Berlin – The agenda brings it to light: The Berlin House of Representatives wants to deal primarily with the main topic of this time on Thursday at its first meeting of the new year: Corona. The CDU, the largest opposition faction, had applied for this – everyone else agreed. At second glance, what is missing is the government statement by the newly elected mayor, Franziska Giffey (SPD). This should take place at the next plenary session in two weeks’ time. This surprises some parliamentarians.
There is an agreement in the German Bundestag that can be read on the website bundestag.de: “At the beginning of their term of office, the Federal Chancellor makes a government statement to the Bundestag in which the policy of the Federal Government during the electoral period is presented to Parliament. The government declaration is not legally binding, but it is binding for Parliament and the government from a constitutional point of view.” This is usually followed by a debate lasting several days.
Such lengthy debates are unusual in the Berlin House of Representatives. Nevertheless: Franziska Giffey was elected head of government by the House of Representatives three weeks ago. Since then, she has made numerous statements, and it was always and above all about Corona. So far she has not made a government statement, a programmatic speech about what the newly formed red-green-red coalition intends to do in the next five years.
And it won’t do it at the first plenary session of the new year either. Instead, the topic of Corona will dominate the session. “Everyone wants to talk about Corona. So we agreed on it,” confirmed the influential SPD parliamentarian Torsten Schneider on Wednesday in an interview with the Berliner Zeitung. And the government statement? It was “perfectly okay” that this would only happen in 14 days.
Opposition leader Kai Wegner: “I would have talked”
Not only Kai Wegner is surprised. The former CDU top candidate and current opposition leader in the House of Representatives says he is surprised at Giffey’s reluctance. “I would have talked,” says the former member of the Bundestag.
But Wegner also breaks with conventions when necessary – in this case with those of his own faction. Wegner, as chairman of the parliamentary group, does not want to go into any technical committee, but would rather remain a generalist, as he said in an interview with the Berliner Zeitung. Predecessor Burkard Dregger sat on the Interior Committee and was also his parliamentary group’s spokesman for interior and thus security policy. It didn’t help him: Dregger was kicked out of parliament in the election.