German Chancellor Olaf Scholz will hold meetings with his two chief ministers to find out how they put forward controversial plans to fix the country’s weak economy, according to Reuters.
Public divisions over economic and industrial policy between Scholz’s Free Democratic Party, the Greens and the Social Democrats have fuelled speculation of a possible coalition break-up a year before elections.
Last week, the finance ministry of Christian Lindner of the Free Democratic Party published a document challenging Economy Minister Robert Habeck’s investment plan, which proposed a fund to encourage large-scale investment and circumvent Germany’s strict budget spending rules.
Lindner, by contrast, favours tax cuts to stimulate the economy, proposing in his article, for example, the immediate abolition of the solidarity tax, paid on top of income and corporate tax and introduced after reunification to support the country’s poorest eastern states.
Deteriorating business prospects in Europe’s largest economy intensified divisions within ideologically splintered coalition over policy measures to stimulate growth, protect industrial jobs and strengthen Germany’s position as a global industrial centre.
