regime in Russia. And you know that in the AfD, that it is so. And yet you are obviously still standing on Russia's side when it comes to defending our freedom here as well. And that is exactly where the deep rift between you and us lies, the deep rift in foreign policy, the deep rift in European policy, and also the deep rift in social policy and peace policy. Ladies and gentlemen, the majority in the German Bundestag will not follow the path you are charting here, and neither will the majority of the population of the Federal Republic of Germany. We will continue to defend our freedom in the future, and that we have to do so, not only throughout Europe but also here in Germany. We learned that at the latest in a whole new dimension on August 4th. Not a word from you, Ms. Weidel, about what happened on August 4th at Leipzig Airport. You are laughing about it. A clear attribution, which you know, that this attack in Russia was planned for months and was directed specifically against Germany, and that greater material and personal damage was prevented only by pure chance. You are laughing about it, ladies and gentlemen. That shows how you think and where you stand.
Not a word from you about the massive threat to our data networks, our cybersecurity. Not a word from you about the disinformation campaigns that, from Russia and with your support, have been trying for weeks, months, and years to destabilize our country, our society, and our democracy. Ladies and gentlemen, you are part of this problem that we have in Germany, and we will defend ourselves against it with everything we have, so that you cannot continue on this path in Germany, and so that we must become more resilient, more capable of defense, and protect our security better. We see that in the most recent days, in the massive attacks also against our digital infrastructure in Germany, up to what happened here in Berlin just a few days ago. Not a word from you about what is currently happening in Germany, ladies and gentlemen. But that is also the reality of life for the people, the institutions, the authorities in our country. What characterizes you is a contempt for our democratic institutions and a permanent personal attack on the representatives of our state. That is the hallmark of your politics and the hallmark of your political action. Ladies and gentlemen.
Yes, we will have to continue to protect ourselves. We will also have to better protect our people, the people in Germany, the population. Civil protection, disaster protection, these are topics that have also occupied and challenged us intensely this summer. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we have set up a special fund for investments and climate protection. We have promised the states in Germany 100 billion euros, 8 billion euros every year, so that civil protection, population protection, and disaster protection can also be implemented in the states. And that this is necessary, we have seen not least in the numerous forest fires this summer. Not a word from you, Ms. Weidel, about what was going on in this country this year. Not a word from you about the causes. These causes are, of course, the climate change that you deny. These are the causes that the population is now feeling exactly and that they notice. Not a word from you either about the fate of the people who were affected by these fires.
Yes, there has been criticism that I did not immediately go to one of the... you were there for four weeks, that cannot be true... that I did not immediately go to one of the places where there was such a large fire. Ladies and gentlemen, let me say this clearly once again. I coordinated this in the days in mid-August, from the 13th, 14th, 15th, closely with the state prime minister of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, with the local district administrator, who explicitly asked me not to come there during the ongoing firefighting operations, but also asked me to come there a few days later and see for myself what had happened there. Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to take this opportunity once again to thank, from the bottom of my heart, the emergency services who did their work there and elsewhere this year: the fire brigade, the Bundeswehr, the Federal Agency for Technical Relief, the German Red Cross, agriculture, forestry, and many volunteers who helped there. That was something great that we saw in our country.
But I also want to add that we will do more in population protection, and that is the civil protection that the federal government is primarily responsible for, and the disaster protection that the states co-responsible for. We must do more in this area in the coming years, and we are doing that. We want to do it. We have to do it so that our society as a whole becomes safer. Because that is what the people in Germany rightly expect from politics: security. They want security from external threats. They want security from internal threats. But they also want security from events like the ones we have seen this year. We can only solve all these tasks if we have a strong economy again. Only then, if there is growth in Germany. And on that too, from you, Ms. Weidel, not a word. I personally had actually only expected growth of over 1% for next year. We have already achieved it this year. 1.3% economic growth for the year 2026 shows that our first measures are helping, that we are on the right track, that we have made decisions that make economic growth in Germany possible again. But it is also true that this will only last if we initiate further reforms in Germany, if we implement further reforms, and if we ensure that our economy as a whole can keep up with the rapid structural change in the world. Only then will we succeed. We must be a modern country, have a modern industry, and we must regain economic growth. And ladies and gentlemen, yes, we have made the first decisions, mostly against your bitter resistance. We have pushed through a statutory health insurance reform. It has been decided, part two will follow in the autumn. We have received proposals for a comprehensive reform of the pension security systems in Germany, and yes, of course there will be discussions about it, and of course we will have to look at the details. Quite concretely, how we deal with people who have worked for 45 years and paid into the pension insurance is of course a topic we will talk about. But ladies and gentlemen, the most important goal is that we establish a pension insurance that, in the longer perspective, gives the young generation the opportunity to build up assets as well. And that is the real core of the proposals we have seen from the pension reform commission. Comprehensive asset building for the young generations, which can only be made possible if we really implement these reforms in this way. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you raised the issue of energy supply, Ms. Weidel. It is true, and I have no reservations about admitting this here, that serious mistakes were made in energy policy in Germany in the past. Serious mistakes were made. The shutdown of power plants in Germany, especially nuclear power plants, at a time when the reserve capacities were not yet available, was at least the wrong order. Yes, that is true. But ladies and gentlemen, you completely overlook that we are doing exactly the right thing today to ensure the energy supply of our country. We are correcting misdevelopments in energy policy. We are ensuring that we can build gas power plants in Germany. The tenders are underway. The permits have been granted. We will ensure that Germany has a secure energy supply in the future, and that with renewable energies, and not without them or even against them, as you constantly claim is supposedly possible.
