News blog on federal politicsBundestag decides on early start pension
October 16, 2026, 10:14 am|
The early start pension is intended to be a building block for old age security. The state pays ten euros per month for children aged six and over. The money should then be invested in the capital market.
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Important updates
6 minutes ago
Bundestag approves early start pension
9:16 p.m
Expensive cigarettes: Bundestag votes for higher tobacco tax
5:14 p.m
Report: Federal government before AI partnership with Nvidia
3:07 p.m
Success for the Left in Karlsruhe: Minister Reiche has to delete Instagram video
1:25 p.m
Bundestag approves reform of emergency care
Bundestag approves early start pension
The Bundestag has approved the introduction of the early start pension. According to the wishes of the federal government, children should in future receive ten euros per month for their retirement provision. The money should then be invested on the capital market. Children aged six and over who were born in 2020 or later and are registered in Germany should receive it. It should be paid by the state until you reach adulthood. To do this, parents must conclude a certified standard custody agreement for their child with a provider of their choice. From the age of 18, you can continue to fund your retirement savings account with your own contributions until you retire.
Expensive cigarettes: Bundestag votes for higher tobacco tax
Cigarettes are likely to become significantly more expensive in Germany in the coming years. With the votes of the coalition factions from the Union and the SPD, the Bundestag voted for an amendment to the law that will gradually increase the tobacco tax in the coming years. Since this tax collection will be passed on to customers, the price is expected to rise from currently a good eight euros per pack of 20 cigarettes to just under 12 euros in 2030. Fine-cut cigarettes - i.e. cigarettes that you roll yourself - will also be significantly more expensive than currently.
The federal government is hoping for additional tax revenue of around 12 billion euros within four years. But the tobacco industry has doubts about this - it fears that smokers will turn to the black market and legal dealers will suffer losses. Millions of people in Germany turn to tobacco cigarettes. The 2025 microcensus showed that 19 percent of people aged 15 and over smoked.
The federal government justified the amendment to the law with the necessary budget consolidation and health protection. According to the German Cancer Research Center, around 131,000 people in Germany died as a result of tobacco-related diseases in 2023. Health experts believe higher prices are an effective measure to encourage smokers to quit.
The legislative process for tobacco tax ends on Friday in the Federal Council. The state chamber has the opportunity to object to the amendment to the law, but there is no sign of this so far. It is therefore expected that the Federal Council will approve the project and that the tax increase will be a done deal.
Report: Federal government before AI partnership with Nvidia
According to a media report, the federal government wants to enter into a partnership with the US chip company Nvidia in order to help artificial intelligence (AI) achieve a breakthrough in the industry. Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Nvidia boss Jensen Huang planned to announce the cooperation on Monday at the “Invest in Germany” investment summit in Berlin, Handelsblatt reports, citing government and industry circles. The federal government is prepared to invest a three-digit million amount in the project.
The initiative is intended to lay the foundation for the use of so-called physical AI, which is needed, for example, for training robots and autonomous vehicles, the report continued. The government start-up financing should, among other things, be used to rent computing capacity on an AI cloud from Deutsche Telekom. Nvidia wants to participate in the project by sending engineers and supplying chips. According to the Handelsblatt, around a dozen German companies will take part in the project, including Siemens, the Volkswagen subsidiary Audi and the AI company Black Forest Labs.
Success for the Left in Karlsruhe: Minister Reiche has to delete Instagram video
In the dispute over an Instagram video by Federal Economics Minister Katherina Reiche (CDU), the Left has achieved success at the Federal Constitutional Court. The minister must first remove the video published on her ministry's website, the highest German court in Karlsruhe decided, thereby granting an urgent request from the Left. It's about a video on the ministry's Instagram account with excerpts from a speech on September 23rd, a few days after the Left's election victory in Berlin. Reiche warns in the article that it is dangerous for the capital and Germany as an investment location that a party talks about expropriation and writes this into its program and that “anti-Semitism is openly practiced, which scares the Jews in this city.”
The Left had asked the minister through a lawyer to remove the video by September 29th. That didn't happen. The party then turned to the Federal Constitutional Court with a lawsuit and an urgent application. The urgent application was now successful. The Second Senate in Karlsruhe decided that Reiche must delete the video until a decision on the organ lawsuit is made, but for a maximum of six months.
If this order were not issued, but the lawsuit were later successful, the Left could potentially suffer a “serious, irreparable disadvantage with regard to its right to equal participation in political competition” due to the continued spread, the judges explained their decision. However, if the lawsuit is later unsuccessful, Reiche will not be prevented from repeating the statements. The Left's application stated that Reiche had disregarded the requirement of neutrality for state organs and violated the Left's right to equal participation in political competition. As Minister of Economic Affairs, she unlawfully made “one-sided and party-political” statements.
In the election to the Berlin House of Representatives on September 20th, the Left was clearly the strongest force. The party is also taking legal action against other politicians who have accused the party of anti-Semitism and proximity to criminal clans via social media.
Bundestag approves reform of emergency care
In the event of a medical emergency, patients in Germany should receive faster and more targeted care in the future. With the votes of the Union, SPD and Greens, the Bundestag spoke out in favor of a long-planned reform of emergency care. In addition, improvements to the austerity reform of statutory health insurance were approved, which met with significant criticism.
In view of overloaded emergency services and emergency rooms, the aim of the emergency reform is to better coordinate the contracted medical emergency service, the emergency rooms and the emergency services. In addition, patients should be controlled more precisely. Federal Health Minister Carsten Linnemann (CDU) emphasized that the reform was long overdue. The reality is that many people don't know where to turn and almost one in three go to the emergency room unnecessarily.
