Coalition building in Berlin: Things are going well now!

dpa/taz | A good six weeks after the election to the Berlin House of Representatives, coalition negotiations between the Left Party, the Greens and the SPD will begin this Monday at 10 a.m. The three-way talks are expected to last a few weeks; there is no exact timetable. The coalition negotiations are led by an umbrella working group made up of top politicians from the three parties, and this is where the decisions are ultimately made. There are also around a dozen specialist working groups.

A coalition agreement could be in place by December. But that is not certain. In the end, the party members of the Left and SPD decide on the government program. The Greens want to obtain a so-called digital opinion from their approximately 17,500 members via online voting.

The Greens officially have the final say at a state party conference with only around 180 delegates. However, he is expected to agree with the outcome of the member survey. The Greens have already reserved four possible dates for this party conference between December 5th and January 16th.

The Left Party cleared the way for this important step in forming a government on Saturday: at a state party conference, a large majority of delegates voted in favor of coalition negotiations. The Greens and SPD had already agreed on October 19th - the former at a small party conference, the Social Democrats by resolution of the state executive committee.

In the House of Representatives election on September 20th, the Left Party became the strongest force with 25.7 percent. This is followed by the CDU (18.8 percent), AfD (16.3 percent), the Greens (14.3 percent) and the SPD (12.1 percent). The Social Democrats performed worse than ever before in a House of Representatives election.

The current black-red Senate will remain in office until a new government is formed. He came into office in the repeat election in mid-February 2023 under the leadership of the then CDU state chairman Kai Wegner.