What issues Katarina Barley wants to lead the SPD into the European elections with

“I’m looking forward to the election campaign with you,” said Katarina Barley to the delegates on Saturday evening in Berlin’s CityCube at the SPD federal party conference. With 92.2 percent, the Vice President of the European Parliament was re-elected the day before as European representative on the SPD party executive board. Barley is supposed to lead the SPD as the top candidate in the European elections next June. Her nomination is scheduled for the end of January. But on Saturday she outlined her program for the upcoming election.

Barley: No to austerity policies

Barley looks at the problem areas within the European Union. “In Europe, people are watching us very closely,” she says, warning of a renaissance of austerity policy in view of the current budget crisis in Germany. This not only resulted in pension cuts for countries like Spain, Greece and Italy. It also meant that those same countries were massively affected by the corona pandemic “because the health systems were previously destroyed”.

The Vice-President of the European Parliament warns of the dangers of rising right-wing extremism with a view to the situation in Sweden, Italy and most recently in the Netherlands. “The extreme political right is doing everything it can to use the European elections to create a completely different Europe,” warns Barley, adding: “We know what happens once they get their hands on the country.” He gives an example She criticized the politics of the post-fascist Meloni, who curtailed the rights of migrants and homosexual couples in Italy. The policies of the PiS party in Poland and its massive restrictions on the right to abortion have already led to two pregnant women dying. “The violation of the rule of law sometimes has so much to do with people’s lives,” says Barley.

Counter the right-wing extremists

She warns against the conservatives’ cozy approach. “You really ask yourself whether they have learned nothing from history.” Because Barley is convinced that right-wing extremists and right-wing populists participating in government will only strengthen them further. She makes it clear: “If anyone can counter the right-wing extremists, it is not the conservatives and not the liberals with their cozy approach, but the social democrats with a clear edge and social policies for you.”