German Elections

Hi everyone, Skip Montreux here. Can I ask you to do me a small favor? We are currently conducting a D2B listener survey. We'd like to know more about our listeners. Who are you? What are you interested in? And how do you feel about down to business English in general? I promise it is a very short survey and would only take a few minutes of your time, but will help us out tremendously in bringing you better content to help you improve your business English.

From Tokyo, Japan and Abu Dhabi UAE, this is Down to Business English. Business news to improve your business English. With your hosts Git Montreux and Des Morgan.

Here we are, Des, recording again on a Saturday night. It's the end of the week for you, isn't it?

Yeah, that's right.

Well, have you had a good one?

It's a four day weekend for us here, so yeah, of course it's been relaxing. You?

Not bad. I did attend a small year-end party the other night or what is referred to over here in Japan as a boninkai with a few friends.

Hey really? I haven't been to any parties this year, I don't think. I was invited to one last week but couldn't make it for one reason or another. Hey, did you have a good time?

Yeah, it was Okay, I was home by midnight though and I was really tired. I don't seem to have the same energy I had a few years ago.

Uh no, me neither. I don't seem to have the staying power I used to.

Well, it happens to the best of us.

Do you know who else is having trouble staying in the party?

Oh, are you talking about that friend of ours who once

No, surprisingly, no, no, not him. Um, here, I'll give you a hint. We're talking about politics and this person is a woman. She's probably soon going to be asked to leave the party.

Oh, okay. Could that person be German Chancellor Angela Merkel? And are you saying that she could soon be ejected from the party she heads? The Christian Democratic Union?

That is what many experts are predicting, Skip. And that is our topic for today.

Okay, let's do it. Let's get D2B down to business with the recent national elections in Germany. Why was it so bad for Angela Merkel and her party? And what does this mean for Germany and for the European Union?

So, what were the results of this recent election in Germany? Uh when was it held exactly?

The vote took place on september twenty fourth, and Angela Merkel's CDU party received the largest number of votes.

Oh so she did win.

But and this is a very big but it was the worst showing for the CDU since nineteen forty nine. Their support from the electorate was down a lot. From forty one percent in the previous election in twenty thirteen to a low of thirty-three percent.

Ouch, those are Donald Trump numbers.

We need to remember though is that going into this election her government was a coalition of two parties and as bad as the results were for the CDU They were even worse for Merkel's coalition partner, the Social Democrats. Their share of the vote fell from twenty-five percent to just over twenty percent.

So if two major parties lost support, then there must have been another party or parties that made gains.

True enough. And that party is the right wing Nationalist Party alternative for Germany, or AFD for sure.

We did a show about the rise of the right wing and the future of the EU back in January of this year. At that time, our concerns about right wing parties taking power in France and the Netherlands didn't come to pass. However, it seems that they are more influential in Germany than we thought.

It looks that way. As you can imagine, the AFD do not support immigration and strongly disagree with Germany's immigration policy to date.

So let me just recap. The CDU and the SPD were in government together, but they lost some support in the election.

That's right.

But together, they still want fifty-three percent of the vote, so they can continue as a coalition. Is that right as well?

Uh technically you're right. But as it happened, Martin Schultz the leader of the SPD stated that his party would rather move into the opposition than try to form another coalition with Merkel.

Hmm, so where does that leave Merkel and her CDU? Well

Well, um she has tried to form a government with the Green Party and the Free Democratic Party FDP, but those talks collapsed once again over immigration issues.

German politics has always been very confusing to me. I think there are too many Democratic parties, or maybe just too many parties on the whole. So what happens next if Merkel cannot find any common ground with the other two parties?

She has two options really. She could either try and form a minority government with just her party. Or she could call a further election. A minority government means that the ruling party is the biggest party but does not have the majority of seats in the government.

In my native country of Canada, we have had minority governments in the past.

Exactly.

Stephen Harper's government, which formed in 2008, was a minority government. I was not a huge Stephen Harper fan, but I thought his Conservative Party functioned quite well as a minority government.

We had a coalition in Britain between the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrat Party from twenty ten till twenty fifteen. But for the most part, um, they're pretty rare in the UK.

In Canada as well. I think there have been two minority governments in Canada in my lifetime.

And that is quite a long time.

Very funny. You are older than I am, Des.