And let me also say something about the gas supply. We naturally have the fill level of the storage facilities in view, and we naturally speak with those who fill the gas storage facilities, and we naturally look towards the winter and the coming year. Assume that the Federal Minister of Economic Affairs, in coordination with the members of the Federal Government, is doing exactly the right thing to ensure the gas supply in winter. Triggering hectic purchasing actions publicly, as you want, Ms. Weidel, would only lead to prices on the gas markets rising so sharply that we can no longer afford them. And not only the public budgets cannot, but the consumers in Germany also cannot. What you are demanding here is the opposite of what is right for the consumers in Germany. We are getting clear indications that the energy supply, especially the gas supply, will be secured during the winter in Germany, and the Federal Government is basing its supply strategy on exactly that. However, we are not doing it like you with public theater, but we are doing it the way responsible households and public budgets do it. That is how we are doing it, and not otherwise.
Only, ladies and gentlemen, we are working intensively on a strategy for the use of artificial intelligence. We have held a cabinet retreat... yes, above all, how is that supposed to work without any natural intelligence? That is also true. Yes... I could now only quote Dieter, but I will refrain from doing so. Read it for yourself. Ladies and gentlemen, we have set up a task force in the Federal Government that has just presented proposals for a strategy in Germany on the use of artificial intelligence. We want to implement this. We will decide on it in the cabinet in a few days, but we also know that decisions of the Federal Government alone are not yet implementation in practice. All companies in Germany, services, crafts, trade, industry, the middle class, all will be affected by this fourth industrial revolution. We want Germany to be at the forefront of technological development in this technology as well. That is why we have already ensured in Germany that we are building data centers on a large scale. We want to build these data centers so that we have the necessary energy and the necessary storage capacity available. And yet we take seriously what comes from the companies. And I would like to quote in particular the one who represents the largest part of our economy, namely the president of the Central Association of German Crafts, Jörg Dittrich, who told us very clearly yesterday, both at the cabinet retreat and again yesterday, where the problems lie in the crafts sector: namely with bureaucracy, with the high costs of labor, with the high energy costs, and with the high taxes. We are working every day to reduce this heavy burden on companies, especially the middle class. But ladies and gentlemen, millions of people with a migration background also work in the crafts sector. And if what you are propagating here were to become true, namely remigration, which is nothing other than an ethnic cleansing by craft, by skin color and origin, nothing else. Ladies and gentlemen, the word, the word remigration is nothing other than a synonym for ethnic cleansing by origin and skin color. Mr. Koppler, you yourself come from the crafts sector. If what you want becomes reality, then the crafts sector in Germany can no longer work. Then not a single nursing home will work. Then not a single hospital in Germany will work. Then not a single restaurant can be operated in Germany. That would be the result of your remigration policy. Ladies and gentlemen, that is exactly what divides our society so deeply that we have problems in the area of migration, that we still have many people who are not allowed to stay in Germany permanently, that we have to deport more. That is the consensus in the coalition, but we carefully differentiate between those who work in Germany, who contribute to our prosperity, who are welcome in Germany, and those who do not have a permanent residence in Germany and who must leave our country again. We make this distinction, in contrast to you, with the greatest care, ladies and gentlemen.
And let me also say a word, on this occasion, about the investigations into the educational level in our schools. We received another PISA study yesterday. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, the results we saw there are sobering, and we know that we need another really great effort in education policy. I want to expressly offer the states in Germany that we here... I want to expressly offer the states that we once again come together for a great effort to improve the situation of education in Germany. Ladies and gentlemen, one thing also belongs to this. Education and upbringing cannot be outsourced to the state. The families, the parents also belong to it and have a responsibility. If we take this on together, we can solve the problem. But if we do it the way you always want, the way you propose, it will not be solvable. I expressly offer it to the states and say it for the Federal Government: yes, we know that these are central tasks of our country to ensure that children and young people have a chance. And with that, I come to what is often said to us, what is asked, what is also said to me. Why all this? What is, so to speak, the superstructure or what is the narrative? What is the meaning of reforms? Well, ladies and gentlemen, that is perhaps the answer we have owed the most so far. I do not exclude myself. We will have to give an answer that especially the young generation in Germany and the young voters are the ones who chose their party in large numbers. We must give the young generation a convincing answer as to what our country stands for and where our society is heading. I want to put it this way, Mr. Chancellor, excuse me also that... it will be whistled in here. It will keep coming. No, now it is my turn. You will have the chance in your own speeches to convince that people are calling out here. Interjections are part of parliamentary business, but it is not part of it that one permanently interrupts a speaker. One must also endure that there are other opinions. What one claims for oneself, one should also be willing to offer to others. Please go ahead, Mr. Chancellor.
That is very kind of you, Madam President, but it will still fall on deaf ears, and this faction will continue to try not only to disturb here. You see, it is going on right away. Listening is not their strength. They want to destabilize our country. Their entire contempt for the German Bundestag is also expressed in this behavior here. You see, it is starting again. It is exactly as we have always said. They do not want a dialogue here. What they keep saying with an outstretched hand... you see, you see, you see. So, we are not on a football pitch here. Save that for the weekend. If this happens again here, such behavior, I will throw you out of here. I have had enough of this now.
I actually wanted to spare you the quote, but your state chairman, Ms. Weidel in Saxony-Anhalt, spoke about Germany a few days before the election in front of the youth organization, the country that they supposedly love so much. And the sentence was the following about Germany: Germany is, he says, a stinking, rotten country stinking of dope. But he said that about Germany. He said that about Germany, and that shows how you think and talk about our country. And there was no contradiction from you to this sentence anywhere.
