Almost three quarters of Germans are dissatisfied with the traffic light government

2023-08-27 12:58:00

Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD)

Disputes, disputes and pending laws: the citizens are dissatisfied with the work of the federal government.

(Photo: dpa)

Berlin The traffic light government is already halfway through its term in office. The balance so far is sobering: almost three quarters of Germans are dissatisfied with the work of politicians from the SPD, Greens and FDP. In a survey by the opinion research institute YouGov on behalf of the German Press Agency, 73 percent share this opinion.

On the other hand, only 23 percent are satisfied with the coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP. 68 percent of the nearly 1,300 respondents do not trust the government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) to solve the country’s pressing problems.

Only 18 percent believe that Scholz will re-elect the traffic light coalition in the 2025 federal election. On the other hand, 73 percent consider it unlikely that Scholz will continue to govern with the FDP and the Greens after the election. However, only 35 percent believe that the coalition will collapse before the election. On the other hand, 45 percent of those surveyed believe that the traffic light will remain in place until the election.

Since the beginning of the year, the disputes in the coalition have increased. The alliance partners clashed particularly violently when it came to the heating law. There is currently a debate about the basic child security from Family Minister Lisa Paus (Greens) and the law for more economic growth. However, there should be an agreement before the start of a two-day cabinet retreat on Tuesday at Meseberg Castle near Berlin.

The chancellor gets particularly bad grades in the survey. 66 percent say he does a rather bad job. On the other hand, only 26 percent rate his work as rather good.

Defense Minister Pistorius comes off well

The work of its most important ministers is almost always rated negatively. 63 percent find the work of Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck (Greens) rather bad, Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) 57 percent and Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (Greens) 52 percent. Only one is rated mostly positively: Defense Minister Boris Pistorius (SPD). 52 percent find his work rather good and only 28 percent rather bad.

If there were elections today, the traffic light parties would be 13 percent below their election results of two years ago. This is the result of the current Sunday trend, which the opinion research institute Insa collects every week for the newspaper “Bild am Sonntag”. According to this, the SPD remains at 18 percent, while it still achieved 25.7 percent in the 2021 federal election. The Greens remain unchanged at 14 percent (2021: 14.8 percent), the FDP loses one point and stands at seven percent (election result: 11.5 percent). Taken together, this is only 39 percent for the traffic light partners (Bundestag election: 52 percent).

Unchanged from the previous week, the Union is 27 percent ahead of the AfD with 21 percent. The left continues to get five percent. Eight percent of the voters would vote for other parties (plus 1). In the election two years ago, the CDU/CSU received 24.1 percent, the AfD 10.3 percent and the left 4.9 percent.

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