Hey, I'm better looking, said

Anyway, forming a minority government is kind of risky for Merkel, though, isn't it?

Well the danger is that other parties can join up together against the minority government and stop any measures or laws being passed. And I think that is what Merkel fears will happen. Especially given that the right wing AFD party now have thirteen percent of the vote. and many of the other parties see immigration as an issue.

So how would another election help her out of this corner?

Surely if you're not sure.

Well

Well that is difficult to say, but I guess the Chancellor would be hoping that voters might be more likely to vote for the majority party to shore it up and bring stability back.

It is possible, I guess, how

However, a recent poll by RTL TV, Germany's largest private broadcaster suggests the opposite result, with Merkel's CDU losing another two percent of the vote, while the smaller parties, including the AFD, gaining a little additional support.

As British Prime Minister Theresa May recently found out, elections don't always go the way they are predicted to. And this fall in popularity for Merkel could prove much worse. So what do you think, Des? Is this situation in Germany all part of electorates around the world voting for change at any price? The US voting for Trump and the British for Brexit, for example?

German magazine Der Spiegel certainly thinks so. In a recent article they said that voters in these countries were willing to throw away decades of stability in favour of change.

I guess a lot of voters don't feel things are as stable as the Derspiegel journalist.

We are certainly living in interesting times.

That's what we always say when we have no idea what's going on.

Uh it sounds more professional actually. What I really think is that Merkel's best option is probably to try and somehow negotiate a coalition with the CDU's previous partner, the SPD. It was a real surprise that talks broke down as immigration and environmental regulations were never seen as key areas for the SPD.

But they were chief concerns of voters in the election though.

Given the results it seems like it. But what is more likely is that the SPD wants to distance itself from the CDU as they fear being closely aligned with them going forward. What does seem certain is whatever happens, Angela Merkel is unlikely to remain as party leader for another full four year term.

I see. And how is this likely to affect neighboring countries in the EU?

Uh weakened Germany will certainly give the UK's Brexit negotiators some confidence. that they have been lacking as they try to negotiate a settlement with the EU. Remember that Germany, the largest and strongest economy in the EU, is in the driving seat in these negotiations.

Hasn't the new French president Emmanuel Macron been pushing for reforms for the EU?

He most certainly has. He wants the countries that share the Euro to be more closely integrated. Hey, maybe even sharing a common finance minister. However, that is less likely to happen now that Angela Merkel's future looks so precarious. I'm guessing that other policies seeking closer unification would also be less likely for the time being.

What a mess, what a mess.

And while the German politicians clean up that mess, why don't you and I get DTV down to vocabulary?

Down to business English audio scripts are a great learning tool. Be sure to visit the D2B website and download your free audio script of today's podcast. Down to businessenglish dot com that's WWW dot down to businessenglish dot com.

Down to vocabulary with the noun coalition. A coalition is an organization created when smaller groups agree to work together toward the same goal, even though they differ from each other on other goals.

It's very often used to talk about different political parties joining together.

And that is how it was used in our report today. Des used coalition several times, and in each instance, he was referring to the partnership between Merkel's CDU party and Martin Schultz's SPD party.

What immediately comes to mind is the multinational coalition of the willing that George Bush forty three put together to invade Iraq in two thousand three. It was a group of 43 countries that supported the US's invasion and post invasion presence.

Interesting. I you know, I've never noticed that before. That the coalition of the willing consisted of forty three members and

And

And it was put together by Bush forty three, you know, the forty third president of the United States. I wonder what is behind.

That. Oh, leave it be, Skip. You have no more room in that brain of yours for yet another conspiracy theory.

And the magic number is thirty-three. Forty three is ten more than thirty-three. So if you take ten and subtract eight, then that's the number of years Bush was in power. You

Moving on, the next word we want to look at is the verb to collapse. When we say something collapsed, we are communicating that it very suddenly broke down.

In the story, Des reported that the negotiations or talks between the SDU and the Green Party, and then later the Free Democratic Party, collapsed.

In other words, their discussions about forming a coalition government broke down very suddenly, and there was no chance of fixing them. What's a business example of collapse, Skip?

The global economy almost collapsed in two thousand eight after the collapse of Lehman Brothers.

How come when I use the two thousand eight financial crisis as an example, you always say it's too old for our listeners to clearly remember. But it's perfectly okay for you to use it.