But ladies and gentlemen, back to what our task will be. Three generations in Germany could rely on the fact that the prosperity promise of the market economic order was fulfilled after the Second World War. Three generations. Germany has had the great fortune to live for almost 80 years in freedom, in peace, in prosperity, and in ever greater social justice. The young generation today doubts this prosperity promise, and that is exactly why we must renew this prosperity promise. We must give the young generation the perspective that at least three generations before them had in Germany. That is the meaning of our politics. That is the task we face together today, ladies and gentlemen. And taking on this task must be expressed more in everything we do than we perhaps have done in the past. Reforms are not a textbook of economics and are not just mathematics. Reforms serve cohesion, progress, and the further development of our country in freedom and in peace. And ladies and gentlemen, I would like to conclude by quoting from a letter that I received a few days ago from the rector of the theological college in Giessen, who wrote to me very thoughtfully, very earnestly, full of concern about the state of our country. But he also writes that there are still inventions made in Germany, model companies, people who strive for social cohesion, club activities, neighborhood help, children's farms, food banks, and so on and so forth. Despite all the problems, he writes, Germany still has so many opportunities and possibilities. And then he concludes... And then he concludes with the words: only if we stick together, tackle things together, also make mistakes together, in brackets, and admit them, forgive them, get up again, only then do we have a future. Ladies and gentlemen, dear colleagues, I am moved by the words: get up, forgive mistakes, and shape the future for our country. Ladies and gentlemen, that is our task. Get up, forgive mistakes, and shape the future for Germany, even against your resistance. We will take the future of our country into our own hands, shape it, make it better than in the last months, and we will ensure that our children and grandchildren again have a hope for the future, that they again have a perspective, that they do not only see the promise of advancement and prosperity of our country in retrospect after 80 years, but also look ahead for the coming years and decades. And that is where our common gaze is directed. I thank you.
For the Alliance 90/The Greens faction, Ms. Katharina Dröge has the floor. Please.
Madam President, dear colleagues, dear Mr. Merz, I tell you personally, I take your dismay and shock about this terrible election result in Saxony-Anhalt very seriously. We have also often talked about it together, and I know how terrible and dangerous you find this party, and that is why I think it is explicitly right that you have taken on this confrontation with the AfD today in this way. And at the same time, I have to tell you that this alone is not enough. This alone is not enough, because many people in this country are now expecting answers from you, answers to what now, what now, after 44% of right-wing extremists were elected to an East German state parliament, and how dangerous this party is, we heard once again today in Alice Weidel's speech. I have to say quite honestly, in the end, that was not a speech. It was more like a scripted screenplay delivered at half speed. They always do that, Ms. Weidel, so that people do not quite realize how full of hate and anger they really are. It is always difficult for you to control that. A scripted screenplay of anger, agitation, the distortion of facts. A screenplay that was staged so embarrassingly that they even invented interjections that did not exist in this room at all, just because it said in their manuscript that they should be outraged. The Bundestag is for free speech, Ms. Weidel. You should try to deliver that once and not just read out what someone has written down for you. So, we are in a state where an absolute disaster has happened politically, and there are people in Saxony-Anhalt who are now afraid. It is a democratic civil society that is asking what repressions are coming their way if the AfD really governs in this federal state. There are people with a migration history who are asking whether they can still let their children play outside safely. There are queer people who are asking whether they can still walk down the street holding hands. And to all of them, Mr. Merz, and I would have expected this from you, we must now give answers. You must now give answers. What are you doing to protect the people in Saxony-Anhalt? Do you really have no plan? I am also asking the SPD, did you really not prepare this? I would have wished that you had stood up here today and said to the associations and clubs that have so bravely fought for civil society and for democracy, that if the AfD cuts the funds, we will do something like a democracy emergency fund at the federal level, that we will step in a bit. What do you say to the people who are worried that an AfD interior minister might get hold of their most sensitive data? Could you not at least ensure that the intelligence information is protected from access by right-wing extremists and the Russians? We have been calling on you to act for a long time. What kind of security do you give the universities in Saxony-Anhalt? Can you not at least ensure that Saxony-Anhalt cannot use its veto power to block university funding in all federal states? These are things you could have prepared. These are things you should have prepared, because the people need some form of security and support now. It is urgently time for you to act here. And the second thing, and I honestly expect this from all of us as democratic parties in the German Bundestag, I would have wished for a serious struggle over the question of how could this go so wrong and what is our share of it? I believe we all have that job now, and the answers to the questions are not easy. There is not a plan A. All over the world, democracies are currently struggling with these questions, whether in France, Poland, Hungary, the USA, Italy, or Great Britain. Everywhere, democrats are fighting against the strengthened right-wing extremism. Therefore, yes, it is a very difficult question that we all have to solve together, but at least an honest search together, a struggle together about what the solutions can be. That must take place here. We are the German Bundestag. We were elected to give people an answer. And I think everyone has to start with themselves. We Greens too. Yes, we Greens also tried a whole range of things in the fight against right-wing extremism that obviously did not work. We went out into the streets for too long with the message of saving democracy, without realizing that the warning about the destruction of democracy by the AfD had long since lost its terror for many people, because democracy itself is no longer the value that many people attribute to it. We were too far away from the people, and that is why it happened that we Greens, in our efforts to protect what we find so worth protecting, the rule of law, freedom, human dignity, and democracy, were suddenly perceived by some as defenders of a status quo in our country, a status quo that simply no longer worked for many people. And we want to and will do that differently. And I would like this confrontation with ourselves and the answers to what is now expected of all others. We have to get into the question of why and where people are voting for right-wing extremists in such large percentages. And I say quite clearly, right-wing extremism in Germany is not an East problem. Anyone who tries to conduct this debate in that way is conducting it wrong. And yet there are regional differences. It is the structural change regions and the structurally weak regions where the AfD was particularly strongly