MSeveral thousand people demonstrated on Saturday in Erding near Munich against the federal government’s planned heating law. Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) used the rally as one of the main speakers to attack the traffic light parties – but was himself booed at the beginning of his speech, apparently by AfD supporters, among others.
“The bourgeois center has nothing to do with AfD, has nothing to do with anti-democrats,” Söder called out to them. The cabaret artist Monika Gruber, who helped organize the rally and was apparently responsible for the large number of visitors, had to ask for silence several times at the beginning.
You say yes to climate protection, “but no to this heating law,” said Söder. Climate protection must be promoted together with the citizens and not against them. The CSU leader repeatedly attacked the Greens in particular, he strictly opposed an alleged “compulsive veganization” and “compulsive gendering”.
AfD also wanted to send speakers
In the morning, the police initially spoke of several thousand participants, Gruber of 6,000 to 8,000 people. Bavaria’s Economics Minister Hubert Aiwanger (free voters) and FDP head of state Martin Hagen were also expected to speak. In addition, several associations support the rally. The AfD also wanted to send a speaker, but according to their own statements, this was denied – now they invited parallel to their own small rally in the immediate vicinity.
With the Building Energy Act next year, the Federal Government intends to finally herald the departure from oil and gas heating systems. According to the traffic light bill, from 2024 every newly installed heating system should be operated with 65 percent renewable energy. State funding is intended to cushion the switch socially, and there should also be transitional periods and hardship regulations.
The heating law is still controversial within the coalition. The FDP is still demanding fundamental improvements to the draft law that has already been passed by the federal cabinet. According to government spokesman Steffen Hebestreit on Friday, Chancellor Olaf Scholz (SPD) expects a quick solution and the bill to be introduced in the Bundestag in the coming week.
