Government Declaration: Merz government declaration: No more work-life balance
When she prevents her first government declaration before the Bundestag in November 2005, required Angela Merkel around 90 minutes. « Dive more freedom » is one of the guidelines of the CDUPolitician who get stuck with the people. « We will take new ground, » promises her successor Olaf Scholz at his Bundestag premiere as a chancellor in December 2021. SPDPoliticians at the time reached a similarly long time as Merkel. On Wednesday it’s on Chancellor Friedrich Merzhis first government declaration under the Reichstag dome. The CDU chairman comes from around 30 minutes less. He uses his one -hour speech to get confidence to the citizens: « Our country has all strengths and all skills to get back forward. »
The tenth Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany is 69 years old, with the father of three children, the offspring in the country can first remove this with the work-life balance. The Sauerländer explains « especially to the young generation: The new Bundersgung will work with all the fact that we realize a new generation contract. » The government has « your chances » in mind: « But I also ask you: Help with it, because the future belongs to you and we want to work for that. »
Chancellor Merz calls for sweat and tears
The evening before, Merz had already tuned old and young what he would like to have from them. He demands more sweat and tears on the CDU business day. Just as Winston Churchill once asked for it from the British. But there was war. In comparison, the deprivations that the German Federal Chancellor calls today are small.
« We have to work more and, above all, more efficiently in this country, » he calls in huge dark hall of the Berlin Marriott Hotel near Potsdamer Platz. 4,000 entrepreneurs and lobbyists have gathered. If Merz could paint people, they would be 4,000. Conservative, performance -conscious and risky. « With a four-day week and work-life balance, we will not be able to maintain the prosperity of this country, » he says in his speech. He was received in the hotel like a boxer on the way to the ring. Loud music pounds out of the speakers, the hall stands and claps. In his speech, the Chancellor gives an orientation of how much longer the employees should tackle. The 40-hour week is to be included in the Working Hours Act. Whether that is sufficient against the furor of Donald Trumps Economic policy and the work of the Asians? CDU general secretary Carsten Linnemann had promised an agenda in 2030, based on the profound social reform (Agenda 2010) by former Chancellor Gerhard Schröder.
The Economic Day is organized by the CDU business council, a party-related entrepreneurial association. Suit, tie and pocket square are still normal there, as was the 40-hour week in the past.
The Economic Council is Merz ‘Schutzburg
The Economic Council is Merz ‘Schutzburg in his party. In 2019 he was elected Vice President and worked on his political comeback. His first attempt to become CDU boss had already failed. Equipped with the title Vice President, he stuck against the Union, who had become limp in his eyes, under long-term Chancellor Angela Merkel.
After the first setback, a few deep and setbacks should follow on the way to the chancellery. Merz had to take the last one last week when his own coalition let him hang in the first ballot and he failed. His wife Charlotte and his two daughters sit in the grandstand of the Reichstag building when the Bundestag president announces the result of the coordination. « MP Friedrich Merz has not reached the necessary majority of at least 316 votes, » explains Julia Klöckner (CDU). Not « the CDU chairman » or otherwise a nice official title, but « the MP ». The disgrace is big.
AfD boss Weidel refers to Merz as the « Chancellor of the Second Election »
The opposition drills with relish and deep in this wound in the Bundestag on Wednesday. « You are the Chancellor of the second choice, and you will not get rid of this flaw, » says AfD parliamentary group leader Alice Weidel, who is the first to react to the government declaration of Merz. For the Greens, their parliamentary group leader Katharina Dröge explains that the defeat is not a little thing. « It is unique in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany, » she says, adding: The « bitter news to the country » is that « this coalition has not pronounced the trust at first. »
The historical slump is on Merz, the correct handling of it he still has to find. On Monday he made up for an appointment that had to be deleted first because of the necessary second ballot: the handover of the office in the Federal Press Office. « It took four passes in Rome, two in Berlin, » says Merz. The comparison with the pope choice should be strange, but the joke does not really ignite. The people present struggle to smile. And anyway: whether the comparison of his job with that of the Pope is actually the correct handling of defeat?
Others deal with him more gentle. « This restart is no coincidence. This restart is the result of persistence, » the President of the Economic Council, Astrid Hamker, welcomed her star guest. « Welcome Home. » The Economic Council gives the Ludwig Erhard Prize for outstanding services once a year. This time the Greek Prime Minister Kyriako’s Mitsotaki got him, like Merz a conservative. After a decade of the most difficult impositions, there is growth and solid households in Greece. What have not been suspected of the Hellenes in Germany during the financial crisis as lazy southern countries that are carefree on the beach. Today the question arises whether the Germans are not too carefree.
Merz apparently sees it that way. In his government declaration, he again emphasizes that black and red for « a change of policy » stands. « And such a change of policy requires a rethink and new priorities in many places, » he says.
Jörg Dittrich, the President of the Central Association of the German Crafts (ZDH), is happy about the « plain text from the new Federal Chancellor ». Friedrich Merz’s first government declaration makes it clear that the political standstill should be over, says the master roofer and medium -sized company. What the Chancellor announces sounds like a declaration: « Active, specific, more uncomfortable than before ». It is particularly noteworthy, says the Dresdner, the new tone towards the citizens. « The attempt at traffic lights to sell profound changes as without consequences apparently has an end. Instead, the overdue honesty that it will not be possible in view of the seriousness of the situation. »
Merz also gets praise for his announcements
Caritas President Eva Welskop-Deffaa praises Merz’s look at the challenges of aging society. « Demographic change is a stress test for our democracy: it is about our social security systems, our social infrastructure, the coexistence of the generations in everyday life, » she says and at the same time puts pressure. « Necessary reform steps must not be postponed with reference to a large reform. »
But to take these steps, Merz needs money, and that can only flow compliant with a valid federal budget. His government must decide two budgets, and there should be the one for 2025 before the summer break. At least in the basic features. « We have funds that can be financed through new debts, » says the CDU chairman in his government declaration with a view to the controversial relaxation of the debt brake and adds: « Let me say an open word: We have to deal with these options extremely carefully and carefully, these debts trigger interest payments and must also be repaid again. »
Whether the SPD understands the same expenses as the CDU and CSU will still show. The Social Democrats applaud at most friendly, there can be no question of enthusiasm. Not even when Merz expresses thanks to his predecessor. « She, colleague Scholz, and her government led Germany through times of exceptional crises. Her reaction to the Russian attack war against Ukraine was groundbreaking and she was historical, » says Merz. How different did that sound when the opposition leader crossed the blades with Scholz. Sentions of the billing were initiated with « Mr. Chancellor » in order to accuse the person addressed to the person addressed. Now that Merz has the post, any fire has given way to his rhetoric. He lends himself to Scholz and Merkel.
And like his predecessors, he has to hold together a coalition that is not a love marriage. However, his new finance minister Lars Klingbeil delivered a foretaste of what can still come there shortly before in a government survey. The SPD politician speaks for the fact that Bundestag members should also pay into the statutory pension insurance. « I would find that would be a real step, but at this point I want to expressly mark it as my private opinion, » says the Vice Chancellor, knowing that such an statement cannot be private in his outstanding position. Klingbeil thus joins the new Minister of Labor and Social Affairs Bärbel Bas. His party friend had proposed to include civil servants in the statutory pension insurance and had been criticized by the CDU and CSU.
Merz has an idea that it will not be easy. « And we want to rule to create cohesion where he threatens to get lost, » he says. This is aimed at the people outside the doors of the Reichstag building – and at the same time also reminders to their own people behind it.