elected. Where industry has moved abroad and jobs have been lost, and also where no bus comes and the last pub has closed. Whether you talk to people in Gelsenkirchen or in Ohio, in the USA or in rural Saxony-Anhalt, these are similar topics. These are places where people feel left behind, abandoned by a policy that they think has forgotten them. And that is exactly where the AfD goes in. That is exactly where right-wing populists and right-wing radicals go in all over the world. They start here with the toxic slogans of nationalism and national isolation. With the longing for a yesterday that they create, that never existed. Take back control, the Brexit said. Make America great again. Back to the past is what Donald Trump propagated. And that is what we have to answer as democrats. We have to answer how the local infrastructure works again. And you had a real chance with the special fund to make something better in this country. It is so tragic, honestly, in this time in which our democracy is stuck, that you did not use it better. But we also have to give an answer to the methods that Ms. Weidel has just presented here in perfection again. The method of the AfD is the incitement of anger. The incitement of anger against minorities as a distraction debate. Anger and frustration are redirected into anger against the unemployed and people with a migration history. And we have to counter that with something. Explaining and changing politics alone is not enough. And I do not want to be misunderstood. There is not one reason why people vote for right-wing extremists. Many people simply vote for right-wing extremists because they want to vote for a right-wing radical party. That is also part of the truth. That has to be said here. And at the same time, a sensible strategy against anger is needed. The anger is incited by the accelerators of social media, by algorithms that were invented by men like Elon Musk or Peter Thiel, whose declared goal is to destroy democracies. And that is why hate is fueled, agitation is fueled, disinformation and false information. And if we do not manage to change these rules on the internet, then we will be playing a game that we cannot win, because the rules are set against us. We have to act here. And the second thing, and I am personally convinced, we have to counter the spirals of anger that are incited by the AfD with our determination. And I think it is one of the biggest mistakes that the Union under your leadership, Mr. Merz, has made in recent years, that you let yourselves be tempted by populism, that you did not keep the distance. Let us take, for example, the debate about the citizens' benefit in the last federal election campaign. You promised people the moon. More than 10 billion euros in cuts was supposed to bring that, or five, or three, or two. It became less and less, because in truth everyone who knew about the topic, and there are people like that among you too, knew from the start that it was completely impossible to push through this cut in the citizens' benefit, and for a few cheap clicks, for a bit of incitement against foreigners, against the unemployed, for riding the wave that exploits our system, you ended up risking one thing, and that is your own credibility, because unlike the right-wing extremists, who never want to act, who never want to shape, who are trying in Saxony-Anhalt to get around it so that they cannot prove that they cannot manage it, unlike the right-wing extremists, you will be measured by reality, you have to deliver, and that is the biggest trap you set for yourselves when you knowingly claim things to ride the waves of populism that you cannot deliver. That creates frustration. That creates political fatigue. That creates distance between voters and you. We must not make these mistakes. And the same, honestly, applies to the issue of migration. I know that many of you in the Union believed that if you make the hardest possible asylum policy, you would shrink the AfD, because you would somehow deal with their core issue. But you have to realize that this idea has obviously failed spectacularly. Alexander Dobrindt has been interior minister for more than a year now. He has pushed through the greatest possible hardness in asylum policy, including breaking the law at the German borders, including cooperation with the criminals of the Taliban, and yet it has brought nothing in terms of the AfD election result. It has brought nothing. On the contrary, they have even become stronger. Therefore, we can argue among democrats about the right asylum policy, but your job is to explain where the difference lies between the Union and the AfD.
I know it exists. Just be Christian Democrats. Give them... especially in the areas where it hurts. That is the job against populism.
And at the same time, we are at a point in our democracy where political debate alone may no longer be enough. And our Basic Law provides for the banning of political parties as a last resort. And I can only appeal to you, to all democratic members of the German Bundestag: we must now set in motion an application to examine a ban on the AfD.
It is time. I can only appeal to you. I can only ask you, as members of the German Bundestag, to examine your own conscience. In the end, you are accountable to it, and we need you for a majority.
And at the same time, and this is also incredibly important to me today, let us not forget, above all, the vast majority of people in our country who are democrats and who keep this society so stable. Let us not forget them.
Those who commit themselves every day to keeping our country together. We need to take care of them. And I would wish, Mr. Merz, that you, as Chancellor, could recognize and appreciate that more, that you would not constantly nag people in such a condescending way, that you would not lecture them, that you would not express it... somehow nothing is ever enough. The people in Germany... that is wrong. With that, you are driving even the most well-meaning people in this country right now up the wall.
The staff of the health system are not a burden. They are people who work to the limit every day so that we can all do well. And they deserve more than just a heartfelt thank you — they deserve more support from us. That is what good politics is about.
And the young people in our country, Mr. Merz, are not simply lazy or chilling in work-life balance. They have worries about the future. And if you look at the current PISA study, it is a declaration of bankruptcy by such a rich country that educational inequality in Germany is so high. It cannot be true that the size of parents' wallets is so decisive for children's educational success. It should be about giving every child fair chances in our country.
And regarding worries about the future, Mr. Merz, you spoke about Hürtgenwald, and it was good that you were there. It is also important that you thanked the firefighters and all the rescue workers here. But you said one sentence in Hürtgenwald by which the country will judge you. You said you want to do everything to combat the climate crisis. And I ask you: what follows from that? What follows from that?
If you are to be taken seriously, you must stand by such words. And we and the people in our country will judge you by them. The first thing you could do would be to reverse the cuts in climate protection in this federal budget. You could act very concretely there. You could stop all of Katharina Reiche's laws — all of them. These are laws that exacerbate the climate crisis. At the very least, you would have to do that if you mean your own words.
And regarding the people in our country who deserve appreciation and support, that above all includes families with children. And against this background — and I say this to the Social Democrats as well, I say this to Lars Klingbeil too — this federal budget is a disaster, it is a catastrophe, and you would have to completely revise it.
