Federal Audit Office criticizes the federal government's budget policy

Immediately before the start of the budget discussions in the Bundestag, the Federal Audit Office accused Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil (SPD) of setting the wrong course in budget policy. “A thoroughgoing consolidation of federal finances is not taking place,” says a report from the Bonn authority to the Bundestag’s budget committee, which is available to WELT’s partner publication “Politico”.

The massive new debt of over 200 billion euros annually in the coming years will lead to the federal government's debt level increasing to three trillion euros by 2030: "This must be counteracted in order to maintain the state's ability to act."

The auditors criticize that the federal government is continuing its expansionary course in terms of spending and new debt. The federal government's borrowing continues to expand. The price is ever higher interest payments: "This narrows the scope for action, which can only be kept open with new loans. So the federal government is heading further towards the debt trap."

In the report, the Federal Audit Office complains that the debt rule has been largely gutted and therefore ineffective. A largely gutted and therefore ineffective debt rule would no longer stand in the way of massive credit expansion: "Decisive budget consolidation must no longer be postponed. The federal government must now abandon the path to the debt trap."