Reinhard Sager in an interview: "The one-sided load contains considerable explosives"

Mr. District Administrator, numerous districts and cities have been pointing out for months that the municipalities are overburdened with taking in refugees and asylum seekers.

Are you heard?

Jasper von Altenbockum

Responsible editor for domestic politics.

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Not to a sufficient degree.

We hardly have any free capacity.

Some people stay in tents.

We are also still waiting for sufficient funding for the accommodation costs.

In the meantime, there is a gap of two billion euros per year in the housing costs for recognized refugees.

We therefore want a meeting with the Chancellor on refugee issues.

Do you want to tell him: We can't do this?

The EU has 455 million inhabitants.

In terms of numbers, the admission of so many asylum seekers and Ukrainian refugees into the EU is actually not a problem.

But Germany is the preferred haven.

Here the government would have to do much more to ensure a more even distribution and also a limitation.

If not, then what?

The one-sided burden on Germany is associated with considerable social explosives.

In any case, there will be great damage in Germany if the municipalities are put in a position in which they can no longer act.

Then the citizens not only lose trust in their municipalities, but also in the state as a whole.

The federal government must do everything possible to make the problem smaller instead of bigger.

There were riots in Grevesmühlen because a new accommodation was decided.

There are first communities that refuse to accept asylum seekers.

Will this happen more often now?

The danger is there.

There are districts that have already communicated this to the chancellor.

A refusal of admission is not a solution to the problem.

This is one of the reasons why I am strictly in favor of reducing the number of refugees to be taken in.

Does limitation of recording also mean: stop recording?

There are two reasons why there cannot be a freeze on admission.

One is obvious: Ukraine must be helped.

The second is that Germany must live up to its humanitarian obligations.

But Germany would have ways of reducing intake.

How should that work?

In the EU it should be regulated that people who have already found refuge are not all automatically forwarded to Germany because the social standards are the highest here.

In cases without a right of residence, repatriation should also be enforced more consistently - but of course this does not apply to people from Ukraine, but from other countries.

The federal government would have several approaches to reduce the problem.

Saxon Interior Minister Schuster has suggested that the federal states prepare for high immigration figures in the long term and ensure that there is a basic capacity for accommodation.

What do you make of it?

I welcome that. That goes in the right direction.

The more reception capacities are created in the countries, the better.

It is particularly important to us that people who have no prospects of staying are not even referred to the municipalities.

Do the municipalities also have to adjust to a permanent burden?

It is clearly regulated that the federal states are initially responsible for admission and initial accommodation.

More and more people are immigrating, but there are fewer and fewer staff to deal with the concerns of the citizens: schools, kindergartens, hospitals, job centres, care, the police, the judiciary - there is a lack of staff everywhere.

How should this continue?