You have decided in this federal budget to cut first of all at families, first of all at children. You are cutting housing benefit, and that hits exactly the families with children who go to work and still can no longer afford the exploding rents. With that, you are driving families into poverty. You are cutting parental allowance, making it even harder for young parents to reconcile work and family planning. You are cutting the advance maintenance payment for the many single parents who need it to get by.
And what I find most bitter is the cut of 25 euros that the federal government spends to support children in poverty. You are cutting first of all at the poorest children in our society. I can only say, such austerity policy is truly socially unjust and shabby.
And you would have alternatives. You would have alternatives if you chose to start with the richest people in our country instead of the poorest when it comes to raising taxes. You could ensure that people who inherit 300 apartments also pay inheritance tax. Why do you spare them? You could ensure that the company car privilege is reformed. Why do you subsidize company cars and cut at children? You could ensure that flight tickets are not subsidized and that, on the contrary, child poverty is fought.
And you could finally take effective action against tax fraud. More than 100 billion euros are lost to the country every year through tax fraud. That is where you would have to act.
And in conclusion, I would like to say: yes, we will continue to argue with each other as democrats. We have to do that in a democracy. But at the same time, we will also continue to find compromises. That is what distinguishes us from the far right. We take responsibility for our country. We also find compromises when it is difficult. And perhaps we need to succeed, especially in this time, in reinventing the political compromise to some extent. Let us campaign for that together. That is now our job.
For the SPD parliamentary group, Member of Parliament Dr. Matthias Mirsch now has the floor. Please.
Madam President, dear colleagues, I believe we all feel that very fundamental matters are being discussed here today. It is far from being only about the federal budget.
And Ms. Weidel, when you speak of hatred here, I say to you: take a look in the mirror. How much hatred have you sprayed from this podium today when you speak of Syrians? How many Syrian women and men are working in this country in care facilities and as doctors, who are necessary to keep this country alive? Dear colleagues,
when you speak of the loss of industrial jobs, yes, that is also a major issue for us. But when you equally say that we must leave the EU or the euro, then there would be many, many more jobs that you would destroy with your policies.
And when you talk about Trump and his peace efforts, then just look at what this Trump has done with Mr. Putin. He let him ride in his car. What did he achieve? Nothing at all. Dear colleagues,
when you say that nuclear power plants are safe around the clock, then please look at France. Look at the countries where nuclear power plants now have to be shut down because the cooling water no longer works. That is the truth, even though it does not interest you at all.
Yes, and I also want to tell you: we still do not have an AfD government in Saxony-Anhalt, and my appeal to all democrats is to prevent that as well.
But — and dear Katharina Dröge — there are recipes, and the best recipe against your politics is the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany. I say that to you. Because all the things you say here violate the constitution. When you, for example, simply tell us here that there are so and so many deportations or rejected asylum seekers, you are concealing, for instance, that there are many grounds on which people may stay in this country even if they do not have asylum. That is stated here among other things.
When you talk about the subsistence minimum and the welfare state, these principles are also enshrined in this constitution, and fortunately you cannot get around them. Dear colleagues,
yes, and everyone who currently has concerns in Saxony-Anhalt — and we all have them in view. And Katharina Dröge, I believe a little restraint would be appropriate here in saying that this Chancellor, this government, this coalition has no answers to that. With what cheek do you say that?
You are concealing that this discussion has long existed for many months, for example in the Conference of Education Ministers, for example in the Conference of Interior Ministers. Do not pretend that you are the only ones there. No — we democrats from the Left Party, SPD, Greens, and CDU/CSU must not allow any doubts about us to arise at this point. That is what it is about.
Yes, and I say to the people who also have concerns now: this constitution helps here too, because even if a federal state violates the constitution, we still have many, many possibilities. And beyond that, we will of course also discuss in this budget what we can do for cultural promotion and democracy promotion in order to remain present in Saxony-Anhalt as well. Dear colleagues,
but — and now I come to all of us, and I will get to the budget, don't worry — the question is indeed, and I ask myself this in many debates: how do we treat each other here when it comes to us and our path? Because one thing must be clear: if we tear ourselves apart here, there is only one group that will be happy. And my request is also, and this is a lesson from what happened in Saxony-Anhalt: we democrats must return to a culture where there is a firm basis for us that is unshakeable, and from that we must draw strength, rather than putting the antagonism among democrats — despite all legitimate disputes — at the center. Dear colleagues.
And yes, then I come to us, to CDU/CSU and SPD, who have taken on responsibility in these times, and Katharina Dröge, who also tries to find compromises in many areas where you have very different opinions. They can be criticized, they must also be criticized, but it is damn difficult to take responsibility in these times when it is quickly about yes or no, about white or black, and the center does not count.
And therefore, dear colleagues, to us who take on responsibility: we must live up to our responsibility precisely in these difficult times. We must struggle for the best path, and in the end we must move this country forward. And that is why, in recent weeks, we have held all kinds of conversations with citizens. We have felt the uncertainty in many, many places. And Mr. Chancellor, I am grateful that you too have addressed this — that one cannot simply operate here on the principle of 'eyes closed and through'.
For example, the question of whether, if I have worked for 45 years, that is worth nothing anymore — that apparently speaks against the sense of justice of very many people. That is a circumstance we must deal with here. This is the place to discuss it, to struggle for the best path. When concerns grow regarding housing benefit, parental allowance, but also advance maintenance payments, then these are things we must discuss with each other here and must also lead to a goal.
Because one thing is certain, dear colleagues: we are not making changes for the sake of change. We must change. We must adapt to the framework conditions. We have a disastrous budget situation. We have a world that is changing rapidly. We have a demographic development that simply forces us to act. And therefore, yes, we must change, but we must make it much, much clearer to the people, in my view, why we are doing it and how we are doing it.
A few examples. We are currently talking about pensions, and the goal or question is how we deal with the 45 contribution years. But it is about much, much more. It is about security. It is about whether we have an old-age security in Germany — not a given, unlike in other countries of this world — that people can continue to rely on.
