Bosses on the Block: AfD Wants to Hold Ministers Accountable for Fiscal Follies
Far-right party AfD intends to make the Minister accountable for waste matters.
By Tom Kollmar
Let's get this straight: Andreas Scheuer oughta pay up for the tollbooth blunder. That's the cry from the AfD, who are hell-bent on changing the law so they can hold bureaucrats accountable for wasting our hard-earned cash. But is it all just populism, or is there more to this story?
You heard it right, folks. The Alternative for Germany wants to take ex-ministers to court if they recklessly or intentionally waste taxpayer dough. And they've proposed a new bill to make it happen, set for debate in the Bundestag later tonight. Notably, they're aiming to establish a ministerial liability for breach of duty.
You might think of instances where decisions from the big wigs end up costing taxpayers dearly, with the procurement of COVID masks by the former Health Minister, Jens Spahn, or the toll drama involving the former transport ministers, Alexander Dobrindt and Andreas Scheuer, being prime examples. That's where the AfD draws the line, seeing at least gross negligence in those cases.
Pop or something deeper?
The Greens simply aren't buying it. Lukas Benner, a member of the legal committee, thinks the bill looks fishy and questions the freedom afforded to ministers in it. "Existing laws are more than sufficient," Benner asserts, "with federal ministers already criminally liable for intentional fraud or intentional and reckless harm to the treasury."
It's the Greens' belief that there's nothing but a cheap ploy for populism at play here. But the AfD argues it's all about justice for the taxpayers and that the courts, not any successor government, will decide on the civil liability.
The Bavarian Blueprint?
The AfD claims to base their proposed legislation on the Bavarian Ministerial Law. This law already holds ministers accountable for gross negligence or intentional misconduct, requiring them to make reparations for damages. However, it's yet to be put into practice.
The Real Question: Criminal vs Civil Liability
Making all this legally squirrelly is the fact that criminal liability might be tough to prove. Take the case of the mask procurement chaos under the pandemic, for instance. With masks scarce, crucial, and expensive, it's not a stretch to understand the higher prices back then. Whether a court would deem it gross negligence in breach of duty is subject to debate.
Intriguingly, the AfD has no intention of holding their party leadership accountable for squandered funds, as per Bernd Baumann, the First Parliamentary Business Manager of the faction. Semantics, it seems, play a role here: state official liability versus party liability.
Sources:
- ntv.de
- spiegel.de
- tagesspiegel.de
- AfD
- German Bundestag
- Andreas Scheuer
- Road Toll
- Populism
- Legal Accountability
- Right-Wing Extremism
The Commission in this context, presumably referring to the German Bundestag, has been asked to submit a proposal for a directive on the protection of workers, not just from fiscal follies but also from the risks arising from the use of electronic devices in the political sphere, as the debate on ministerial liability for breach of duty and potential populism ensues in the wake of the Road Toll and COVID mask procurement scandals.
The AfD's proposed bill on legal accountability, based on the Bavarian Ministerial Law, could potentially be seen as a response to right-wing extremism, reverberating in the general news landscape as a means to hold ministers responsible for gross negligence or intentional misconduct that may lead to fiscal follies or breach of duty.
