In an interview with ntv.de, the SPD co-chair increased the pressure on Federal Health Minister Spahn – during testing and in the mask affair. But: The agreed step-by-step lockdown plan is a "light at the end of the tunnel". In addition, Walter-Borjans explains how his party wants to reduce taxes for 95 percent of the population, abolish spouse splitting and overcome Hartz IV.
ntv.de: After the federal-state conference, business associations are disappointed about insufficient easing. Other voices warn that Germany is opening into the middle of the third wave. How relaxed do you look to the coming weeks?
Norbert Walter-Borjans: There is no reason to relax. On the one hand there is the increased risk of infection from the corona mutant, on the other hand the quiet dying of entire industries and the serious consequences for education, especially for children from socially disadvantaged families. The appointments made are a light at the end of the tunnel. They show how you can systematically open without giving up health protection requirements.
But what was the main reason for the easing at this point in time? A favorable pandemic situation or social pressure?
The effectiveness of regulations and laws presupposes that the population supports them. The decisive factors were, on the one hand, the vaccination successes in those over eighty, which have enormously reduced the death rate in this particularly endangered group, and, on the other hand, the possibility of testing on a much larger scale. This enables us to strike a new balance between health protection and long-awaited relaxation.
However, the free quick test offers will not be available everywhere from Monday. And a task force led by Jens Spahn and Andreas Scheuer is now to work on the logistics behind the distribution of the self-tests. The prerequisites for opening are still in preparation. One wonders what the federal government is actually doing when there is not a federal-state conference?
It was not agreed that everything would open tomorrow, but a step-by-step approach. If the responsible ministries do their job now, it can succeed. Or better: it has to be successful. This goal can be achieved with a stringent organization.
But the Federal Minister of Health had aroused completely different expectations. Is Jens Spahn up to his key role in this historical situation?
I don't mind big gigs. But if you make big announcements, you have to deliver. The Federal Minister of Health did not do this well either with vaccinations or with the Corona warning app. There was always a noticeably large gap between desire and reality – with the corresponding great disappointment among the citizens. It has to work now when testing. I don't give up hope that everyone will learn from past mistakes. It is urgently needed now.
The criticism of Health Minister Spahn is embedded in the SPD's increased criticism of the coalition partner. What is your personal relationship with the Union and what is your perspective on the work of the grand coalition?
A coalition – and especially a grand coalition – is not a love marriage. This is an alliance of convenience that has achieved good results in dealing with the pandemic so far. But when it comes to the matter, you have to be able to talk openly about deficits. This is the case in the areas of health protection and economic assistance. But it is also true: We treat each other decently, be it in the government, in the coalition committee or in contacts with individual politicians of the coalition partner.
Are you proud of the SPD's role in government over the past three years?
Yes absolutely. You just have to look at what the coalition partner and the Chancellor also portray as a joint success: the basic pension, the Corona stimulus package including the change in focus towards electromobility, the EU aid package, the short-time working regulations, the financial support of the municipalities. We know too well how hard the SPD had to wrestle within the coalition for this. Even if the word is a bit strange to me: The SPD can be proud of what it has achieved.
Central pillars of the Bundestag election program presented on Monday are a citizen's allowance instead of Hartz IV and the introduction of a basic child benefit. What is the central message? The SPD finally ends its Hartz trauma and breaks with Agenda 2010? Or: Look, the SPD has a modern, lean welfare state concept?
The SPD has presented a future program for our country. The welfare state concept plays an important role in this. With this we show that we have learned from Hartz IV and that we have the strength to say: "We know today that Hartz IV has side effects that are unacceptable. A stable society requires that we maintain cohesion and that no one is left behind. And with basic child security we are eliminating a major injustice. In the future, it should end with the fact that children of parents with high incomes are worth more for tax purposes than children of poorer parents.
Would your program be more credible if your top candidate Olaf Scholz apologized for his personal contribution to Agenda 2010?
No. Everyone who worked on it at the time acted with the best of intentions. Experience with implementation and new social developments have shown us where and what we need to change in terms of social security. Like all of us, Olaf Scholz is fully committed to this new, shared approach.
Many SPD projects – the greater burden on higher incomes, a wealth tax, a higher minimum wage – are aimed at better social security for the lower income groups. Is the SPD winning back voters from the center with redistribution programs?
Our future program will lead to a reduction in taxes for 95 to 97 percent of society. So taxpayers will be better off until well beyond the middle. In return, the 3 to 5 percent strongest shoulders have to contribute a little more. These are the very wealthy, whose income and wealth development has decoupled from the general public in recent years. The wealth tax only affects one percent of the population. None of this prevents the lobbyists of the top earners from telling us all that the SPD wants to raise taxes. This accusation is not all nonsense – it turns those against reform who would benefit from it.
They also want to end the spouse splitting. But especially in non-academic professions, women often earn less than men, work part-time and, as a result, find it attractive to take on more of the family work. Why do you intervene in these life plans?
Our concept from 2017 already provided that spouses with an income difference of up to 40,000 euros a year would not lose a cent. These are the vast majority of households. They would be much better off with children. In addition, the new rules should only be applied to newly concluded marriages; existing marriages would have a right to vote. It is not difficult to predict that the vast majority would opt for the new law – especially with children. With this change, by the way, the millions of children in such households would finally also benefit from the support, who today have nothing at all from spouse splitting – children of single parents and in families in which both partners earn a similar amount. The splitting of spouses is completely out of date and has largely missed the goal of supporting households with children for decades.
The pandemic measures are leading to an accelerated death of the retail trade in the inner cities. The SPD wants to counteract this with a rent index and rent caps for commercial properties and expand the municipal scope for action. Is that enough to prevent empty inner cities?
In many cities, rents are now hardly affordable. Nevertheless, the conditions differ from city to city. That is why there is no magic bullet. Instead, we need a mixture of intelligent rental price limitation and regulatory law that defines which use is permitted. We must do everything we can to avoid having to abandon traditional retail outlets and fall into the hands of chain stores that look the same everywhere. At the same time, inner-city retail must become more hybrid and combine the opportunities of digitization with on-site presence in order to be able to hold its own against the online giants.
In autumn, the SPD also wants to convince with the focus on climate protection. You attribute a key role in the transformation of Germany as an industrial location to hydrogen. How does this approach differ from that of the Union or the Greens?
To use CO2-neutral hydrogen, we need a lot more renewable energy generated in Germany. The CDU and CSU are actively slowing down wind power by making the expansion of wind turbines on land more difficult and preventing the construction of power lines for wind turbines in the sea. The consequence would be that hydrogen produced abroad would have to be imported. Not only are the technical prerequisites missing at the moment, we would also create new dependencies.
And the greens?
In contrast to the Greens, we have a plan that eliminates economic and social disruptions. In the end, social upheavals would not lead to any improvement. The fastest possible switch will require gas for a while. Also to produce hydrogen from it. If we want to accelerate the phase-out of coal as far as possible and do without nuclear power, that is imperative. That's why we want to finish building the last 100 of the 1100-kilometer NorthStream-2 pipeline. That must not prevent us from consistently pursuing the phase out of gas combustion. In this way, the last 100 kilometers of the pipeline do not make us more dependent, but more independent and flexible.
Sebastian Huld spoke to Norbert Walter-Borjans.
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