And by the way, this commission report contains a great deal else, for example that as many occupational groups as possible should pay into the system of the future, that we will not have retirement at 70 tomorrow, but perhaps at 92. Dear colleagues, this commission report is something that is worth discussing now, and I am very sure that if we, as the democratic center, manage to actually realize this old-age security, then that is proof that the democratic center can move things forward for the population. Dear colleagues.
And the same applies to health insurance. Mr. Chancellor, you pointed out that it is a reform. It was not really one yet, but rather it was first and foremost an attempt to really avoid and prevent contribution increases. Cuts, but also actual cuts in some places, because otherwise everyone would have had to bleed through higher contributions. We want to prevent that, dear colleagues. But it is about much, much more.
It is about much, much more. It is about having a health system at the end of the day — and that is by no means a given in this world — where you can rely on solidarity when you need the general public, when you need security. And I say we now need structural change, and for example, what we have agreed — that a person with statutory health insurance has exactly the same claim to a specialist appointment as someone with private insurance — would be a reform that goes in the right direction, because we are finally eliminating inequality. That is what it must be about, dear colleagues.
And the financial situation is what also concerns us here now in the budget deliberations. And Ms. Dröge, when you then say that this state invests too little, I can tell you: just look at this budget. We have really put together a future package. We have record investments in the future. You cannot just brush that aside, dear colleagues.
51 billion have currently flowed into cohesion, into infrastructure, and also into important measures such as, for example, in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the construction of fire stations, police stations, etc. These are investments in the future that this country has not experienced for a very long time — far too long. Dear colleagues,
and we are investing at record levels. There is an increase of 60% in the area of research and development, because it matters to us that AI is also made in Germany, that chips are produced here and not somewhere else. Dear colleagues, this budget contains future investments that will move this country forward. We must emphasize that again and again.
And it is also about security, and we simply cannot pretend that we are not threatened. But it is not only about external security; it is also about resilience and independence. And that is why we are certainly also discussing and regulating how things continue, for example with the raw materials fund, the question of how we equip the THW, and all these things. There are also investments in this budget that build security.
And let me also say this at this point: beyond the concept of defense, it is also about security when we invest in economic cooperation, because this globe is damn small, and crises elsewhere can be here very quickly. That is why we must also have stability there, also investment security, dear colleagues.
Yes, and we can continue to argue, and we must continue to argue, and we have different opinions, and perhaps we could decide on quite different things with this or that issue. Let me put it this way: on the wealth tax issue or on the inheritance tax issue, we may get further once the Federal Constitutional Court has decided. But perhaps we will not get further. And then, ladies and gentlemen, it comes down to the decisive question: can we manage to reach a common denominator, yes or no?
In opposition, I can demand a great deal, and that is entirely your right. But in the end, it comes down to whether the democratic center of this country can move things forward through compromises, yes or no. And I say to you — and I say this to you as a representative of a party that in over 160 years never had to change its name, that has always stood for this constitution since 1949 — a great deal is at stake.
The SPD Bundestag parliamentary group knows its responsibility in these times, and it knows its responsibility, together with you, dear colleagues from the Union, to move these things forward now in the spirit of the Federal Republic of Germany. I thank you for your attention.
For the Left Party parliamentary group, Member of Parliament Hören Herrmann now has the floor. Please.
Madam President, dear colleagues, dear Federal Chancellor Friedrich Merz, I am impressed. From your speech, I heard line by line a measure of self-criticism. However, in its effect and in the reaction, I was surprised, because if you really want us to believe in the young generation to whom we have made a promise of prosperity, then a change of course must come now, and not a continuation of the same. Let that be said to you.
The fact is that with the budget you have presented, you are continuing where you began. You are acting against the majority of the people in our country. Ever since Agenda 2010, which you are now continuing with Agenda March 2030, it is exactly this social class warfare that you are pursuing. Mr. Merz, stop this wrong path.
Do not drive our country further into the abyss. If you do not finally come to your senses now, our democracy will suffer serious damage. How does your budget stand? In the social area, in very many areas, there are minus signs everywhere. Cuts are being made only in armaments. There, every third euro is supposed to flow in the long run. That is a cannons-instead-of-butter policy.
If I look at the 2027 budget plan: 140 billion for defense including the special fund. In the perspective planning up to 2030, we are at 183 billion for armaments. That is 30% of our core budget. Armaments investments have the conceivable lowest economic effect, and therefore we must change that.
The scientists at the University of Mannheim have calculated: in terms of economic return on investment, investment in armaments is associated with further consequences of 50 cents per euro invested. If I look at infrastructure investment, it brings further investments of 2 euros, and if I invest in the future of our country — in daycare centers and schools — it is even up to 3 euros. That is where we need to go, dear colleagues.
And let me say a word to the far right, since we are talking about armaments and peace. The AfD, which likes to present itself especially in the east as a peace party, would like to be a peace angel, yet especially when it comes to wasteful spending and armaments, they are always among the first to raise their hands, and in the committees they have repeatedly said: armaments, militarization — that is exactly our thing. That is the duplicity with which you act here, and that must also be named here.
The budget has further consequences when you look closely at the numbers. For housing benefit, you are planning cuts of 600 million euros. You want to halve the heating cost component. For the child benefit supplement, 260 million euros are being cut. For the advance maintenance payment, you are worsening the benefit by 400 million euros. And precisely for the program 'Living Democracy' — which civil society needs more urgently than ever — you are cutting a further 20 million euros.
If you look at the election result from the weekend, this is irresponsible, dear colleagues, and must be corrected.
