Berlin Mayor Kai Wegner was the first to emerge from cover. On Thursday he called for a reform of the debt brake in the stern – and thus went against the official line of his party leader Friedrich Merz.
Now he is receiving prominent support from the East: Saxony-Anhalt’s Prime Minister Reiner Haseloff is also pushing for a change in the rules. “The debt brake must remain,” Haseloff, who has been in office since 2011, told the star: “But for very important future investments in business, technology and science, constitutionally compliant ways must be found to realize them.”
The background: The ruling by the Karlsruhe Constitutional Court not only plunges the traffic light coalition into financing worries, but also the federal states. Like the federal government, some of them have decided on special funds to finance projects and have partly rededicated them. Schleswig-Holstein has therefore declared a budget emergency.
In Saxony-Anhalt, the Corona special fund was not reallocated. But it’s still part of the current budget, even though the emergency spending for the pandemic no longer exists. The AfD had already announced that it wanted to take action against this. If the money were lost, the country could face a financing hole of up to 400 million euros.
Berlin’s Governing Mayor Wegner opened the debate within the Union. He said on Thursday that he considers the current design of the debt brake to be “dangerous.” “It is to be feared that the debt brake will increasingly become a brake on the future.” The Federal Constitutional Court’s ruling made it clear “how inhibiting investment the current debt brake is – in view of the mega-needs for climate protection, the crumbling transport routes, the huge investment backlog in our schools, the neglected social infrastructure, the necessary restructuring of our energy supply.”
Without investments, not only the infrastructure such as roads, rails and schools would be at risk, but also the entire future of a country, warned Wegner. “Anyone who currently has government responsibility and therefore responsibility for drawing up budgets knows that the necessary investments simply cannot be financed from normal budgets,” said the CDU politician. “We therefore need new thinking and new courage.”
Wegner, who had also been critical of the debt brake in the past, called for an immediate reform of the instrument enshrined in the constitution in 2009. “I understand the concern that some politicians would incur debt after debt,” Wegner told the star. “That’s why I don’t want to delete the debt brake from the constitution, I want to make it future-proof in the constitution.” There must be the possibility of loans, but only for investments: “Loans for consumptive spending are taboo.”
CDU leader Friedrich Merz had given his party the motto that the debt brake should remain untouched. On Tuesday, he reiterated his opposition to reform and higher taxes on the talk show. However, he left a back door open: “I don’t see at the moment that we have to approach the debt brake,” said Merz during his appearance.
It is quite possible that Merz – when the pressure from his own ranks for a reform of the debt brake grows – will remember Adenauer’s old dictum: “What do I care about my chatter from yesterday. Nothing is stopping me from becoming wiser.”
