German Chancellor Angela Merkel attends a reception of German carnival societies at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, January 23, 2018. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke
January 25, 2018
By Michelle Martin
BERLIN (Reuters) – Senior members of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative bloc stressed on Thursday they would not give ground to the Social Democrats (SPD) on immigration as the two parties prepare to launch make-or-break negotiations on forming a government.
The SPD voted by a whisker on Sunday to start coalition talks with the conservatives but many members are skeptical about a re-run of the “grand coalition” that has ruled Germany since 2013. The SPD got its worst election result in the postwar era in September and many fear a further fall in votes.
Immigration will be one of the most controversial issues in the talks, with the conservatives keen to take a tough line to prevent further losses to the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) while the SPD takes a more migrant-friendly approach.
Julia Kloeckner, deputy of Merkel’s Christian Democrats (CDU), said the benchmark of 180,000 to 220,000 refugees per year laid out in a coalition blueprint agreed between the parties after exploratory talks earlier this month was crucial.
“We don’t want more immigration and certainly not uncontrolled immigration – the Jusos must accept that,” Kloeckner told Focus magazine, referring to the youth wing of the SPD that has railed against another grand coalition and criticised the benchmark as being equivalent to a migrant cap.
Dorothee Baer, deputy chair of Merkel’s Bavarian CSU allies, said her party could not give the SPD any concessions on family reunification for refugees, with all possible wiggle room for this exploited during exploratory talks.
She told broadcaster ARD the parties had already negotiated that issue, adding: “We won’t reopen issues that have already been negotiated.”
The coalition blueprint said the parties would cap at 1,000 a month the number of people who will be allowed to join their family now living as refugees in Germany. But the SPD wants to add a “hardship provision” to that.
The SPD is meeting on Thursday to prepare for the coalition negotiations that are due to begin on Friday after four months of political deadlock since September’s election.
On her way into that meeting, senior SPD member Manuela Schwesig said: “We want to have good, detailed negotiations now. They need to be swift but we also need to take the time we need so something good comes out of it.”
But the SPD is facing strong internal opposition and new members are joining the party in hordes in the hope they can reject a renewed coalition with the conservatives because the SPD has vowed to let its 443,000 members vote on a final deal.
Kevin Kuehnert, head of the Jusos who is spearheading attempts to prevent a grand coalition, told broadcaster n-tv: “We’ve had some extremely bad experiences working with the conservatives.”
He added that some of the projects laid out in the coalition blueprint had already been agreed on by the parties in 2013 but not carried out during the last legislative period.
(Additional reporting by Reuters Television; Writing by Michelle Martin; Editing by Alison Williams)
