In view of the high inflation, the calls for financial help for pensioners are getting louder.

The pressure comes particularly from Lower Saxony, where the next state elections are due on October 9th.

The Prime Minister of Lower Saxony and SPD top candidate Stephan Weil has already announced that he will "fight hard" in talks with the federal government for further aid.

Many pensioners and students are rightly "upset" because no energy money is provided for them.

Economics Minister and CDU top candidate Bernd Althusmann had also attacked the Berlin traffic light coalition for not considering pensioners.

Reinhard Bingener

Political correspondent for Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Bremen based in Hanover.

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Now the Lower Saxony FDP top candidate Stefan Birkner is also demanding more money for pensioners.

In a letter to Federal Labor Minister Hubertus Heil (SPD), Birkner writes that he can understand the resentment of many pensioners at the fact that the energy bill is not taken into account.

In contrast to the SPD's top candidate, Weil, Birkner is not calling for pensioners to be included in the energy money, but for "faster inflation compensation".

Instead of an annual pension adjustment, there should be “at least one semi-annual adjustment” in the future.

At present, the duration between the price increases and the pension increase is "sometimes life-threatening, especially for recipients of small pensions," says Birkner in the letter that is available to the FAZ.

Letter allows several conclusions

The demands from Lower Saxony allow several conclusions: The parties have identified inflation as a possibly crucial issue for the state elections.

The Lower Saxony CDU is easy on its calls for more money for pensioners because it is not involved in the federal government.

The demands of the top candidates from the SPD and FDP, on the other hand, are also aimed at their own party friends in the Berlin traffic light coalition.

The conflict readiness of both state associations is likely to have something to do with the fact that the SPD and FDP suffered the heaviest losses in the past state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein.

The demands also point to cracks within the traffic light:

The SPD mainly blames Finance Minister Lindner (FDP) for not taking pensioners into account.

The FDP, in turn, is now trying to redirect the pressure on Labor Minister Heil (SPD).