Overview
- The draft empowers jobcenters to cut payments more quickly, including immediate three‑month 30% or €150 reductions for noncooperation and full suspensions, including housing costs, after repeated missed appointments or if recipients cannot be reached.
- Labor obligations would tighten with the return of Vermittlungsvorrang and a shorter parental exemption requiring availability for work one year after childbirth, while Ukrainians arriving after April 1, 2025 would be moved to lower asylum‑benefit support.
- Government leaders argue the plan strengthens responsibility and participation, but the official estimate projects about €86 million in savings in year one and warns of higher administrative burdens from 2028.
- Minister Bärbel Bas highlighted additional training resources, though reporting indicates roughly €1 billion in new funding for jobcenter operations versus her reference to €4 billion in qualification funds.
- The debate laid bare splits as SPD MP Annika Klose labeled full sanctions "pretty populist bullshit" and unions, social groups and church organizations protested outside the Bundestag, while the Federal Employment Agency refuted an AfD claim about payments without registered addresses.