BERLIN (Reuters) – A senior member of Germany’s Social Democrats (SPD) said her party would start exploratory talks next week with Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservatives on forming a coalition, a move that could end a political impasse in Europe’s largest economy.
The SPD voted on Thursday to open talks with the conservatives, even though the party had earlier pledged to go into opposition after suffering its worst election result in the post-war era in September. The talks will begin on Wednesday.
The result of the talks was still open and a “grand coalition” between the SPD and conservatives was by no means a foregone conclusion, Andrea Nahles, the parliamentary leader of the SPD, said in an interview on Deutschlandfunk radio on Friday.
“It’s no more and no less than having talks at the moment,” Nahles said. “It’s not automatic that we’ll end up in a grand coalition – rather tough discussions will be necessary, and I don’t know what the conservatives are prepared to work with us on.”
Merkel is hoping the SPD will agree to a re-run of the grand coalition that has governed Germany for the last four years. She was forced to turn to the SPD after talks with the environmentalist Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP) on a three-way alliance collapsed.
Merkel’s conservatives and the SPD both saw their vote share shrink in September elections, complicating the coalition arithmetic. Their coalition remains in place as a caretaker government.
Nahles said the SPD had not set any conditions for joining a coalition with the conservatives but had laid out key points for the SPD, including getting rid of Germany’s two-tier public and private health system – an idea the conservatives oppose.
“But you don’t go into negotiations with a huge backpack full of red lines,” she said.
The exploratory talks will be held to determine whether they can foresee working together, before deciding whether to proceed to full-blown coalition talks.
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