FDP: Step towards realpolitik
Cabinet approves payment card draft
March 1, 2024, 8:39 p.m
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A few days before Chancellor Scholz’s meeting with the states, the federal government is stepping up the pace on the issue of payment cards for refugees. The project will pass the cabinet and should go to the Bundestag the week after next. While the FDP is celebrating, criticism is growing among the Greens.
A uniform payment card for asylum seekers is getting closer. The Federal Cabinet decided on a federal regulation for such a card by circulation, which is intended to enable more benefits in kind rather than cash. FDP parliamentary group leader Christian Dürr is now urging the Bundestag to pass a resolution on the payment card in the next week of meetings starting March 11th. However, there is criticism from the Greens. Some of their politicians, unlike the SPD and FDP, consider federal regulation to be unnecessary. The card is intended to prevent asylum seekers from transferring money to smugglers or to their family or friends abroad.
“The FDP has long pushed for a payment card to be introduced for asylum seekers instead of cash,” Dürr told the “Rheinische Post”. The abolition of pull factors such as cash is the central task in order to reduce the incentives to come to Germany irregularly. FDP interior expert Stephan Thomae said the payment card would “help overburdened municipalities and help reduce incentives for irregular migration.” The introduction is “a step towards a new realpolitik in migration”. The card “will effectively reduce the attractiveness of the German social system,” said FDP leader Christian Lindner at X, urging its rapid introduction. The city council also welcomed the agreement.
Green Economics Minister Robert Habeck also expressed his approval. “We think the plan is fundamentally correct,” he said through a spokeswoman. In contrast, Green Party member of the Bundestag Karoline Otte criticized the government decision. “The planned payment card prevents integration,” she told the t-online portal. “The payment card plays into the hands of right-wing extremists.” Green MP Julian Pahlke also told the news portal that she was worried about the discriminatory effect of the payment card. The President of the German Institute for Economic Research (DIW), Marcel Fratzscher, also criticized the decision. This is “pure symbolic politics,” he wrote at X.
The day before, the federal government initiated the interdepartmental vote on a legal formulation by Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil. The draft provides for an amendment to the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act, with which a payment card is expressly mentioned as an option for providing benefits. However, cash benefits are not excluded: “If benefits in kind for necessary personal needs are not possible with reasonable administrative effort, benefits can also be granted in the form of payment cards, vouchers, other comparable non-cash settlements or cash benefits.”
The plan is for every adult member of a household entitled to benefits to receive their own payment card. The specific design of the map should be the responsibility of the countries that have agreed on minimum standards in a working group.
Another point of contention so far has been the question of how to deal with asylum seekers who receive benefits equivalent to citizen’s allowance after 18 or, in the future, 36 months of stay. This should now be clarified in the parliamentary procedure, according to the Table Media portal. The same applies to dealing with employed asylum seekers as well as students or trainees.
New federal-state round on Wednesday
A number of municipalities have already introduced payment cards for asylum seekers, but each with different regulations. That is why some federal states insisted on a nationwide legal framework. The traffic light is also under pressure because the 16 Prime Ministers want to talk to Chancellor Olaf Scholz next Wednesday about the status of the implementation of the asylum agreements of November 6, 2023. At the end of January, 14 of 16 federal states agreed on a joint procurement process to introduce a payment card for asylum seekers, which should be completed by the summer. Bavaria and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania are going their own way, but also want to introduce a payment card.
The background is to curb so-called illegal migration. According to the Federal Ministry of the Interior, the number of unauthorized entries into Germany fell to 6,892 in January 2024. For comparison: In October 2023 there were 20,073. The number of deportations, however, remained roughly the same in January at 1,325 (October: 1,378). The number of initial asylum applications has also fallen: in January 2024, the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees accepted 26,376 initial applications. In January of the previous year there were 29,072 initial applications (minus 9.3 percent).