Liveblog federal politics: The Left stays open to approval of the pension bundle | EUROtoday

He additionally wished to debate with the SPD the potential for an “accompanying text” to the deliberate regulation, for instance within the type of a “motion for a resolution,” Merz continued. This may be “another indication of how things should continue after 2031” within the justification for the regulation. He is “completely open” to this. However, it’s now necessary to “recognize the sequence of steps we have agreed on with each other”.

The background to the dispute is the menace from the 18 members of the so-called Young Group of the Union faction within the Bundestag to stop the regulation from being handed. If their votes had been lacking from the vote within the Bundestag, the coalition alone wouldn’t have a majority. The SPD insists on the adoption of the pension plans permitted by the cupboard to stabilize pension ranges.

Merz continued that he had “no disagreement at all” with the Junge Union on the matter. But now it is a matter of coping with this query “in the coming weeks and months”.

Looking again on the Junge Union’s three-day “Germany Day” in Rust, Merz stated: “It was clear to me that yesterday would not be a home run and that it would of course be a controversial discussion.” He “experienced very self-confident members of the Junge Union”. If he then goes towards this along with his convictions, then it’s “not mutual arrogance”, however slightly “a hard struggle for the issues and for the right solution”.

Merz rejected hypothesis about resistance to the pension bundle even inside the coalition. He identified that “all cabinet members” had permitted the draft. “There is no cabinet member who left any doubts about whether the law would then be approved in the Bundestag.”

Regarding the “autumn of reforms” he’s aiming for, Merz stated: “We are in the middle of an intensive reform process.” It took longer than he would have preferred. “But we’re getting there.”

About disagreements with the coalition accomplice SPD, the Chancellor stated: “We are not in a coalition to make each other happy.” The Union and the Social Democrats are “in this coalition to move the country forward and to govern well together – and above all to show that we are able to solve problems from the political center of this country.” He “has no doubt that we can succeed.”