BERLIN (MNI) – Germany’s largest opposition party, the center-left
SPD, said Tuesday that it does not rule out voting for the government’s
bill on the European aid measures for fiscally troubled states.
The SPD’s parliamentary managing secretary, Thomas Oppermann, in an
interview with German ARD television renewed his appeal to Chancellor
Angela Merkel’s conservative-liberal CDU/CSU-FDP government coalition
for the introduction of a financial transaction tax.
If the government “finally goes in that direction, I cannot rule
out an approval” of the government’s European aid bill by the SPD,
Oppermann said.
At last week’s parliamentary vote on the rescue bill for Greece,
the SPD abstained from voting because the government coalition had
refused to agree on a joint resolution for a financial transaction tax.
Merkel’s CDU/CSU-FDP coalition controls a majority in the lower
house of parliament, the Bundestag, but on Sunday lost its majority in
the upper house, the Bundesrat, representing the 16 states.
However, Germany’s share of the loan guarantees for financially
troubled Eurozone countries foreseen under the European aid package will
come out of the federal budget. The Bundesrat can only delay federal
budget bills but not block them indefinitely.
–Berlin bureau: +49-30-22 62 05 80; email: twidder@marketnews.com
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