Union examines “double whammy” lawsuit
Bundestag extends energy price brakes
November 17, 2023, 3:19 a.m
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The price controls for gas and electricity do not end at the end of the year. The Bundestag decides to maintain the regulations until the end of March. The Union is currently waiting for a report on whether the financing for this is even constitutional.
The state caps on gas and electricity prices will remain in place beyond the turn of the year. The Bundestag decided late on Thursday evening to extend the regulation, which expires at the end of the year, until March 31, 2024.
However, the MPs rejected the originally planned extension until the end of April. The signals from the EU Commission, which must approve the project, only allow an extension until the end of March, according to the Bundestag’s Energy Committee.
The price caps for electricity and gas were introduced in March of this year and were granted retroactively for January and February. This should protect consumers in Germany from being financially overwhelmed by skyrocketing energy prices as a result of the Russian attack on Ukraine. The prices are capped for a large part of the consumption of private households – for electricity at 40 cents and for gas at 12 cents per kilowatt hour.
The situation on the energy markets has now stabilized, but the continuation of the price caps is “insurance against unexpected risks,” according to the regulation from Economics Minister Robert Habeck. However, according to calculations by comparison portals, the relief for consumers is likely to be very small. Verivox assumes that electricity costs will fall by an average of 0.3 percent and gas spending by 1.4 percent. Check24 also expects electricity customers in a model household to only save 13 euros. The experts estimate savings of 45 euros for gas customers.
Union is examining lawsuit against financing
However, the Union parliamentary group in the Bundestag has already indicated that, after the Karlsruhe budget ruling, the special fund for energy price brakes will also be checked for constitutionality. CDU leader Friedrich Merz said on ZDF on Thursday evening that he was expecting the first result of a legal report he had commissioned at the end of next week and the beginning of the week after next as to whether the ruling on the transfer of Corona billions to the so-called Climate and Transformation Fund (KTF) also applies to the Economic Stabilization Fund (WSF). On this basis, the Union will decide whether it will also go to Karlsruhe against this fund. The energy price brakes are financed from the WSF.
The federal government is also examining what consequences the Karlsruhe ruling has for the WSF, which Chancellor Olaf Scholz described as a “double whammy” against increased energy prices as a result of the war in Ukraine. The WSF was provided with 200 billion euros in loans in 2022 while the debt brake was suspended. The government thus created a stockpile of debt.
The traffic light coalition made up of the SPD, Greens and FDP wanted to use 60 billion euros to combat Corona for climate protection and the modernization of the economy and reallocated the money with the approval of the Bundestag. The Karlsruhe judges declared this unconstitutional on Wednesday.