Berlin According to Interior Minister Nancy Faeser, the courts are still not making enough use of the existing legal framework when it comes to punishing attacks on firefighters, paramedics or police officers. “Those who protect us must also be able to rely on the state,” said the SPD politician at the annual conference of the DBB officials’ association and collective bargaining union in Cologne.
The fact that rescue and security forces were deliberately ambushed and attacked with alarm guns and firecrackers, as on New Year’s Eve in Berlin, made them stunned and angry, said Faeser. “We will not accept that as a state.”
Employees in the public sector are increasingly becoming “victims of increasingly brutal excesses of violence,” complained DBB boss Ulrich Silberbach. But the rule of law often limits itself to recording personal details; there is no consistent criminal prosecution. “The mockery of the criminals sounds in all of our ears,” said Silberbach.
On New Year’s Eve there were riots and attacks on security and rescue workers in Berlin and other cities. Since then there has been discussion about how the rule of law can be more tough and whether the violence mainly comes from migrant milieus.
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“The attacks on state officials – whether police, fire brigade, rescue services or municipal officials – are completely unacceptable and have unfortunately been increasing for years,” said the general manager of the German Association of Towns and Municipalities, Gerd Landsberg, the Handelsblatt.
Tightened penalties have apparently had little effect so far
However, the already significantly tightened range of penalties does not seem to impress the perpetrators very much. It is crucial that they are actually investigated, charged and convicted. “For this, the resources of the police and judiciary must be expanded,” emphasized Landsberg. “Video surveillance and bodycams can also make an effective contribution.”
Fire brigade video shows firecracker fire: “We are stunned”
As early as 2017, the grand coalition had tightened the penalties for attacks on police officers and also extended them to rescue workers. Offenders face up to five years in prison. Both the DBB boss and the interior minister therefore see an implementation problem rather than a legislative problem – albeit for different reasons.
While Silberbach sees the lack of staff and the sluggish digitization in public prosecutor’s offices and courts as the main reason why perpetrators are not prosecuted consistently enough, Faeser would like the possible penal framework to be more fully exploited, especially in youth law.
But speed is also important. Only a quick reaction “creates respect for our constitutional state,” said the interior minister. As an example, she cited Heilbronn, where a 30-year-old man who attacked police officers on New Year’s Eve was sentenced to nine months in prison.
In Berlin, the police have now handed over 22 cases involving around ten suspects to the public prosecutor’s office, as Police President Barbara Slowik said on Monday in the Interior Committee of the House of Representatives. According to the current status, there are 49 cases of attacks on police officers and 53 cases of attacks on firefighters.
Do not put the entire public service under general suspicion because of individual criminal extremists.
(Photo: ddp/FlashPic)
Faeser also commented on the question of whether violence and attacks on law enforcement officers are increasingly being committed by young people from immigrant families. “We have a problem with young men with a migration background in big cities,” said the interior minister. You have to be able to state that clearly without immediately being accused of stirring up resentment. The police must therefore be present in hotspot areas.
Silberbach also warned against turning a blind eye to existing problems. If violence is discussed in the immigration society, one should not always immediately swing the “discrimination club”. Berlin’s Governing Mayor Franziska Giffey (SPD) wants to speak to actors from the Senate, districts and civil society at a so-called summit against youth violence on Wednesday.
The DBB boss also wants politicians to show the same zeal for solutions and implementation when it comes to violence against civil servants as they do when trying to remove extremists from public service. Interior Minister Faeser recently presented a draft law that is intended to make it easier to dismiss Reich citizens or other enemies of the constitution from the service through accelerated disciplinary procedures.
Two out of three citizens currently consider the state to be overwhelmed
The trade unionist emphasized that anyone who does not have both feet on the ground of the constitution has no place in the civil service. At the same time, however, one must be careful not to place the entire public service “under general suspicion because of individual criminal extremists,” said Silberbach.
>> Read here: Consequences of New Year’s Eve: A different kind of integration debate is needed
All in all, the head of the trade union in Cologne drew the picture of a state whose employees were pushing the limits of their own capabilities, but which nevertheless threatened to lose the trust of the citizens. In the Forsa survey regularly carried out for the DBB on the public image of the public service, only 29 percent of the citizens saw the state as capable of fulfilling its tasks. On the other hand, 66 percent consider him to be “overwhelmed”.
Politicians should not constantly burden the administrations with new tasks in a rushed procedure without providing the appropriate human and material resources. As an example, he named the housing benefit reform or the taxation of the gas price brake, which the tax authorities now have to take care of.
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