CDU on the environment and animal welfare

The CDU wants to keep supporting animal shelters and welfare groups and to regulate the trade in animals, especially puppies, more strictly. It points to a rise in problematic, dangerous or sick animals. Pet owners are to bear more responsibility and have the necessary knowledge.

The CDU wants to keep helping animal shelters. The trade in animals should get stricter rules, especially for puppies. More dogs and cats should have a chip. Pet owners should know how to care for their animals.

Together with shelters, associations and municipalities, the CDU wants to analyze problems and work out solutions so their work remains secure. Topics include wild and exotic animals, protection of free-roaming cats, and more chipped and registered dogs and cats. Organized crime that harms animal welfare is to be fought across borders. Veterinary care and the veterinary emergency service are to be strengthened.

The CDU wants wolves to be hunted on a regular basis and to open up to one third of the population to hunting each year. Culling is to be allowed at a lower damage threshold and more quickly after an attack on livestock. The protected status of beavers, cormorants and otters is also to be reviewed.

The CDU wants hunters to be allowed to shoot wolves. Each year this could apply to up to one third of the wolves. After a farm animal is killed, shooting should be allowed faster. Animal owners keep getting money for damage and protection. The CDU also wants to review protection for beavers, cormorants and otters.

The federal government is to implement EU law so that a predetermined number of wolves may be killed under strict control, with a uniform nationwide rule. Saxony's wolf management ordinance is to permit culling once economic damage is "serious" rather than only when it is "substantial." In areas with many attacks, a single kill within 1,000 meters of the pasture should allow culling within 21 days. The CDU wants to keep reimbursing livestock owners for extra costs and losses caused by strictly protected species. It rejects further restrictions on commercial and recreational fishing.

The CDU wants local communities and counties to decide on protected areas, which should have concrete conservation goals. It rejects taking land in the cultivated landscape out of use except within research programs. The ordinance for the Saxon Switzerland National Park is to be revised.

The CDU wants nature protection to be decided more locally. Towns and counties should decide on protected areas. Land that is in use should not simply be left idle. The rules for the Saxon Switzerland National Park should be rewritten. The towns there should be able to develop.

The platform sees environmental protection as a balance between ecology, the economy and social concerns and prefers incentives to bans. Measurable success factors are to be set for conservation. Towns and counties should be able to protect landscape-defining features themselves. Municipally run conservation funds are to get more legal options for financial compensation. The border region with Czechia is to be strengthened as a Green Belt, including state land for municipal projects. The revision of the national park ordinance is to be coordinated with the county and municipalities.

The CDU wants a statewide drinking water supply at stable prices. Villages that still depend on private wells are to be connected to the public network in the next legislative term. Wastewater treatment is also to be developed and funded in a planned way.

Some villages in Saxony only have their own wells. The CDU wants to connect them to the public water network. This should happen in the next five years. The funding should be affordable for everyone. Sewer lines should also be built again.

The funding conditions for connection are to be set so that everyone involved can bear them. Sewer construction is to resume. Regional master plans are to define wastewater treatment structures, and funding is to be based on long-term need and keep prices stable. Pilot projects and especially energy-efficient plants are to receive specific support.

The CDU wants to continue funding regional and local flood protection and update the related plans. Measures should fit the cultivated landscape. The state forestry administration is to be responsible for flood protection on the land it manages.

The CDU wants to protect towns better against floods. The state keeps paying for this. The plans for it get updated. The protection should fit the landscape. The state forestry office must provide protection on its own land.

The platform puts particular emphasis on cross-border flood protection and on land that can hold back more water. Saxony's floodplain program is to continue. Projects restoring areas near rivers and streams are to go on where water conditions allow.

The CDU wants to stop further bureaucratization of environmental administration. State law should not narrow the leeway left by EU and federal law. For vehicles, climate-neutral fuels are to be treated on equal terms with electric drives.

The CDU wants less paperwork in environmental matters. Saxony should not make EU and federal rules even stricter. Local offices should be able to decide for themselves. For cars, not only electric motors count. Climate-neutral fuels should be treated the same.

Where EU or federal rules leave discretion, that discretion is to be preserved. Whether a measure is appropriate should be decided conclusively at the local level. The platform rejects debates about bans and price increases and relies on incentives, innovation and openness to all technologies.