The central component of the reform is a networking of the emergency number 112 and the number of the medical on-call service 116 117. Using an initial assessment procedure, health complaints are to be assessed and callers are referred to the appropriate care. For example, if a patient calls 112 and there is no urgent emergency, their case will be forwarded directly to 116 117. For emergencies, 112 remains the direct number.
Integrated emergency centers - INZ for short - are to be established at selected clinics and are open around the clock. They consist of an emergency room, an emergency service practice and an initial assessment center. In the INZ, hospitals and associations of statutory health insurance physicians work together in a binding manner. In addition, special emergency centers for children and young people are planned.
What is new in the draft law is that emergency rescue - i.e. on-site care and the transport of emergency patients - will in future be classified as a benefit in kind from statutory health insurance. This prevents insured persons from having to bear part of the costs themselves. The Björn Steiger Foundation particularly welcomed this point. However, there is still a need for improvement in the emergency call query, quality control and additional payment, it was said.
SPD party conference with presidential election in mid-January
After the resignation of co-party leader Bärbel Bas, the SPD wants to re-elect its leadership at a party conference in mid-January. According to SZ information, the federal party conference will take place on January 16th and 17th in Bremen. The entire party executive committee will be re-elected. The Germany editorial network had previously reported on the event. In Bremen, the citizenship, the state parliament, will also be re-elected on May 30th.
After Bas' resignation on Monday, the SPD presidium voted unanimously in favor of a new election for the entire leadership at the suggestion of party leader Lars Klingbeil. Klingbeil himself is keeping it open whether he will run again. The party also considers the Prime Ministers of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Saarland, Manuela Schwesig and Anke Rehlinger, as possible candidates for dual leadership. Defense Minister Boris Pistorius, the most popular SPD politician according to surveys, has ruled out running for office.
Bundestag lifts MP Ahmetović's immunity
In connection with the tender for the former clinic site in Lehrte near Hanover, investigators are searching the Bundestag office of SPD MP Adis Ahmetović and three apartments. Two apartments in Hanover and one in Berlin were affected, a spokesman for the Hanover public prosecutor's office told the German Press Agency. The searches continued late in the morning.
Ahmetović is being investigated on charges of aiding and abetting anti-competitive agreements in tenders in conjunction with violating trade secrets. The spokesman confirmed the connection with the tender for the former site of the Hannover Region Hospital (KRH) in Lehrte.
The Bundestag had previously lifted the immunity of the Lower Saxony MP. The execution of judicial search and seizure orders was approved. The public prosecutor's office did not initially explain what specific actions the 33-year-old was accused of. According to the spokesman, investigators also visited the SPD office on Odeonstrasse in Hanover. There they were informed that Ahmetović did not have an office at the address. A search therefore did not take place there. The 33-year-old's constituency office in Hanover was also not searched.
Ahmetović is chairman of the SPD in Hanover. After the investigation became known, he had his lawyer explain that he had nothing to blame himself for. The law firm announced on October 8th that it had signaled its full willingness to cooperate with the public prosecutor's office, but had not yet received access to the files.
Investigations against the former Hanover regional president Steffen Krach had already become known regarding the tender for the clinic site. An investigation is also underway against the Lower Saxony SPD parliamentary group leader Stefan Politze, who has since resigned. His lawyer made a connection with the allegations against Krach. Krach and Politze rejected the allegations made against them.
Pistorius promises to clarify allegations against soldiers in Saxony-Anhalt
Defense Minister Boris Pistorius promises to clarify possible misconduct by soldiers in the 1st Medical Regiment in Weißenfels in Saxony-Anhalt. "So far these are allegations. If they are confirmed, it would be disgusting," said the SPD politician on the sidelines of a visit to Crete. “We will do everything we can to arrest every perpetrator and bring them to justice, while at the same time better protecting those affected.”
The Federal Ministry of Defense has confirmed investigations into possible violations. As the German editorial network (RND) reports, citing the commander of the Bundeswehr's Central Medical Service, Chief Medical Officer Ralf Hoffmann, it is about suspected drug trafficking, threats and sexual misconduct by superiors. There are a total of ten accused.
Unfortunately, violations occur again and again in the Bundeswehr, said Pistorius. "I don't know whether we will ever be able to stop this. But what we have to do in individual cases is to use the entire range of possibilities to sanction those who commit the acts, but also those who suppress them, who do not report them, who do not prosecute them. This is our common task in the sense of camaraderie in the troops, reliability and security for all soldiers in the Bundeswehr."
Merz: No euro for Ukraine aid is missing from social spending
Chancellor Friedrich Merz has rejected the accusation from the far right and left that the aid to Ukraine comes at the expense of social spending. “Not a single euro that flows into Ukraine is missing from social spending and education spending in our country,” emphasized Merz before the EU summit in the Bundestag, to sustained applause from his group. For this purpose, the so-called area exception to the debt brake was decided, from which defense and Ukraine aid are financed. He accused the AfD and the Left of wanting to divide Germany.
The heads of state and government of the European Union (EU) will meet in Brussels on Thursday for two days of consultations. At the top of the agenda is the EU budget for the years 2028 to 2034. The resources are limited, said Merz in Berlin: "At the same time, we want to set the priorities more clearly and correctly, because we have to invest where the future of Europe is decided - in our security and in our competitiveness."
Merz on EU trade protection: “We will no longer stand idly by”
Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) wants to push for stronger EU action against unfair trading practices of other countries. The CDU chairman said in a government statement in the Bundestag about the upcoming EU summit: “We will no longer stand idly by while other states use high subsidies to artificially devalue W
