Government: CDU wants to have the MV protection fund audited by the Court of Auditors

Regardless of the state government’s announcement that it would dissolve the controversial MV Corona protection fund early, it is urgent CDU for a legal review of the billion-dollar package. The opposition faction sees its criticism of the financial behavior of the red-red state government confirmed by the Federal Constitutional Court’s recent ruling on the federal government’s reallocation of unneeded Corona funds. In a submission for the state parliament session in mid-December, the CDU requests that the use of the funds from the loan-financed MV protection fund be examined by the State Audit Office.

The Federal Constitutional Court’s ruling made it clear that stricter standards would apply to exceptions to the debt brake. This also applies to the use of loans permitted to deal with emergencies. A thorough and independent assessment of previous practice is necessary in order to draw conclusions for the future constitutional application of financial constitutional law Mecklenburg-Vorpommern to be able to draw, it says in the justification for the application. The paper signed by parliamentary group leader Franz-Robert Liskow was also available to the dpa.

According to the Union’s will, it should be determined, among other things, whether the MV protection fund, for which loans worth 2.85 billion euros were approved, and the use of these funds complied with the constitution and the country’s budget law. In particular, the creation of special funds for university medicine and broadband expansion using funds from the protection fund have repeatedly been criticized because these were areas with no direct connection to the corona pandemic.

The State Audit Office had already expressed doubts in March 2021 that all Corona measures really had to do with the pandemic. The President of the country’s highest audit authority, Martina Johannsen, explained that it is worrying that projects are being financed with emergency loans that were started before the start of the pandemic. In their opinion, the funding of university medicine from the protection fund is intended to reduce an investment backlog that has already arisen.

The Taxpayers’ Association welcomed the CDU’s initiative to examine the MV protection fund. State managing director Sascha Mummenhoff emphasized that the taxpayers’ association had criticized the size of the protection fund and the use of the funds from it from the beginning. It is therefore right to have the fund examined more closely in light of the current ruling, said Mummenhoff.

However, Prime Minister Manuela Schwesig (SPD) had already announced that the MV protection fund would be dissolved at the end of this year, one year earlier than planned. Instead of the first repayment installment of 270 million euros planned for 2024, 415 million euros of the special loan to deal with the Corona crisis should be repaid next year.

The state parliament had approved credit authorizations worth 2.85 billion euros in order to prevent the collapse of the health system, the economy and society. Schwesig assured that wage aid that has not yet been applied for but is permitted for companies or investments that are still outstanding, for example in the digitalization of schools, would be financed from the state’s reserves. According to reports, around two billion euros have flowed out of the protection fund so far.

© dpa-infocom, dpa:231203-99-163258/2