The writer, Mr Bivar, who always had claimed that he was innocent, had been awarded the Alternative Nobel Prize. He said on radio SWF that firstly his proposals would be to the students' advantage, and secondly that there were no alternatives the SPD's and the Greens' proposals being out of financial reach. Mr Ruettgers argues that the federation would get some 1.6 billion marks in revenue per year by charging interest on a part of the loans, plus some 1.2 billion more if the federal states came to the party. The moneys could be spent on building and renovating tertiary institutions or research. And this would result in students graduating sooner and with better marks.
Parents usually support and contribute to the cost of their children's university education.
Maier said that this government had saddled future generations with some 1.4 billiards of marks of debt while privatisations were eroding public assets. There should be real concern that Germany would be unable to meet the stability-criteria required for a common currency within the European Union. Mr Waigel countered that the opposition parties were only in for slinging-matches and hardly interested in digging deeper. Federal government postpones Islamic Conference Originally this would have taken place next week but has been postponed indefinitely. This was Foreign Minister Mr Kinkel's reaction to being defeated in a vote in the Lower House.