CDU on other topics

The CDU promises that key essential services will be reachable within 20 minutes anywhere in Thuringia. To that end, village shops would be supported, state agencies located in rural areas and village churches renovated. Urban and rural areas should offer equal opportunities.

Important services should be reachable in 20 minutes. This includes buying groceries, for example. The CDU wants to support village shops. More state offices should move to rural areas. Village churches should be repaired.

The CDU wants to set up village shops and relaunch the program for 24-hour stores with simpler conditions. The shops would add postal services, a pharmacy and access to online government services and become meeting places. Rural areas would get more state agencies and co-working spaces for their staff. The village church program would be relaunched so that smaller renovations in particular become easier.

The CDU wants to keep supporting the work of the churches and their welfare organizations and to protect Sundays and the major Christian holidays. Church monuments are to be preserved and the village church program relaunched. The platform justifies this with the state's Christian heritage.

The CDU wants to keep supporting the churches. Sundays and Christian holidays should stay protected. Old churches should be preserved. A program for village churches should start again.

Support for church-run facilities such as nursing homes, kindergartens, schools and hospitals, as well as for Caritas and Diakonie, is to continue under existing law. The CDU affirms the reference to God in the Basic Law and the state constitution, and at the same time religious freedom and the existing relationship between state and religion. The village church program (Dorfkirchenprogramm) is to be relaunched. Church building offices are to be allowed to take on the duties of a lower monument protection authority for the buildings they manage.

The CDU wants to relieve volunteers and clubs of bureaucracy and make this binding in a volunteering law, which it says would be the first in Germany. Funding applications and proof-of-use reports are to be simplified, as are data protection rules for clubs.

The CDU wants to reduce paperwork for clubs and volunteers. Applying for funding should become easier. Data protection rules should become easier for clubs too. All of this should be written into a volunteering law.

New legislation is to undergo a "volunteering check." At the federal level, the CDU wants to push for simpler rules in association and tax law, fewer statistical and documentation duties, an easier process for criminal record certificates, and no food labeling requirements at club festivals. On data protection, clubs are to get advice from the state data protection commissioner and pay no fines for unintentional violations. Small clubs are to be exempted from the requirements of the EU General Data Protection Regulation, and the duty to appoint a data protection officer is to be dropped.

The CDU wants to create and fund a state program called "Ehrenamt" (volunteering) to support clubs, initiatives and volunteers. It also plans higher allocations to the volunteering foundation, the state sports federation and welfare associations, state coverage of GEMA music licensing fees, and tax incentives at the federal level.

The CDU wants to start a state program for volunteering. Clubs and volunteers should get more money and help. The state should pay GEMA fees at events with free entry. GEMA fees are fees for playing music in public. Volunteers should also pay less tax.

The state program is to fund projects, training and coaching licenses, youth recruitment, hardship aid and discounts through the volunteer card, among other things. Institutional funding for the Thuringian volunteering foundation is to rise; the state sports federation and the LIGA of independent welfare associations are to receive more money from gambling revenues. GEMA fees for club festivals and free-admission events are to be covered by the state under a new law. The plan also includes anniversary bonuses for firefighters and disaster relief workers, time off for youth fire brigade members, a note on volunteering in school report cards, and higher mileage compensation. At the federal level, the CDU wants to push for a higher tax allowance for coaches, a higher tax-free volunteer allowance and a new flat-rate deduction for volunteers.

The CDU wants to put more money into building and renovating sports facilities and launch a special program called "Sportland Thüringen." Together with the state sports federation, sports funding is to be reassessed in a future plan; school sports, coaches and youth development are to be strengthened.

The CDU wants to spend more money on sports fields and gyms. A special program should keep sports facilities in good shape. Sports at school should be strengthened. Coaches should be paid better step by step.

The higher investment funds are meant to offset rising construction costs and encourage energy-efficient renovation. For the special program, the stock of and need for sports facilities is to be surveyed first; at the federal level, the CDU wants a "Goldener Plan Ost 2.0" to clear a renovation backlog of about one billion euros. Municipalities are to get enough funding for their sports facilities and clubs and support for sports development planning, especially joint planning across county lines. School sports are to be strengthened and linked more closely with club activities in all-day schooling. Coaches paid by the state are to be gradually paid like comparably qualified teachers and educators. The CDU also wants to fund licenses for coaches and referees and bring larger sporting events to Thuringia.

The CDU wants every child in Thuringia to learn to swim. It plans a swimming instruction campaign, a 50-euro voucher for all first graders and a state program to preserve indoor and outdoor pools.

Every child in Thuringia should learn to swim. All first graders should get a voucher worth 50 euros. They can use it for a swimming course. The CDU also wants to keep swimming pools open.

The swimming campaign is to take place in kindergartens, schools, clubs and pools and is aimed at children, teenagers and adults alike. The voucher is handed out at the start of the school year and covers a course for the "Seepferdchen" beginner's swimming badge. All Thuringians are to have a place to swim within reach. To that end, the CDU wants to launch a Thuringian pool program.