Former Social Democratic Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, a character who has become a source of shame for Germany for his recalcitrant ties to Vladimir Putin in the midst of the Russian war against Ukraine, will lose much of his privileges as former chancellor for this reason. The three parties of the ruling coalition – social democrats, environmentalists and liberals – will promote in the Bundestag (lower house of Parliament) a reform designed by their parliamentary budget committee so that the perks of former foreign ministers are linked to their royal duties and not to their status of former rulers.
The provision could therefore also affect Angela Merkel –conservative chancellor between 2005 and 2021–, although it is clear that the measure is intended for Schröder, who governed the country between 1998 and 2005. They are the only former chancellors who they still live. As such, they are entitled to an office in the Bundestag, personal protection and a car for life, in addition to several collaborators and drivers. The cost to taxpayers is around 400,000 euros per year for each former chancellor.
Schröder will thus lose the office and the staff, but will maintain his pension of 8,300 euros per month, calculated on his two terms as chancellor, along with other benefits as a former deputy and from his time in the Government of Lower Saxony.
The position of Schröder, who is now 78 years old and a personal friend of Putin, has hardly changed with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Promoter of the German-Russian agreement of 2005 to build the Nord Stream 1 Baltic gas pipeline –which would later be followed, already in Merkel's time, by Nord Stream 2–, Schröder continues as chairman of the Nord Stream shareholders' committee, and as chairman of the supervisory board of Rosneft, the big Russian oil group.
In an interview with The New York Times in April, Schröder said he had no intention of stepping down from those posts unless Moscow cut off gas supplies to Germany, a scenario he says will not come to pass. The interview, in which Schröder criticized the war but expressed understanding of Putin's attitude, caused irritation in Germany, because he also said that the massacre of civilians in Bucha "has to be investigated", but that he did not believe that Putin was the principal. .
The interview prompted Saskia Esken, co-chair of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), to demand his departure from the party. The leadership of the SPD has distanced itself from him a long time ago, but he is still in the party without anyone deciding to expel him. For Social Democratic Chancellor Olaf Scholz it is embarrassing.
Now, the budget committee will strip Schröder of privileges for not exercising "any continuing obligation arising from his [former] position," a way of saying that his current activities as a Russian-linked businessman are detrimental to Germany. In March, the staff of his office in Berlin resigned due to his refusal to disassociate himself from Putin, and in these weeks several city councils and institutions have withdrawn honorary titles.
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