After the federal election: SPD leader: Merz must change course and tone significantly

In the upcoming coalition talks, the Union's candidate for chancellor, Friedrich Merz, will have to make significant concessions from the SPD's perspective, despite his clear election victory. The Social Democrats have never ducked away from taking responsibility for the country, said SPD leader Lars Klingbeil in the ZDF "heute journal". "But the expectation is that Merz will change his course and his tone significantly." The working middle class needs better wages and more money in their wallets, pensions must be stabilized and investments worth billions must be initiated.

Klingbeil stressed again that it was not yet clear whether there would be a government with the Social Democrats. "The ball is in Friedrich Merz's court. He now has the responsibility to hold talks," he said on ARD.

The Union was clearly the strongest force in the federal election , while the SPD fell to an all-time low. Everything is now pointing towards this two-party alliance - also because a coalition of the Union and the Greens would not have a majority of seats.

Defense Minister Boris Pistorius (SPD) specifically demanded in the "Bild" newspaper that the CDU and CSU agree to an exception to the debt brake. This is practically unavoidable for the "adequate equipment" of the Bundeswehr. "The budget of my ministry will have to double to over 100 billion euros in the coming years due to necessary investments. We are talking about more than three percent of the gross domestic product. This cannot be saved at the expense of other areas."

However, in the debate about loosening the debt brake, the first parliamentary secretary of the CDU /CSU faction, Thorsten Frei, put the brakes on with the majority of the old Bundestag. The debt brake in the Basic Law is right and good, said the CDU politician in a "ZDF special". "We must not make the mistake of opening all the floodgates to all the challenges that may arise."

Despite differences of opinion with the SPD, CSU chairman Markus Söder expects the Social Democrats to agree to a coalition. In an ARD "Brennpunkt" program, he said that "the SPD has always been a party that supports the state and is full of responsibility." "Nevertheless, there will be a lot to discuss and there will be some big issues to discuss."

Söder, for his part, made a coalition with the SPD dependent on the traffic light coalition's electoral reform being overturned. "That was an unfair process," he said. "It was a kind of last act of revenge by the traffic light coalition against the south. We will change that again." Merz also pointed out that 23 direct candidates nationwide who won their constituency will still not enter the Bundestag. 18 of them come from the CDU or CSU.

CSU regional group leader Alexander Dobrindt said on ARD's "Tagesthemen" that the SPD must be willing to reorganize migration policy - that is a "basic condition". At the same time, Dobrindt stressed: "We now have the task of forming a coalition. To do that, we also need compromises." We must now focus on what we have in common, not what divides us.

From the perspective of the chairwoman of the German Council of Economic Experts, Monika Schnitzer, it will be difficult for the next government to turn around economic and financial policy. Germany is in danger of getting stuck in recession again this year, she told the "Stern" magazine. This means there is not enough growth to invest a lot of money in defense and infrastructure, for example. "We also lack the scope to reduce taxes."

Schnitzer called for a relaxation of the debt brake in order to cover defense spending and also trigger state investments. She also suggested launching a housing construction program.

Economist Veronika Grimm expects a "consistent growth agenda" from the new federal government, as she told the "Rheinische Post". "This includes reducing corporate taxes, income taxes and non-wage labor costs," said Grimm. This must be accompanied by structural reforms in the social security systems and the health system in order to keep spending under control.

The MPs are meeting for their first sessions today. Joint meetings of the old and new representatives as well as constitutive meetings of the parliamentary groups are planned.

The CDU and CSU are electing a new parliamentary group executive and renewing the parliamentary group alliance between the two parties. The AfD is also meeting for its inaugural meeting and electing its parliamentary group leader. The two previous parliamentary group leaders, Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla, are running again.

The Left Party is also meeting for its inaugural session and wants to prepare for the upcoming election period. The SPD and the Greens are only planning joint sessions of the old and new MPs without any personnel decisions.

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