The Bundestag of the 20th convocation, during its last session on Tuesday, approved amendments to the Basic Law that will allow exceeding the previously set borrowing limits.
This was reported by a Ukrinform correspondent.
The bill to amend the Basic Law was passed by the votes of the CDU/CSU factions, the SPD, and the Greens.
Thus, the draft law received 513 votes out of the necessary 489 (two-thirds) votes of all members of the German parliament.
The far-right party Alternative for Germany, the two left-wing parties – The Left and the Sara Wagenknecht Bloc, as well as one democratic party, the Free Democrats, voted against, totaling 207 legislators.
In total, 720 parliamentarians cast their votes.
The document was submitted to parliament by the parliamentary groups of the Social Democratic Party and the conservative Christian Democratic and Christian Social Union.
In the future, defense spending and some security policy expenses exceeding 1% of nominal GDP will be exempt from the debt rule.
As part of this provision, it gives the “green light” to unblock €3 billion for military aid to Ukraine.
Additionally, a special fund of €500 billion will be established for additional infrastructure investments and investments aimed at achieving climate neutrality by 2045. Furthermore, when preparing the budgets of the federal states, local authorities will be given the opportunity for additional borrowing.
The bill was already approved by the Bundestag Budget Committee on March 16.
The adoption of the bill was the result of negotiations between the CDU/CSU and the SPD, which are negotiating the formation of a new government. To secure the necessary majority, these two parties had to agree on a joint vote with the Greens, who were able to incorporate some of their demands into the draft document.
The newly elected parliament and government will have to implement the decision made by the old composition of the Bundestag.
The vote marked the end of the work of the Bundestag of the 20th convocation.
The new parliament will meet for its inaugural session in a week, on March 25.
It should be noted that the candidate for Chancellor of Germany, Friedrich Merz, plans to complete coalition negotiations by Easter (April 20).
As reported, with the addition of the €3 billion, the amount allocated in the German budget (which has not yet been approved) for military aid to Ukraine will reach €7 billion, almost the same amount as last year.
Source: Bundestag approves amendments to Constitution to unblock military aid to Ukraine
