The coalition deal the CDU/CSU and the SPD have spent so long thrashing out reflects the priorities of an ageing nation
One of the small ways in which Berlin life differs from London life is that people rarely rush up or down escalators. Even in the heart of the city, there's no two-way traffic on the way down to the underground. You just stand there and wait. If you miss the next U-Bahn, so be it: another will be along in a minute.
Much the same logic applies to politics. Whereas the current British government was formed during a frantic five-day wargaming session, hurried along by a civil service worried that the markets would make the government "pay a price" for indecision, 66 days have passed since the German general election and Wednesday's presentation of a coalition agreement.
And that may not even the end of it: only if a coalition deal passes an SPD membership ballot will Angela Merkel be sworn in for her third term as German chancellor on 17 December. If the Social Democrat party faithful say no, everything goes back to the top of the escalator, so to speak.
Asked by a Danish journalist at her press conference on Wednesday if she didn't find the speed of the process incredibly frustrating, Merkel shook her head: "I just sit calmly and get on with my work."
The advantage of the slow-stream approach to coalition-forming is that it should produce stabler coalitions and more thought-through policies; the risk is that it can entirely sap the process of its spirit of adventure, and make bold decisions unlikely.
The coalition agreement the CDU/CSU and the SPD presented today bears out the latter rather than the former. The SPD leader, Sigmar Gabriel, can present his party members with at least three key policies that have survived from his election manifesto: the introduction of a minimum wage, rent controls in major cities including Hamburg, Munich and Berlin, and dual citizenship, all of which had previously been noisily dismissed by conservative politicians and business leaders.
There are caveats: the minimum wage won't come into full effect until 2017, and dual citizenship will only apply to those born in Germany, not the first generation of Turkish "guest workers" who gave birth to them. But these policies have been discussed at such length that it is hard not to see them being realised in the coming term. It should be enough to guarantee a yes in the SPD membership ballot.
What is noticeable is that while the left mostly got its way on social issues, the conservatives barely had to compromise on any of the more fundamental questions around healthcare, tax rises or Europe.
Greece is mentioned in the coalition agreement but there are no concrete measures on debt restructuring or what to do about Greek unemployment. If this is supposed to be the "Marshall Plan for Europe" that the SPD announced in its election manifesto, it may struggle to live up to such bold a name.
Germany under a grand-coalition government may become more socially liberal but it will remain conservative in its attitude to debt and spending.
The title of the coalition treaty is Shaping Germany's Future, but the priorities it sets are very much those of an ageing nation. On pensions, the two parties didn't so much compromise as push through changes that will please the elder members of their respective constituencies.
While crisis-hit countries like Greece are raising the pension age, Germany will move to lower it: in the future, those of who have worked for a full 45 years can earn a full pension from 63, four years earlier than the statutory threshold of 67. Gabriel claims it is a gesture of "fairness" towards parents who have worked harder than their children ever will.
The CDU, on the other hand, has got its way with a "mothers' pension", which aims to do more to compensate mothers who had children before 1992: more "fairness" for senior citizens.
Experts calculate the cost of the "pension with 63" at €5bn (£4.2bn) a year and the "mothers' pension" at €6.5bn, dwarfing the €6bn the coalition pledges to invest in education and research for younger people.
At 45, Germany's median age is almost three and a half years higher than the median age of the rest of Europe. Rarely have the consequences of this been more evident in the coalition agreement: it reads like the manifesto of a country that feels it has worked hard to accrue its current wealth, and doesn't fancy too much heavy lifting in the future.
GermanyAngela MerkelGreeceEuropePhilip Oltermanntheguardian.com © 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited or its affiliated companies. All rights reserved. | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds |
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