Bundestag member Sahra Wagenknecht is calling for a drastic tightening of German refugee policy: Rejected asylum seekers without protection status should no longer receive cash benefits, Wagenknecht told the dpa in Berlin. “The fact that the state continues to pay the same benefits after a rejection cannot be explained to the taxpayer. After a transition period, cash benefits should expire if there is no protection status.”
The chairwoman of the alliance, Sahra Wagenknecht, said that one in three refugees in Europe comes to Germany is also because “it actually makes no difference whether you are recognized as entitled to protection or not.” The majority of asylum seekers did not receive protection status this year. “But anyone who makes it to us can safely assume that they will be able to stay and receive benefits permanently, even without protection status,” said Wagenknecht. No other EU country permanently pays such high benefits to rejected asylum seekers as Germany.
According to the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees, 54,705 asylum applications were decided in January and February. The “overall protection rate” was around 45 percent. According to a spokesman, this refers to all positive decisions for a right to remain, including the legal status according to the Geneva Refugee Convention, so-called subsidiary protection and bans on deportation. However, rejected asylum seekers have the option of taking legal action, which can take years and in many cases still leads to a right to remain.
Wagenknecht’s initiative goes much further than the debate about a payment card that would convert benefits under the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act to cashless payment. However, the Federal Constitutional Court has set strict limits on cuts in benefits for asylum seekers in several rulings. As early as 2012, the constitutional judges held that, according to Article 20 of the Basic Law, there is a fundamental right to guarantee a humane minimum subsistence level. “German and foreign nationals who are staying in the Federal Republic of Germany are equally entitled to this fundamental right,” said the guiding principles of the ruling at the time.
