An this Tuesday, Sahra Wagenknecht is taking another step towards becoming a new political force. In the Bundestag she will speak on the constitution of the group “Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht – For Reason and Justice”. But since the group doesn't exist yet and its previous left-wing faction no longer exists, it has to be a little inventive about the location for the press conference and gather the journalists in the entrance hall of one of the Bundestag buildings. These are very special days, especially for the politician and her former party friends.
It has been almost a week since the Left parliamentary group in the Bundestag ceased to exist. Wagenknecht had made this step inevitable by leaving the party together with nine other members of the Bundestag. Now the faction is being liquidated and the employees are being laid off, which could take years. What is more important for MPs now is the question of when and whether they will be recognized as a group – and what rights and resources they will receive. This is not clearly regulated. But there are precedents in the 1990s that people on the left point to, especially in 1994, when the PDS was recognized as a group by the Bundestag. Looking at what was granted to the group back then, you can get a feeling for what is still possible for the Left and Wagenknecht – and what is not.
Who can vote in the committees?
The 28 remaining MPs who still belong to the Left party submitted their joint application for group status to Bundestag President Bärbel Bas before the group's end. In the application, which the FAZ has received, it was said in a few dry lines that the Left group wanted to continue their joint parliamentary work and pursue common political goals. Reference is also made to a ruling by the Federal Constitutional Court from 1991, in which Karlsruhe emphasizes the right of MPs “to join together for joint work in a way other than in factions”.
It also states that the principle of mirror image in the composition of parliament and committees requires that members of groups be taken into account when forming committees according to their size and that they are entitled to the same rights as members of parliamentary groups. Groups of MPs would also be entitled “to appropriate provision of material and human resources”. The MPs from the PDS list had sued. The verdict was not a success for them at the time, as they had actually hoped to be recognized as a faction with all rights and means.
It is clear that what exactly the two would-be groups will get will have to be negotiated in the Bundestag in the coming weeks and months – in the end, the Bundestag must agree. A detailed explanation of the rights that were granted to the PDS group after the 1994 election can be found in the Archive of Democratic Socialism at the Rosa-Luxemburg-Stiftung. Currently, MPs from the Left and Wagenknecht are only advisory members in the committees without voting rights, as after the end of the parliamentary group and before recognition as a group, they are only considered individual MPs. With status as a group, they become normal members again. The PDS group was also allowed to send a member to the Council of Elders as a group, which is crucial for the organization of the week of meetings.
Can Petra Pau remain in the Bundestag presidency?
The group was also allowed to make large and small inquiries and motions and introduce draft laws. However, the PDS was not granted, among other things, the right to have a deputy elected to the Bundestag Presidium. But now the left-wing politician Petra Pau is sitting there, elected at the beginning of the legislative period. Pau had just told the FAZ that she would like to keep her position, and there were also positive comments from the executive committee about it. The AfD nevertheless had its deselection placed on the Bundestag's agenda this week.
The paper also states that the rules of procedure and speaking rights of the PDS group MPs were “significantly restricted”. The PDS MPs could not have demanded the adjournment of a meeting, the closing of a debate or a roll-call vote. The number of current hours that the group could apply for – a very popular tool in the opposition to gain attention – was also limited. And with a view to the money that was available to the group at the time, it says: “The group only had half the basic amount of the parliamentary group’s basic amount available to it in terms of financial donations.” This question is important for the Left and the MPs around Wagenknecht – because it depends on it. how many employees the groups can ultimately rehire.
But because these are special days, it is not only open whether and how the groups are allowed to work. It is even unclear how important the question will be after next week. The Left is looking forward to December 19th with some nervousness. The Federal Constitutional Court announced how comprehensively the 2021 federal election must be repeated in the state of Berlin. Like all the Left MPs, Wagenknecht is only in the Bundestag because the Left won three direct mandates nationwide despite only 4.9 percent. Two of them in Berlin. Will it stay that way? Another low point cannot be ruled out.
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