Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck believes it is possible that the decision to accelerate planning will be slowed down by continuing the lengthy discussion process of the traffic light coalition at state level.
“There is a danger, of course,” said the Greens politician in the evening on ZDF’s “Heute Journal”. The background is that an overriding public interest in accelerated infrastructure planning should be established in agreement with the country concerned.
For weeks, the SPD, the Greens and the FDP had wrestled over this point, among other things. It took your top people in the coalition committee from Sunday to Tuesday to come to an agreement, longer than seldom before. In the end, they agreed to promote simplified and accelerated planning not only for the expansion of eco-energy generation, power grids and rail transport, but also – as desired by the FDP – for the elimination of serious motorway bottlenecks.
That’s what Habeck is all about
“Of course, a lot of the implementation takes place at state or municipal level,” said Habeck. This applies to the motorway expansion originally rejected by the Greens as well as to nature and environmental protection, which is also a matter for the federal states. From Habeck’s point of view, it is therefore important that the three traffic light parties have an appropriate effect on the lower levels.
He hopes that “respect for what we actually have to deal with will also help us to advise or motivate our levels in such a way that we say: Ok, now forward, we have agreed, now we can do something else hope and expect and work towards making agreements happen.”
The Greens were only able to push through a small part of their positions against the SPD and FDP. In his own words, Habeck does not believe that the critics of the compromise, for example in the environmental groups, see his party to blame. “In any case, they’re not mad at the Greens,” he said. “Isn’t it rather the case that one can perhaps even be almost proud that we have the power to get a government working again. Well, I don’t know where the accusation is supposed to be.”
bankruptcies feared
The green youth named those responsible from their point of view: “(SPD Chancellor) Olaf Scholz and (FDP Finance Minister) Christian Lindner have fraternized against climate protection,” said their federal spokesman Timon Dzienus the editorial network Germany (RND). In the Berlin “Tagesspiegel” he explained: “The traffic light started with the claim that it is the last government that can still influence the climate crisis. This coalition does not seem to do justice to that.”
The forwarding association BGL naturally sees things differently and criticizes the most important point enforced by the Greens: the increase in truck tolls in favor of investments in the railways. Association leader Dirk Engelhardt fears bankruptcies, as he told the RND.
At best, his industry has a return on sales of three percent – in long-distance transport, however, the share of toll costs has now doubled from around 10 to 20 percent. Some medium-sized clients, such as small gravel or concrete works, would not be able to cope with the rising transport costs and would then possibly drag transport companies into insolvency.
