Left Party sues economy minister at top court

Since May, the German government has paid out subsidies to 100,000 households wanting to procure an electric vehicle, Environment Minister Carsten Schneider told the mass-circulation Bild newspaper on Monday.

Schneider, from junior coalition partner the Social Democrats (SPD), said the program, worth €3 billion ($3.36 billion), had “far exceeded our expectations.”

He said that every additional electric vehicle protected households from high fuel prices and made the county less dependent on expensive oil imports and international conflicts.

According to the Bild article, half of households applying for the subsidy had a maximum annual income of €45,000 and three-quarters of them €60,000.

Schneider said he found it particularly important that this graduation of payments according to income functioned properly.

Preliminary assessments have shown that less than 15% of households that applied for the subsidy were looking to buy vehicles from China, contradicting expert views that Chinese automakers would profit the most.

The Left Party is taking a row about a remark made by Economy Minister Katherina Reiche to the Constitutional Court after Reiche failed to give a declaration to cease and desist on time.

Reiche had posted a remark on the official Instagram site of her ministry saying: “Antisemitism and expropriation endanger Germany and the economy.”

The comment refers first to the unproven accusation that the Left Party is antisemitic in its ideology and then to the Left Party’s plan to socialize apartments from corporate landlords in a bid to reduce skyrocketing rents in the capital.

Reiche doubled down on her criticism of the socialist party in comments she made during a visit to Ukraine over the weekend, telling the Sunday edition of the mass-circulation Bild she feared a national loss of growth if a leftist coalition took power in Berlin.

“What the Left Party represents here in Berlin and the people that it represents is dangerous not only for Berlin but for our country,” she said.

The Berlin branch of the Left Party has accused the Christian Democrats (CDU), to which Reiche and Chancellor Friedrich Merz belong, of carrying out a “large-scale campaign” against its top candidate, Elif Eralp, who won recent state elections in Berlin.

It has taken legal action over similar statements on CDU interior ministry websites in various states, criticizing the use of official government channels to denigrate another party.

The ministries in Saxony and Schleswig Holstein withdrew the statements, but those in Baden-Württemberg, Brandenburg and Hesse have so far not done so.

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The Left Party‘s victory in state elections in Berlin continues to make waves, with conservatives around the country not amused at the prospect of a socialist-led government in the capital region.

The party is fighting back against what it sees as an illegal campaign against it by the Christian Democrats (CDU) and is now taking the economy minister to a top court over remarks she made on her ministry’s website.

The environment minister, Carsten Schneider from the Social Democrats (SPD), has voiced satisfaction over the number of households taking advantage of government subsidies to procure an electric vehicle.

And the justice minister wants to help victims of domestic violence escape the proximity with their tormentors by making it easier for them to move house.

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