Another item, when I look at it: crisis prevention and peace promotion of the Foreign Office — a central building block for combating the root causes of flight. Here too, only the red pencil. A completely wrong signal. And when I look back, Mr. Merz, at the previous legislative period of the Bundestag: a defeated Bundestag is once again tasked with tackling the debt brake, with the exception of defense and intelligence services above a certain percentage, which are excluded. For schools, daycare centers, and housing, it still applies, and that is irresponsible, dear colleagues.
It is also irresponsible to explain poor approval ratings by saying that you have not explained it well enough. You are pursuing an unsocial policy for our country against the majority of the people in the country. And that must change. Dear colleagues,
the families in our country understand all too well that they and their children are not a priority of this government. And given the immense sums flowing into the armaments sector, only one thing was foreseeable from the start: the armaments industry will thank you, because they are the ones making the big money at the expense of taxpayers.
One example: Rheinmetall. The operating profit rose by 74% in the first half of the year — a 74% increase to 786 million. That is redistribution from bottom to top, and we will not go along with that. Dear colleagues.
Because it should not be the families who have to explain why they have to fight for every euro of housing benefit. It should not be children who have to explain their needs when it comes to dilapidated schools. And it should not be the associations that have to explain themselves when it comes to the daily promotion of our democracy. What needs to be explained are the billions spent on armaments and rearmament, while the welfare state still gets the red pencil.
And then, dear Federal Chancellor Friedrich Merz, you say that the welfare state is no longer economically viable. Mr. Merz, that is called black pedagogy. First the budget is made small, then people are supposed to tighten their belts. The fact is: whoever cuts the welfare state also cuts purchasing power. What people lack in their wallets at the end of the month, they cannot spend in the tills of shops and businesses.
Especially when you look at the situation of our municipalities — you have not said a word about that in your speeches so far. What does this budget mean for our municipal families? First the swimming pool faces closure, then the library, then the youth club, and all the other voluntary, municipal, social services that make this society worth living in are on the chopping block. And that is how you bankrupt a country from the bottom up, and we as the Left will not go along with that, dear colleagues,
because it creates frustration and strengthens the feeling that the state is withdrawing from more and more areas of life. And you know that, Mr. Merz — that ultimately endangers our democracy.
Dear colleagues, a look at the world of sports. My colleague Gürke will elaborate on this. Who was actually the football world champion in 2006? Perhaps some of you still know. I had to look it up too. It was a damn long time ago. It was not Germany — it was Italy. Exactly. In that context, the motorway between Leipzig and Chemnitz was supposed to be finished in 2006. They are still building it today, and the railway line between Leipzig and Chemnitz looks quite different. The southern section is supposed to be finished in 2035. The northern section is not even being discussed yet.
On the squares in our republic, I have repeatedly noticed exactly these discordant tones in recent weeks, in different places, in different federal states, heard similar stories. And that is why we as the Left say: we now need a reconstruction plan, dear colleagues. And by that I do not mean a policy that only thinks in terms of electoral terms, but one that is planned for at least a ten-year perspective.
Given the scale of the challenge, we need at least ten years of forward-looking planning. A reconstruction plan starts exactly at the places where we need it most urgently now: in infrastructure, in investment in the future, in rail, in roads, in housing construction, in schools, in securing our jobs, and in ecological transformation.
Concretely, we need, first, more investment in housing construction. Last year, around 27,000 new apartments were subsidized in social housing. At the same time, 57,000 fell out of the binding period, resulting in a deficit of 20,000. We therefore demand 25 billion euros per year for new construction and renovation of housing. That creates housing, that creates orders for craftspeople, the construction industry, and our industry.
Second focus, Mr. Merz, you touched on it: the situation in our schools. The investment backlog now amounts to 70 billion euros. I have heard your words, but I can say this clearly as a teacher: pupils need warm classrooms in winter and cooled ones in summer. They need schools where windows can be opened, where toilets also work and are usable, where school buildings are planned with a perspective and not always housed in makeshift structures.
And thirdly — I would have expected more today, honestly, Mr. Chancellor — our economy needs an active industrial policy. The federal government and corporate boards have delayed the transformation for far too long. Now jobs in many regions of our country are at risk. We need a comprehensive investment program so that our plants can also produce in the future: affordable electric cars, electric buses, batteries, microchips, and also climate-neutral steel. For that too, you need a plan — and you do not have one.
But we also say clearly as the Left: support — there can only be support if there are job and location guarantees, if there is collective bargaining coverage and genuine co-determination of employees, because good industrial work sustains our welfare state. Anyone who works on the assembly line, at the machine, or in the laboratory must be able to co-decide on the transformation. Yes, this plan costs money, but we are firmly convinced that there is enough money if everyone is involved according to their income situation.
This country needs a reconstruction plan. Mr. Merz, you wanted people to feel that things are moving forward. With what you are presenting here, that will certainly not succeed. Thank you very much.
For the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, Member of Parliament Thorsten Frei now has the floor. Please.
Madam President, dear colleagues, when you talk to people in the country — to employees in companies, to entrepreneurs who want to invest, to families who worry about their future — you are always met with the same question: will Germany still be a country tomorrow in which prosperity is created and in which our children have better chances than we ourselves?
And if you have heard Ms. Weidel's speech today, then the answer to this question is a very clear no. The AfD claims at every opportunity that Germany is in decline, and no matter how many economic signs of turnaround there may have been in recent months, every positive development is talked down, every progress is denied, every problem is declared a catastrophe.
And the political business model of the AfD is not hope. The political business model of the AfD is outrage.
And when you ask the question — will Germany still be a country tomorrow in which prosperity is created, in which our children have better chances than we ourselves — you know, if you have listened to the Chancellor's speech, that we give a different answer to this question than they do. To outrage, we counter responsibility, and to doubt, we counter courage. Dear colleagues.
