After the top meeting: CDU and CSU demonstrate unity

The leaders of the CDU and CSU demonstrated unity almost 100 days before the federal election and sharply attacked the political opponents of the Greens and the SPD.

"Our aim is to make a program for a modern Germany," said Chancellor candidate Armin Laschet on Sunday at a performance with CSU leader Markus Söder before the Union's final deliberations on the joint election program in Berlin.

To the surprise of many observers, the evening meeting ended after just under two hours.

According to reports, the presidia of both parties do not want to discuss the content of the election program until Monday morning.

Both party leaders stressed before the meeting that there would be no tax increases with the Union.

Because of Corona, there will be no nationwide tax cuts, as the state will remain dependent on the income.

"Vision of modernization"

"We want to shape a decade of modernization, and we want to create a climate-neutral industrialized country, where both the concerns of climate protection and the concerns of the employees and the jobs of the future are secured," said Laschet.

He added: "It has to be designed in a socially acceptable way, otherwise our society will break down over this question."

Laschet warned urgently against a red-red-green alliance or a traffic light coalition of the Greens, SPD and FDP after the election.

Neither constellation could shape the decade of modernization.

"This requires seriousness in government action and a vision of modernization." Therefore, "this combination is not a good one for Germany," said Laschet, who emphasized: "An alliance against the Union must not be formed."

The Union is striving for the best possible result - if it has a result of 30 percent plus x, there is a good chance that it will be able to contribute its expertise to shape it.

"I would also be happy with 32 or 33 or 35," said the CDU chief.

Söder emphasized: "Germany has always been led strongly when the CDU and CSU were closed." After there were certainly still points between the sister parties in the past few weeks that were controversial, the Union is now on course.

The power struggle for the candidacy for chancellor does not burden the relationship between the parties or that of himself and Laschet personally, said Söder: “The world is whole between us.

We want the Union to be successful. ”The joint retreat for the election program is both the content and the atmospheric prelude to the election campaign.

CSU strives for alignment

According to Söder, all points of the election program are united between the CDU and the CSU except for the maternal pension.

This is an "important act of justice".

He hoped that the topic could be discussed in coalition negotiations.

With this, Söder signaled that there will be no more dispute on this issue in the negotiations with the CDU about the election program - leading CDU representatives had strictly rejected the inclusion of the maternal pension in the joint manifesto for financial reasons.

So far, mothers or fathers who have brought up children born before 1992 have generally only received 2.5 pension points per child.

For those born afterwards it is 3 pension points.

The CSU is striving for an alignment here.

The expansion of the mother's pension should therefore be reflected in the CSU election program for Bavaria.

The deliberations took place on Sunday evening in great secrecy, although the contents of the election manifesto were reportedly not initially discussed. Rather, according to participants, Laschet, Söder and Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) initially only talked about the current situation, while Merkel's statement was about the corona crisis and foreign policy, among other things.

In the retreat of the presidia of the CDU and CSU - the closest leadership around Laschet and Söder - iPads were also distributed on which the participants could read the draft program. Laschet and Söder want to present the program on Monday afternoon - it is their first major joint appearance after the power struggle for the candidacy for chancellor. Before that, the boards of both parties should be connected to the exam online because of the corona pandemic and vote on the manifesto.

In the Sunday trend of the Insa polling institute for “Bild am Sonntag”, the CDU and CSU come to 28 percent, one point more than the previous week. The Greens remain at 20 percent. Shortly after the nomination of Chancellor candidate Annalena Baerbock, the party was temporarily ahead of the Union. SPD (16 percent), FDP (13), AfD (11) and Left (6) do not change. For the first time, Laschet leads on the question of who would be elected in a purely theoretical direct election. It comes to 19 percent (plus 1), Baerbock to 17 (minus 1), SPD chancellor candidate Olaf Scholz remains at 18 percent.