Union faction leader Friedrich Merz has sharply criticized the plan by Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck (Greens) not to let the last three remaining nuclear power plants in Germany continue to operate normally next year. “I’m telling you, Mr. Chancellor: Stop this madness!” Merz, who is also the head of the CDU, called out to Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) on Wednesday in the general debate on the next federal budget in the Bundestag. Merz warned that the decision could irrevocably damage Germany as a business location.
Merz accused the federal government of relying on the wrong solutions in the energy crisis and thus continuing to drive up prices. “You lack the ability to think politically and strategically in economic policy,” Merz exclaimed from the podium in the general debate in the German Bundestag. “They argue constantly for weeks, the result is a smorgasbord of compromises on the smallest common level that still holds the coalition together.”
Merz called for an energy security council of experts. Because: “You can’t leave the highly complex questions to an economics minister who can formulate pleasantly and whom we can watch thinking again and again, but who is bypassed by lobby groups that keep bringing good ideas down,” said Merz. “How helpless you are, Mr. Habeck could be seen on TV last night,” said the CDU faction leader, alluding to Habeck’s appearance at Maischberger.
Merz sees currency devaluation as the biggest problem. “Many companies have full order books, but prices are going through the roof and the supply chains have broken off.” Merz strongly criticizes the gas levy. It will drive up inflation, and private households are also a burden on companies. “And that’s only because they’re desperately clinging to this bad design, which it was from the start.” It would be right to abolish them. Instead, he proposes a government protective shield for companies.
When it came to the relief package, he praised the fact that pensioners and students were thought of. Companies should also be happy to take advantage of the possibility of a tax-free payment of EUR 3,000 to their employees. But: “You and I also get 300 euros. do we need them no It would have been better to give someone who earns 1600 euros 1000 euros.”
This crisis is a “classic supply shock,” says Merz. In such a situation there is only one answer in the market economy: the supply must be exhausted.
And the government doesn’t do that. Coal-fired power plants are underused. Ten times as much electricity could be generated from biomass if this were not capped. “In 2022 we generated more gas than before. Because of their blocking attitude to other power generation.”
A huge outcry erupted in Parliament when Merz said: “Nobody wants to go back to the old nuclear energy”. “Let me be clear, nobody wants to go back to the old nuclear power that we ended in 2011. The ignorance on this topic is written all over their faces.” But, according to Merz, Germany has some of the most modern and safest nuclear power plants in the whole world, and everyone says Germany is crazy to shut them down, they could supply thousands of households with electricity. “That can no longer be topped in terms of irrationality.” The opposition had suggested letting the nuclear power plants continue to run for three to four years. “Join our application.” A standby operation does not help anyone and is only expensive. “We have to do something on the supply side of electricity.”
Merz also accused Scholz of prolonging the war in Ukraine with his hesitation. Merz criticized this hesitancy as one reason why the war was lengthening and causing even more victims. “You and your government are simply not delivering on their commitment to supply Ukraine with heavy weapons.”
Scholz also failed to keep his own promise to make more than two percent of gross domestic product available to the Bundeswehr with immediate effect. Instead, the defense budget will be reduced by 300 million euros. “We cannot trust the promises you have made,” criticized Merz.