And for this reason, we are not simply deliberating on a budget today. This budget and the program for upswing and employment are a directional decision, and they decide whether Germany invests or waits. They decide whether Germany faces the challenges of the times or avoids them. And the 2027 budget draft is the expression of our will to move Germany forward again.
Our country does not have a problem of understanding. Our country does not suffer from a lack of analyses. The central question of our time is not whether we know the challenges of the country. We know the challenges. The decisive question is: are we prepared to do what is necessary — and even when it is uncomfortable?
Because the truth is also that Germany has lost economic dynamism in recent years. Too much infrastructure was neglected for too long. Too many permits take too long. Our competitiveness has come under pressure, and the dramatically changed security situation demands that we take responsibility as never before since the end of the Cold War. And that is why we cannot simply continue as before.
And that is why I want to name four decisive tasks. Germany needs more investments — not at some point, but immediately. We need above all private investments, but we also need public investments. And that is why this budget sets a focus. We are investing from the core budget, from the special fund, from the climate and transformation fund — altogether in 2027 more than 117 billion euros in transport routes, in digitalization, in modern energy supply, in short, in the future of our country.
And Germany needs strong companies. The prosperity of our country, dear colleagues, is not created in the plenary hall. It is created where people dare something, where investment and work take place. That is why we are reducing the tax burden on companies that invest. That is why we are abolishing citizen's income. That is why we are passing labor market reforms and keeping wage-related non-wage costs stable. That is why we are working on permanently lower energy costs. That is why we are strengthening the competitiveness of our country.
And because economic success must reach the people, we are relieving families with an adjustment in income tax. Because upswing is not an end in itself. Upswing must serve the people.
And my dear colleagues, upswing will only succeed with comprehensive bureaucracy reduction. Germany must become faster. As mayor, I learned that it does not matter to citizens at the end whether the federal government, the state, or the municipality is responsible. They want results. They want the bridge to be built, the road to be repaired, decisions to be implemented.
And as Minister of State at the Chancellery, I learned that this problem is not confined to individual municipalities, but that it is a structural problem in our country. Too often we know in Germany what needs to be done, but too rarely does the action succeed — and it is from this knowledge that this coalition acts.
That is why on July 1 we passed the Reporting Burden Act, a genuine paradigm shift. For too long, anyone who wanted to reduce bureaucracy in Germany had to justify themselves. Too often, bureaucracy was taken for granted. And we are now turning that around, because less bureaucracy creates growth, and growth creates prosperity.
It will not be freedom that has to justify itself in future. It will be the restriction that has to explain itself under this coalition, dear colleagues.
And fourthly, a strong Germany also includes security. The Russian war of aggression against Ukraine shows that freedom and peace are not a given in Europe. Whoever wants peace must arm themselves.
We do not count among those from the far right and the far left — we heard that in the two speeches — of whom Winston Churchill once said that they are those who feed the crocodile in the hope that they will be the last to be eaten, ladies and gentlemen. And that is why we are investing 140 billion euros in more security for our country. We are protecting our country. With you, it is in danger, ladies and gentlemen.
And we are strengthening our security authorities. We are giving our intelligence services new, real powers so that they are able not only to recognize, but also to protect us. That was already important to me in the past. Not because I want war, but peace. Not out of a thirst for adventure, but out of responsibility — responsibility for the security of our children, responsibility for peace in Europe, and responsibility for the freedom in which we live and which we want to preserve.
Dear colleagues, when you have listened to the various speeches of the opposition factions, you have heard very different theories about why our country will fail under this government. But they all have one thing in common: no convincing alternative.
The business model of the AfD is outrage. And that becomes especially clear with this budget and this budget speech you have given. You criticize every expenditure. You criticize investments in infrastructure. You criticize investments in security. You create the impression that solid fiscal policy consists solely of not making expenditures.
And at the same time, you demand a pension level of 70%. You promise earlier and penalty-free retirement. You promise more benefits in long-term care. You promise massive tax relief. Only one simple question regularly remains unanswered: who is actually supposed to pay for it?
And when you look at your economic program and listen to your speeches — withdrawal from the Schengen area, withdrawal from the European Union — that is no master plan for an export-oriented economy. That is a shredder for prosperity and jobs.
Dear colleagues, one can argue about many things, but the laws of mathematics also apply to the opposition. Less revenue, more expenditures. Whoever puts forward such a program does not need a finance minister — they need a math teacher.
And I want to pick up on my colleague Matthias Mirsch, who looked with great astonishment at the way the Greens are conducting this debate. Because when you listen to their speeches, Ms. Dröge, one might believe that they have merely been observers in recent years. In fact, you were a governing party. Yesterday you governed. Today you act as if others had carried the responsibility.
Yesterday you were responsible for energy policy. Today you complain about high energy prices and a lack of competitiveness. Yesterday you passed new regulations, reporting requirements, and conditions, and today you complain about a lack of growth and missing investments. Credibility does not arise from that. You have rather proven that you are well acquainted with populism.
And Mr. Pellmann of the Left Party, you have basically given the same answer to every one of the questions raised. For every problem in Germany, there is a solution, and for you it is always more state money. Whether housing is lacking — more state money. When the economy falters — more state money. When the social systems come under pressure — more state money.
But the truth is, there is no state money. There is only the money of the citizens who pay taxes, who earn something here in Germany. And it is the money of the people who get up every day, work, and pay taxes. And I believe these people deserve more respect than what you have presented here.
Our problem, dear colleagues, is not that too little is distributed in Germany. Our problem is that too little is produced. That is what we must focus on. We need economic growth, more investments, more competitiveness — and that is what this coalition and this federal government are concerned with.
We want a positive narrative of the future. We are working to make life better for the people in Germany. We have a solution for that. We have proposals for that, and above all we have the willingness and the courage not only to do what currently goes down well, but we have the courage to do what is necessary, to take responsibility for it, and we do not run away from this responsibility. Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen.
