Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) has again called for a "critical stocktaking" of benefits for asylum seekers. "Citizens rightly expect us to return to management and control," he said Tuesday after a meeting with the Saxon cabinet in Berlin. Currently, he said, the federal and state governments are discussing the cost implications of migration. In fact, however, it is not decisive for the people in the core whether the federal government or the states finance, but that the numbers are reduced overall.
Lindner did not want to name an upper limit of refugees. The federal government and the states would talk about funding at the next conference of state premiers. The federal government stands by its overall state responsibility. As finance minister, however, he said he wanted to talk not only about how costs are distributed, but also how they can be reduced. "We need a critical stocktaking of the social security we provide to refugees (...)." He said it should not be taboo to also talk about the level or duration of coverage under the Asylum Seekers' Benefits Act and access to benefits under the statutory health insurance.
"The numbers have to go down, we don't solve this with money," said Saxony's head of government Michael Kretschmer (CDU), referring, for example, to the lack of housing and schools. "Germany will continue to be a country of solidarity for people who are fleeing. We just have to determine how many that is and how we make the rules." Kretschmer himself did not assume that the upper limit of 200,000 refugees per year, which was previously under discussion, was still possible at the moment. He said a toolbox would have to be built in the coming weeks with which to get the numbers down. There must be no placebo policy, he said. "This all has to have a hand and a foot, what is happening now."
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