Angela Merkel wants to wrap up coalition talks within two weeks

Displaying a fine sense of irony, Germany’s largest political parties promised “speedy” coalition talks on Friday after keeping voters – and Europe – waiting 123 days since an inconclusive federal election.

Chancellor Angela Merkel, aiming for a fourth term in office, wants to wrap up negotiations within two weeks at the latest. With her would-be coalition partner playing hard-to-get, however, no one in Berlin is taking bets as to the outcome of talks.

“People really expect now that we move in the direction of forming a government,” said Dr Merkel, leader of the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU).

Last chance

Talks to create another coalition, with the Greens and liberal Free Democrats (FDP), collapsed in November and reviving the grand coalition with the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) is her last chance to avoid a snap election.

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After preliminary talks, SPD leaders have come around to the idea. But just over half of SPD delegates gave them a mandate last weekend to open formal talks. Many SPD members fear another term in office with Dr Merkel’s CDU – the third since 2005 – poses an existential threat to their party.

Among many points of disagreement in talks, three loom large. The SPD wants to merge Germany’s two-tier health system, complaining richer private patients are buying their way up the queue to better treatment. The centre-left party is also unhappy with plans to loosen grounds for dismissal in work contracts, which the SPD youth wing says discriminates against people starting their careers.

Immigration policy

Finally the SPD opposes plans of Merkel allies to tighten up immigration policy and the grounds on which refugees can bring their families to Germany.

Andrea Nahles, the SPD’s parliamentary party leader, agreed on Friday on the need for speed, but added that “in the end, the content has to be right”.

Her caution is well-placed. As well as grappling with ambivalent members, who may yet reject a final coalition deal and trigger fresh elections, an opinion poll out on Friday showed another slump in party support.

The poll for ARD public television put the party on 19 per cent, down from 20.5 per cent in September’s election – its worst result since 1949.

With talks only beginning, SPD insiders say nerves are beginning to fray. To the annoyance of party colleagues, leader Martin Schulz, a diminished figure after the election disaster, has demanded a cabinet post.

Other senior party leaders at state level appear to be distancing themselves from the coalition talks, in case they hit the wall.

Olaf Scholz, the influential SPD mayor of Hamburg, accused Dr Merkel and her allies of clinging to power “without any ambition to shape the future”.

Meanwhile Stephan Weil, the SPD head of Lower Saxony, urged his party to be more confrontational with Dr Merkel.

"I don't want chaos in the government but . . . the SPD should avoid agreeing too quickly to compromises that contravene their deepest convictions," he told Saturday's Der Spiegel. "The SPD will have to take much greater care with its own profile."