Item 1 of 5 German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Christian Democratic Union’s Jens Spahn, the CDU\/CSU parliamentary group leader, ahead of a session of the lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, on the day of a vote on a contentious pensions package, in Berlin, Germany, December 5, 2025. REUTERS\/Lisi Niesner<\/p>\n
[1\/5]<\/b>German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Christian Democratic Union’s Jens Spahn, the CDU\/CSU parliamentary group leader, ahead of a session of the lower house of parliament, the Bundestag, on the day of a vote on a contentious pensions package, in Berlin, Germany, December 5, 2025. REUTERS\/Lisi… Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab<\/a> Read more<\/p>\n BERLIN, Dec 5 (Reuters) – German Chancellor Friedrich Merz narrowly averted a government crisis after securing an absolute majority for a pensions bill in parliament on Friday, despite an earlier revolt within his own conservatives that had highlighted his weak authority.<\/p>\n The bill, which raises pension spending by around 185 billion euros over the next 15 years, passed with 318 votes in the 630-seat Bundestag, without requiring a last-minute offer of help from the left-wing opposition.<\/p>\n Sign up here.<\/a><\/p>\n The fact its passage had been uncertain until the last minute, however, has highlighted Merz’s lack of authority over his unruly coalition of conservatives and centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) just seven months after taking office.<\/p>\n The row has also heightened doubts about the coalition’s ability to pass much-needed reforms to revive an ailing economy, Europe’s largest, and rebuild Germany’s long-neglected armed forces.<\/p>\n Coalition rows are helping boost support for the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) to new highs, with the party now topping nationwide polls and on track to make strong gains in five state elections next year.<\/p>\n “The chancellor is a weakened victor today,” said political scientist Johannes Hillje. “The debate has exposed the limits of his authority. Governing reliably and predictably is very difficult under these conditions.”<\/p>\n “The government’s management will have to improve,” he said.<\/p>\n The parliamentary vote tally showed seven conservatives voted against the bill, while two abstained — an unusually large number of rebels, said Hillje.<\/p>\n PENSIONS: FLASHPOINT ACROSS EUROPE<\/p>\n The bill fixes pensions at the current level of 48% of the average wage until 2031, rather than letting them fall relative to wages. It was a pillar of the deal to form the ruling coalition in May, and particularly important to the SPD.<\/p>\n The youth faction of the conservatives, which has 18 votes, opposed the bill saying it perpetuated a financially unsustainable system, leaving younger generations to foot the bill.<\/p>\n Given the coalition only has a slender majority of 12 votes in parliament, that left it unclear until the last minute whether or not it could pass the bill with its own majority.<\/p>\n The opposition far-left Left Party had made a last-minute intervention<\/a>, offering to abstain so the coalition would need fewer votes to pass the bill, in order to protect pensioners.Pensions and generational fairness are turning into political flashpoints<\/a> across Europe as populations age and public finances tighten, with smaller working-age populations supporting larger numbers of pensioners.<\/p>\n Economists say the German pensions bill ignores the reality and only worsens the situation.<\/p>\n “The government still would like to live in a never-ending present, one in which demographic changes and increasing government debt and debt sustainability issues can simply be ignored,” said Carsten Brzeski, global head of macro at ING.<\/p>\n A SERIES OF BLUNDERS<\/p>\n During the election campaign, Merz, who had never previously held government office, railed against the infighting within the coalition of his SPD predecessor Olaf Scholz.<\/p>\n Expectations were high after he secured a historic agreement for record spending on infrastructure and defence before even taking office, and made clear he intended to return Germany to the international stage as a major player.<\/p>\n But his own coalition has proven shaky. On the day he took office he became the first chancellor ever to require a second round of votes<\/a> to secure formal approval of parliament.In the summer, Merz also failed to marshal<\/a> his conservatives behind the SPD’s agreed candidate for the constitutional court, dooming the vote.<\/p>\n “The government’s public image as ineffective, divided and poorly managed is becoming increasingly entrenched,” said Jan Techau at consulting firm Eurasia Group.<\/p>\n Merz has won plaudits abroad for his strong engagement for Ukraine, but at home his popularity has sunk to around 25%, making him one of the least popular chancellors in memory.<\/p>\n Meanwhile combined support for the conservatives and SPD is down to 39% from 44.9% in February’s election, according to the latest poll by Forsa. The AfD, which surged into pole position in August, remains in the lead on 26%.<\/p>\n Reporting by Sarah Marsh, Andreas Rinke, Markus Wacket, Holger Hansen and Maria Martinez Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles., opens new tab<\/a><\/p>\n Purchase Licensing Rights<\/a><\/a><\/p>\n Chief correspondent covering political and general news in Germany with experience in Argentina and in Cuba leading Reuters\u2019 broader Caribbean coverage.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Item 1 of 5 German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Christian Democratic Union’s Jens Spahn, the CDU\/CSU parliamentary group…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":216903,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[177],"tags":[79,82517,82794,84897,82525,82545,83395,82535,82556,82541,82776,82553,83396,82536,84041,83397,83391,83393,82532,82969,82777,82547,82539,82557,82537,82540,82554,82552,83394,82548,82551,84043,84042,83113,83116,18,55396,82520,82522,45748,85214,88436,19,17,4164,83122,82507,82970,234,235,82508,84824,90104,83126,82534,82533,27763,82518],"class_list":{"0":"post-216902","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-ceeu","10":"tag-clj","11":"tag-dbt","12":"tag-de","13":"tag-destafa","14":"tag-destc","15":"tag-destcsa","16":"tag-destd","17":"tag-deste","18":"tag-destg","19":"tag-destgns","20":"tag-destgro","21":"tag-destlby","22":"tag-destm","23":"tag-destmtl","24":"tag-desto","25":"tag-destoil","26":"tag-destouktpm","27":"tag-destouswdm","28":"tag-destpge","29":"tag-destpsc","30":"tag-destrast","31":"tag-destrbn","32":"tag-destreulb","33":"tag-destrnp","34":"tag-destrws","35":"tag-destrwsa","36":"tag-destsof","37":"tag-destu","38":"tag-destucdptest","39":"tag-destzd","40":"tag-destzz","41":"tag-dli","42":"tag-eco","43":"tag-eire","44":"tag-emea","45":"tag-europ","46":"tag-ezc","47":"tag-gen","48":"tag-gfin","49":"tag-gvd","50":"tag-ie","51":"tag-ireland","52":"tag-law","53":"tag-mce","54":"tag-news1","55":"tag-packageworld-news","56":"tag-personal-finance","57":"tag-personalfinance","58":"tag-pol","59":"tag-rtm","60":"tag-rulesworld-germany","61":"tag-soci","62":"tag-topcmb","63":"tag-topnws","64":"tag-vote","65":"tag-weu"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216902","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216902"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216902\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216903"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
\nEditing by Thomas Seythal and Peter Graff<\/p>\n