The Federal Chairwoman of the Greens, Ricarda Lang, considers a decision on the successor to the resigned Federal Minister for Family Affairs Anne Spiegel to be likely this week.
The party will take the necessary time. “Nevertheless, there is now a need to clarify this question quickly,” said Lang on Tuesday’s RTL/ntv program “Frühstart”. “That means I don’t think we’ll be dealing with this question beyond Easter.” One is now in talks within the party, “and that’s the status quo”.
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Lang indicated that a woman would again take over the post in the Ministry of Family Affairs. At that time, the party said that the posts would be filled equally. “Of course we will stick to this principle,” she said. The most important requirement is that the person takes responsibility for families, children and the open society. “Above all, the person must have one quality: that is to be suitable for this office.”
The parliamentary group leader of the Greens, Britta Haßelmann, also emphasized that a decision on the new appointment would be made “very quickly”. On Deutschlandfunk she said on Tuesday: “There will be decisions on this in a timely manner, which are now the next.”
When asked whether Anton Hofreiter could move up to the post, she said: “Everyone who knows the Greens knows how important the quota is to us and how important it is for women to be represented in top positions. We will also take that into account in the question of the decision.” The former parliamentary group leader Hofreiter is currently chairman of the Europe Committee in the Bundestag.
In Husum in Schleswig-Holstein, the Greens’ Federal Executive Committee continues its retreat on Tuesday with a focus on energy. There, the question of personnel should also play a role in the consultations.
Spiegel announced her resignation from the position of Minister for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth on Monday. “Due to political pressure, I decided today to make the position of Federal Family Minister available. I’m doing this to avert damage to the office, which is facing major political challenges,” said the Greens politician.
[Lesen Sie auch: Rücktritt von Anne Spiegel: Als Idealbesetzung gestartet – von der Vergangenheit eingeholt (T+)]
It became known over the weekend that she, as the then Rhineland-Palatinate Minister of the Environment, had left for a four-week family vacation in France ten days after the flood and had only interrupted it once for a visit to the Ahr Valley. In the flood disaster in mid-July 2021, more than 180 people died in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia, 134 of them in the Ahr Valley.
Family ministry run by woman since 1985
During an emotional appearance, Spiegel described the holiday on Sunday evening as a mistake and apologized for it. She justified her decision at the time, among other things, with the health of her husband, who suffered a stroke in 2019. Spiegel also cited the stress on her four children in the corona pandemic. Her family needed the vacation.
When she took office as Minister for Family Affairs last December, she named the fight against child poverty and the introduction of so-called basic child security as priority political goals. Spiegel recently moved to Berlin with her family. She does not have a seat in the Bundestag.
According to a report in the “Bild” newspaper, Spiegel will now receive a transitional allowance of 75,600 euros after her resignation. This was explained by the deputy chairman of the taxpayers’ association, Michael Jäger. The amount of the transitional allowance is based on Section 14 of the Federal Ministers Act. According to “Bild”, Spiegel receives 4.5 monthly salaries after she has headed the Federal Ministry for Family Affairs since the beginning of the legislative period in December.
In previous decades, the Family Ministry had been run by women. The last man at the top was Heiner Geißler (CDU) from 1982 to 1985. He was followed by Rita Süssmuth, Ursula Lehr, Hannelore Rönsch, Claudia Nolte, Christine Bergmann, Renate Schmidt, Ursula von der Leyen, Kristina Schröder, Manuela Schwesig, Katarina Barley, Franziska Giffey, Christine Lambrecht and most recently Anne Spiegel. The later Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) was Minister for Women and Youth from 1991 to 1994, today this part is part of the family department. (dpa, Tsp)
