Germany’s biggest police union has complained about the dilapidated state of hundreds of police stations across the country and a fleet of aged vehicles, saying conditions are a threat to officers’ health and an insult to their dignity.

“Decades-old toilet bowls, mould in the offices, vermin, broken heating units and holes in the ceiling that let the rain in,” said Hagen Husgen of the GdP union, citing just a few of the complaints his organisation had received from members.

“Some of the conditions our people have to endure there are hazardous to their health,” he told the regional daily Münchner Merkur.

Husgen said police cruisers in Europe’s top economy, which prides itself on its automotive prowess, were often so old and beat-up that they were “shameful” and “embarrassing” to officers on their patrols.

“Vehicles with torn seats and half a million kilometres [on the odometer], broken gear sticks. When citizens see this, it does not reflect well on the police,” he said, blaming the problem in part on privatisation of police car maintenance.

“It’s a job that’s fun when the conditions are right. But when you take a closer look at the circumstances, sometimes I just want to throw my hands up in despair.”

Husgen said the dismal conditions in many police stations were compounding “big problems” recruiting young officers.

The trade union supplied Merkur with a series of photos showing what it said were ramshackle police buildings with gaping holes in the ceiling and a mouse under a desk as well as cars with foam spilling out of the seats.

The GdP said Germany’s 16 federal states needed more support from Berlin to improve conditions for police officers and enable them to carry out their duties.

The German parliament in March approved plans spearheaded by the then chancellor elect, Friedrich Merz, to relax the country’s strict debt brake, allowing an increase in defence spending and creating a €500bn “special fund” or Sondervermögen for the next decade dedicated to infrastructure overhauls, including increased financing for the federal police.

The GdP has said this spending will be “far from sufficient” to address the dramatic shortfalls at the state level and indicated a separate Sondervermögen would be required for domestic security.

“In Germany, we in the police forces have an investment backlog in the double-digit billion (euro) range for our property alone,” Husgen said.

Asked about the GdP’s complaints, a spokesperson for the federal interior ministry said police matters including police stations and the vehicle fleet “are constitutionally within the jurisdiction of the regional states”.

The ministry said the federal government assisted regional police forces in a range of areas including through special programmes for equipment, digital communications and IT infrastructure.

The federal government, whose term is due to run until 2029, has also promised to increase financing for special police forces as part of plans to strengthen the domestic security authorities, the spokesperson added.

The GdP, founded in 1950, calls itself the “world’s largest police trade union”, with more than 200,000 members across Germany.