Oh okay, you were right. There is no excuse for that. How about this? Hyundai workers in South Korea have walked off the job at two factories because talks between the union and the company collapsed.

They couldn't agree on salary.

Actually, no. The dispute was over how many workers would be used to make one of their SUVs. Apparently, the company started using one of the factories to make an SUV instead of the Hyundai Accent subcompact. Now, this SUV manufacturing is more automated than the accent model, thus, requires fewer workers.

Oh I see, well no wonder the union isn't happy. What's our next word?

Now let's look at the phrasal verb to shore up. When you shore something up, you are giving it support because it is in a weakened state. In the story, Des reported that Merkel may call another election in hopes that voters would shore up her CDU party.

In other words, even if they didn't vote for her in this last election, after seeing how unstable the political situation is now, they might help. strengthen the CDU's position in a second election.

Just a few days ago in Australia, the government turned on the largest lithium battery ever built, courtesy of Elon Musk's company Tesla.

What does that have to do with shore up?

Well, Australia had ordered the battery to shore up their weak power grid system. Australia suffered many many power outages last year, so they contracted Tesla to build and install this lithium battery in time for Australia's next summer, which, as you know, starts in December down under.

Ah, interesting. Those kind of headlines will not be popular over here in the oil-producing Middle East.

I suppose not. Apparently, Musk promised that they could get the job done in a hundred days, or else Australia wouldn't have to pay for it. They did with just a few days to spare.

Hey, good for them. Moving on though, I'd like to look at the common pattern to prove much work. In the story Skip commented that if Merkel decides to have another election, the results could prove much worse than she thinks. What Skip meant was that the results could be much worse than she predicted.

Of course I could have just said that, the results could be worse. But by using the verb prove, my remark sounded a little more professional.

You can use the verb prove with any adjective to talk about prediction.

For example,

For example, the heat in Abu Dhabi proves to be too hot for some foreign teachers and they go back to their home countries after just one or maybe two years of teaching here.

Okay, well how about a business example?

Sure, as you know, the US, Canada and Mexico are currently renegotiating NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement.

Yes, I am well aware of that. From what I understand, things are not going very smoothly.

Hey, that's right. It's proving very difficult for Canada to get any mention of climate change in the new agreement. Something Justin Trudeau strongly believes in, but Donald Trump thinks is a hoax.

Renewing NAFTA just might prove to be impossible with the current political landscape in North America.

Well, don't despair. At least the talks haven't collapsed yet.

Keyword is yet. But before we go down a Trump rabbit hole, let's go on to our next word.

Okay, um which word is that?

Next up is the idiom to be in the driving seat. When you are in the driving seat, you are controlling the car. So idiomatically, the person or thing that is in the driving seat has the most control or most power. In the story, Des remarked that because Germany is the largest economy in the EU, they are in the driving seat in the EU-UK Brexit negotiations. To put that another way, Germany has the most power in those talks.

You could say that Amazon is certainly in the driving seat when it comes to retail logistics. They have a lot of power in the home delivery marketplace and it's almost impossible for rival companies to compete.

That is a great business example. Hey Dez, who is in the driving seat in your home?

No question about that. I can confidently tell you that Roxy is in the driving seat. She is 100% in charge.

I have a similar situation, but I'd rather not talk about it.

In that case, let me go on to our final word of today, the adjective precarious. A situation or relationship can be described as precarious if it's not well balanced and could fall over or break easily.

In more literal terms, if I balanced a cup on the edge of a table, we would say that I need to be careful as I have left it in a precarious spot.

Yes, make sure you don't knock it over. In the story I said that Angela Merkel's position politically was precarious as she could easily lose her job.

And I understand that the situation in the Middle East is pretty precarious right now.

It sure is, and that's a story we'll be discussing very soon.

That is a good idea. Do you know what else is precarious?

No, tell me.

My work-life balance. I seem to do nothing but work, and if I'm not careful, I could just suddenly break down.

Skip, I've known you for over ten years. You've always had a busy schedule. If you slowed down, I doubt you'd know what to do with yourself.

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Thanks, Daz. It was good speaking with you today.

Hey you too skip. Please take care of yourself. Maybe take a day off soon.

I will consider that as soon as I get this episode posted.

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We would very much appreciate the support.

Yes indeed.

Thanks for listening everyone. See you next time. Bye bye.

Bye bye.

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