The CDU chairman Friedrich Merz has criticized the federal government’s previous relief packages against high inflation as ineffective. For possible future aid measures, he called for a targeted focus on those sections of the population who actually need support. “It would have been better to give really needy households a little more instead of distributing money with the watering can,” said Merz of the German Press Agency in Berlin. “In my view, that is the completely wrong approach. That puts a strain on the federal budget and not enough gets to those who really need support.”
The two main cornerstones of the previous programs were the 9-euro ticket and the energy money, explained the opposition leader in the Bundestag. The following applies to the 9-euro ticket: “Instead of improving local public transport, demand was artificially boosted – with a flash in the pan effect.” In September, all 300 euros would then receive energy money. “Let me say: the vast majority of households don’t need it.”
Merz said: “We have to ask ourselves which groups in society politics must now pay particular attention to.” These are those who receive Hartz IV or receive housing benefit. “But then, of course, there are also households whose income is just above these transfer payments. I call them border households. How do we help them?”
The state must certainly also help these citizens in such a difficult situation, said the CDU leader. “I would have liked the federal government to make a plausible, understandable distinction and make suggestions on how to effectively support households whose income is really just above the level for transfer payments.”
