Patrick Donahue
By Patrick Donahue
Chancellor Angela Merkel will confront a stiffening challenge to form a government this week even after her record election victory as prospective coalition partners raise demands to open official talks.
With the leadership of Germany’s Greens party already casting doubt on negotiations with Merkel’s Christian Democratic-led bloc, the Social Democrats are hardening in their demand for a nationwide minimum wage of 8.50 euros ($11.51) an hour.
“It’s clear above all that there won’t be a government with the SPD” without an obligatory minimum wage, SPD General Secretary Andrea Nahles told Bild am Sonntag in an interview Sunday. “Our members won’t accept anything else.” The difficulty for Merkel of navigating coalition talks belies winning the biggest election victory since German reunification.
The vote three weeks ago put Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union and the Bavarian CSU five seats short of an absolute majority, rendering any negotiating party an overshadowed junior partner. After CDU, CSU and SPD negotiators met for a three-hour meeting on October 4 to set the tone, the 21 interlocutors are scheduled to reconvene at 4pm today in central Berlin to tackle differences on issues such as labour policy and the European debt crisis.
While SPD Chairman Sigmar Gabriel last week signalled a softening on the party’s demand to raise taxes, the ultimatum on the minimum wage underscores the difficulty of bridging differences. Merkel rejected a statutory minimum wage throughout the campaign, preferring an industry-by-industry approach that allows wages to be set by collective bargaining. Over the weekend, Merkel reiterated her support for industry-determined wages, showing no hint of compromise.
“The government has introduced branch-specific minimum wages for more than 4 million employees in the last four years,” the chancellor said in a podcast ahead of a speech she’ll give on October 16 to the IG-BCE labour union. In the Bild interview, the SPD’s Nahles raised the stakes and said Monday’s meeting should be the deciding moment.
Merkel’s bloc “shouldn’t assume that there will automatically be a third round of exploratory talks,” Nahles said. “We need concrete indications already yesterday on whether entering coalition talks would make sense.” Still, most signals pointed to the likelihood of an eventual agreement between Merkel and the SPD for a “grand coalition,” reprising a government of the rival factions that Merkel oversaw in her first term between 2005 and 2009. Merkel’s CDU/CSU won 311 seats out of 631 in the Bundestag, requiring her to form a coalition to have a majority. The SPD has 193, while the Greens won 63. The anti-capitalist Left Party has 64 seats. WP-BLOOMBERG
By Patrick Donahue
Chancellor Angela Merkel will confront a stiffening challenge to form a government this week even after her record election victory as prospective coalition partners raise demands to open official talks.
With the leadership of Germany’s Greens party already casting doubt on negotiations with Merkel’s Christian Democratic-led bloc, the Social Democrats are hardening in their demand for a nationwide minimum wage of 8.50 euros ($11.51) an hour.
“It’s clear above all that there won’t be a government with the SPD” without an obligatory minimum wage, SPD General Secretary Andrea Nahles told Bild am Sonntag in an interview Sunday. “Our members won’t accept anything else.” The difficulty for Merkel of navigating coalition talks belies winning the biggest election victory since German reunification.
The vote three weeks ago put Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union and the Bavarian CSU five seats short of an absolute majority, rendering any negotiating party an overshadowed junior partner. After CDU, CSU and SPD negotiators met for a three-hour meeting on October 4 to set the tone, the 21 interlocutors are scheduled to reconvene at 4pm today in central Berlin to tackle differences on issues such as labour policy and the European debt crisis.
While SPD Chairman Sigmar Gabriel last week signalled a softening on the party’s demand to raise taxes, the ultimatum on the minimum wage underscores the difficulty of bridging differences. Merkel rejected a statutory minimum wage throughout the campaign, preferring an industry-by-industry approach that allows wages to be set by collective bargaining. Over the weekend, Merkel reiterated her support for industry-determined wages, showing no hint of compromise.
“The government has introduced branch-specific minimum wages for more than 4 million employees in the last four years,” the chancellor said in a podcast ahead of a speech she’ll give on October 16 to the IG-BCE labour union. In the Bild interview, the SPD’s Nahles raised the stakes and said Monday’s meeting should be the deciding moment.
Merkel’s bloc “shouldn’t assume that there will automatically be a third round of exploratory talks,” Nahles said. “We need concrete indications already yesterday on whether entering coalition talks would make sense.” Still, most signals pointed to the likelihood of an eventual agreement between Merkel and the SPD for a “grand coalition,” reprising a government of the rival factions that Merkel oversaw in her first term between 2005 and 2009. Merkel’s CDU/CSU won 311 seats out of 631 in the Bundestag, requiring her to form a coalition to have a majority. The SPD has 193, while the Greens won 63. The anti-capitalist Left Party has 64 seats. WP-BLOOMBERG
