Thursday April 22, 2021
“Basically off track”
Railway board members should forego bonuses
The railway has been badly shaken by the Corona crisis, last year it suffered the biggest loss in its history. The federal government wants to jump to the side of the rail companies with aid worth billions. For this, the board members should cut back financially – at least for this year.
In return for planned aid from the federal government in the Corona crisis at Deutsche Bahn, the board of directors should forego bonuses. This emerges from a resolution of the budget committee of the Bundestag. Accordingly, the board members of Deutsche Bahn AG are requested to forego variable remuneration or comparable remuneration components, special payments, profit sharing or other separate remuneration in 2022 for the 2021 financial year.
In view of the corona crisis, the group management board had not received any bonuses for the past year. The Green budget politician Sven-Christian Kindler said: “There is no question that the board of directors of Deutsche Bahn cannot also receive bonuses in view of the billions in aid. Right so that the budget committee has clarified that again.”
The negotiations between the Federal Government and the EU Commission on financial aid worth billions for the railways are on the home straight. Significant progress has been made, according to government circles. The aim is to find an “industry solution” – from which not only Deutsche Bahn but also the competition should benefit. The focus here is on lowering train path prices, for example in rail freight transport. This is now stored in the planned supplementary federal budget for 2021.
In return, there should be no more competitive conditions for the group in the planned equity increase by the federal government for Deutsche Bahn. The aim is a “building block solution” totaling around five billion euros, as it was said.
Kindler wants to re-regulate remuneration
The corona crisis also had serious consequences for the federally owned Deutsche Bahn. The group had suffered the biggest loss in its history due to a slump in passenger numbers last year with a bottom line of 5.7 billion euros. Kindler demanded that the bonus regulations for the rail board would have to be fundamentally revised and reduced for the time after Corona. In general, the federal government must ensure that the management board remuneration is proportionate and middle-class. According to Kindler, it could not be that the variable remuneration, i.e. the bonus payments, were as high as the fixed salary in the last few years before Corona. “Something has basically gotten off track.”
The train must double the number of passengers by 2030 and expand and improve the quality of the offer, demanded the Green politician. “This is how the board of directors should be measured and remunerated accordingly.” The current freeze on bonuses is “the ideal opportunity” to reform the remuneration regulations for the railroad management board.
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