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Traffic lights Habeck, Scholz, Lindner
Photo: Kay Nietfeld / dpa
According to the parliamentary secretary of the SPD parliamentary group, Katja Mast, the budget for 2024 can no longer be decided in time this year. She wrote this in a message to the members of the SPD parliamentary group, which is available to SPIEGEL. "Olaf, R. Habeck and Ch. Lindner have not yet been able to bring their intensive talks to a conclusion," Mast explained.
The SPD in particular had pushed for the budget for 2024 to be passed before the end of this year. She wanted a political agreement before the SPD party congress this weekend. But even after a series of talks between Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Economics Minister Robert Habeck and Finance Minister Christian Lindner, there has been no result so far. Now there is not enough time to complete the parliamentary procedure in 2023.
This means that the so-called provisional budget management will come into force from the turn of the year until the budget is actually adopted. In the meantime, the individual ministries are only allowed to spend the bare minimum, and no new projects are allowed to begin.
Hope for political agreement
However, the SPD politician Mast at least held out the prospect of a political agreement in the budget dispute this year. In doing so, it invokes the Chancellor. "Olaf is confident that a result can be achieved in the coming days," Mast wrote.
SPD leader Lars Klingbeil also expects a "political clarification" before the end of this year. After an agreement of the top trio of Scholz, Habeck and Lindner, there must still be a coalition committee. "In the end, it is clear that this cannot be decided by the three, but by the parties, the parliamentary groups together with the government," Klingbeil emphasized in the ARD program "maischberger".
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