Parents will 'drink away' new child care subsidy - Germany

Heinz Buschkowsky, the mayor of Berlin's multicultural Neukölln district, tells Sandra Dassler from Berlin daily Der Tagesspiegel why he thinks the German government's plans to introduce a new "home-care" subsidy for children opting out of day care could have disastrous repercussions.

One of the most controversial policy decisions already made by Chancellor Angela Merkel's new centre-right coalition is the introduction in 2013 of the so-called Betreuungsgeld, money paid to parents deciding to keep their children out of public day care.

The €150 a month for each child under three years old was a key demand of the CSU, the Bavarian sister party of Merkel's conservative Christian Democrats, during coalition negotiations. But the subsidy has been dubbed the "stove premium" by critics, who fear it discourages women with children from working. Others, such as Buschkowsky from the centre-left Social Democrats, see it as a threat to efforts to integrate immigrants into German society.

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I would guess that no small amount of children will not be allowed to goto kindergarden because the parents would rather spend the money on fags and other stuff utterly useless for the kids. Hell if you have no chance of getting your hands on cash because your a lazy shit this a real good deal. Guess a lot of kindergardens will be closing in social hotspots all over the country. poor kids

Yea, those pesky voters who can't be trusted with money and decision-making. [/extreme irritation and incredulity]

How many fags can you buy with 150€ ? Dont be naive MrNosey. This well just leave more room for tampering with a childhood thats already getting a tough start. I wish we would only be talking about little houses and white fences in the alps but thats not the case in Berlin or Frankfurt.

You Germans just can't get it can you?! Firstly you have to define what is exactly meant by integration, because for many of you this actually means assimilation, and you go around blabing about it like Borg from Star Treck.
If you want immigrants to really integrate, you have to make a better effort. You want Turks to get integrated but you ban teachers wearing headscarf in schools. You don't have any reckognition of immigrant traditions, holidays, etc. By your nacionalist merrits, you make it almost impossible for, I emphasise, HIGHLY educated immigrants, to get higher, managerial and political positions.....und so weiter. Can you please find me a single immigrant who hasn't fealt this on his own skin, at work, immigration office or just a public place.
Your assimilation plans will fail, and not because immigrans are uneducated and stupid, on contrary, they are clever enough to see your trying to completely deprive them of their origins, Germanize them.

welp... looks like to look for job back in the states.... i can stand this crap... any longer... great!!! I thought i was getting somewhere... guess not...

"If you want immigrants to really integrate, you have to make a better effort. You want Turks to get integrated but you ban teachers wearing headscarf in schools. You don't have any reckognition of immigrant traditions, holidays, etc. By your nacionalist merrits, you make it almost impossible for, I emphasise, HIGHLY educated immigrants, to get higher, managerial and political positions.....und so weiter."
Yet the majority of the people coming to Germany come from counties that would have absolutely no acceptance of Western attitudes, ie alcohol, women in public, relationships, our dress standards, however you expect Europe/Germans to accept everyone unconditionally.
"Can you please find me a single immigrant who hasn't fealt this on his own skin, at work, immigration office or just a public place."
Also what is your definition of an immigrant?? We are all immigrants here at The Local are we not. We all live and work in Germany, just like the people you point out. Should I start campaigning for a few English nation holidays to be introduced just because I live here and want to feel what, English in Germany????

Children under 6 need to be with their mothers.

Thanks so much Edin, you said it all...I´m child of an immigrant so I know better. Thank you very very much sir.

"Children under 6 need to be with their mothers."
Or fathers ;-)
I was a home dad for the first 3 years and I intend to do the same with the second child despite the wife insisting on full time day area after 1 year.
However I do agree with the article about language, these children of immigrants need to be in some German language setting daily long before they start school.
Edin, you make a good point about the German attitude to qualifications gained outside Germany. In many cases, whether it be a bus license or Bachelor of Science degree, Germany does seem to be very selective in what they consider a credible qualification if it isn't German.

Edin is right!

"Children under 6 need to be with their mothers"
Did you bother asking your children what they wanted? (Do you have any?)
That is actually not as stupid as it may sound.
Each have my two have been in day care since their first birthday. they've loved the entire experience. They make friends on the playground and can share things more easily than I've seen from most other children. When they had the emergency cover in the Creche/Kindergarten over Pfingsten (same organisation, son was in Kindergarten, daughter in Creche) they had all of the children in one kindergarten group. We had a fight every morning after that to get my daughter back in the Creche - she wanted to stay in the Kindergarten. She knew exactly what she wanted, and she started in the kindergarten at 2 1/2 because all the carers could see she was more than ready for it.
I myself was in school (no, not kindergarten, school with desks and teachers etc. ) at 3 1/2. Did me no harm whatsoever.
Zero tolerance, as the above statement suggests, has been proven many times to be counter productive, and in the case of childcare it definitely lies with the individual child *as well as* parental circumstances.
But being paid to keep your children at home??? Madness. To develop healthily as socially aware and responsible people, children need contact with peers much more than continual contact with Mummy/Daddy. I agree that this law is ridiculous - especially for the children if nobody else.

For a parent existing on Hartz4 and associated welfare handouts an extra 150Euros would be a lot of money and a huge temptation to take the kids out of daycare.

Not sure if I like the rather extreme blunt and frank way of expressing the ideas though, on the other hand it makes a change from all the PC touchy feely language.

I really don't get the reasoning behind this subsidy. What are they trying to accomplish?

I'll give you one guess and if you say money saving then you win.

It costs a LOT more than 150euros a month to pay for daycare so every kid they can remove from the system saves money that can be spent on much more interesting things like bonuses for bank managers and the like.