Daycare at stake

Faced with record-high public debt and lower tax revenue than expected, budget cuts seem unavoidable in Germany. Just ahead of a national education summit in Berlin on May 17, the debate on where and how to save has turned to the fields of child care, education and research.

Roland Koch, the Christian Democrat premier of the central state of Hesse, set the ball rolling by arguing that the federal government should reconsider its plans spend more on education and child care.

"There was a policy objective to spend 10 percent of our GDP on education by 2015," Koch told the Hamburger Abendblatt newspaper. "But that isn't feasible anymore, given our budgetary constraints."

Koch singled out the government's plan to grant all children under three years of age access to daycare facilities by 2013. He called on Berlin to abandon the scheme, adding that there must be no taboos in the debate on where to reduce spending over the next few years.

Future generations in for a raw deal?

Chancellor Angela Merkel however ruled out making budget cuts would affect education or child care. Education, research and child care were set out as priorities for this government in the coalition agreement between Merkel's Christian Democrats and the liberal Free Democrats. This is not up for discussion, a government spokeswoman told reporters in Berlin on Friday.

Family Affairs Minister Kristina Schroeder was equally quick to dismiss the idea.

"Although I see the need for budgetary cuts, we need to stick to our priorities in our policies," Schroeder said. "The extension of daycare facilities is one of these priorities, and you cannot throw it overboard just like that."

Education Minister Annette Schavan called the proposed cuts extremely short-sighted. She warned that cuts in the education system would backfire and mean nothing short of increased welfare costs in the longer term.

"We cannot leave future generations to deal with massive public debt and an education system full of weaknesses to boot," Schavan told public German broadcaster ARD on Friday.

"It doesn't make any sense at all to me to call for cuts in the fields of education and research."

Not a voice in the wilderness

But Koch's controversial suggestion did not only draw criticism and condemnation. Saxony Premier Stanislaw Tillich told the Financial Times Deutschland newspaper that spending more money on education would not necessarily lead to improvement.

He argued that at a time when the government is facing a budgetary squeeze, there must be other ways to improve education rather than to continue pumping more resources into it.

Otto Fricke, spokesman for budgetary affairs for the Free Democrats made a similar argument.

"If it now turns out that we have no money for tax cuts in the years ahead, it stands to reason that we cannot afford any additional expenditures for educational schemes either," Fricke said.

In order to keep in line with the eurozone's Stability and Growth Pact, which requires member nations to keep their deficits below three percent of gross domestic product, Germany will have to make structural cuts of at least 45 billion euros ($29 billion) by 2014.

The debate on how to do that is just beginning.

Author: Hardy Graupner
Editor: Chuck Penfold