Again thick air between the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Economics: Habeck asks Lindner in a letter to refrain from making public statements about financing. He also calls for proposals to increase revenue. In his reaction, Lindner refers to compliance with the debt brake.
Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner and Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck clashed violently when preparing the 2024 budget. “We ask you not to make any further public or internal preliminary decisions that unilaterally prioritize further expenditure,” said Habeck in a letter available to the Reuters news agency to the FDP leader on Tuesday. He expressly mentions the areas of share pensions, the armed forces and sales tax reduction for the catering trade “representing the ministries led by the Greens”.
Habeck suggests discussing “how we could improve revenue,” cut environmentally harmful subsidies, and identify programs to be replaced by regulatory law. Since there are still no proposals on the table, “we cannot accept the benchmarks (for the 2024 budget) either.”
Finance Minister Lindner rejects the request in a letter also available to Reuters on Wednesday. “Representing the ministries led by the Free Democrats, I can state that tax increases or other structural additional burdens for the citizens or the economy are excluded from the coalition agreement,” he said in his answer.
He is also surprised that the green ministries apparently no longer accept the key figures for the 2024 federal budget. Lindner also points out that political projects in the coalition agreement are subordinate to the debt brake anchored in the Basic Law. Habeck had written that he did not want to question the debt brake. “However, other projects were also agreed, which are by no means subordinate to compliance with the debt brake.”
