The Federal Court of Auditors sharply criticized the "subsidy jungle" in local public transport and called for a fundamental financing reform.

The system of subsidies is growing steadily and is becoming more and more opaque, criticized the President of the Federal Audit Office, Kay Scheller, on Tuesday when presenting a special report on the use of federal funds for public transport.

"The federal government got so lost in it that it lost track of things." Transparency and efficiency of tax funds fell by the wayside.

The only thing that is clear is that the federal government is now investing a double-digit billion amount in local public transport via a number of programs.

Corinna Budras

Business correspondent in Berlin.

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The three largest financing programs alone would have totaled 11.6 billion euros in 2021.

The Federal Court of Auditors was less concerned with saving a specific contribution than with the lack of transparency and effectiveness of the funds.

Scheller emphasized that local public transport is becoming increasingly important against the background of efforts to improve climate protection.

A contributing factor to the dilemma of opaque structures is that local public transport is basically a task for the federal states, but the federal states put much less into their regional buses and trains.

This "mixed financing" has led to growing entanglements and interdependencies that are no longer easy to resolve.

The result is "years" of undesirable developments that the new Federal Minister of Transport, Volker Wissing (FDP), urgently needs to address.

In principle, such mixed financing is also a problem in other fields such as education or climate protection.

In local public transport, however, the problem is of particular proportions because of the large sums of money involved.

Court of Auditors: uniform public transport law needed

In its coalition agreement, the traffic light government clearly emphasized the role of local public transport in combating the climate crisis.

The coalition of SPD, Greens and FDP wants to increase regionalization funds so that states and municipalities can improve the attractiveness and capacities of public transport.

The coalition agreement also states that the federal, state and local governments should agree on funding, including the individual contributions of the states and local governments and the distribution of federal funds.

However, the inspectors complained that the basic problem of non-transparent financing was not addressed in the letter of intent.

The opposite phenomenon also causes resentment: the federal states simply left funds "simply unused to a considerable extent" from the lavishly paid subsidies.

Also: "In practice, the federal states do not spend these funds entirely on public transport."

The Court of Auditors demanded that there should be a uniform public transport law for federal funds in the future.

Federal funding must be "imperatively" linked to the states providing the basic funding for public transport "reliably".

Regular information to the federal government is essential.

Wissing did not want to comment on the report itself.

According to media reports, however, he is planning a special meeting with the federal states to strengthen public transport.

"My goal is therefore that we work with the states to develop a catalog of measures that we can implement specifically to make public transport more attractive," said Wissing.