German Ruling Puts €770 Billion of Government Funds at Risk
- Initial analysis suggest 29 funding vehicles could be affected
- Scholz’s coalition vowed to find a solution to budget setback
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A decision by Germany’s top court to strike down off-budget funding for climate action has called into question about €770 billion ($840 billion) of state funding, according to people familiar with the matter.
The Constitutional Court declared Wednesday that repurposing €60 billion of pandemic aid from 2021 to finance climate protection contravened Germany’s Basic Law. As officials from Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s administration began to digest more than 60 pages of legal arguments, they feared that similar vehicles providing as much as €770 billion in funding may have to be dissolved or at least changed by the end of the year, according to people familiar with the government’s initial analysis.