Grüne on migration and integration

The Greens want refugees to move quickly from initial reception centers into towns and villages. Municipalities are to get support in expanding their capacity, and children are to gain early access to school.

Refugees should not stay long in large shelters. They should move quickly into towns and villages. The Greens want to help the towns with this. Children should go to school as early as possible.

The platform describes Rhineland-Palatinate as a state that depends on immigration and takes in people in need. All leeway within EU and federal rules is to be used to receive refugees humanely. Strong local social support is planned from the start. Decentralized housing, housing exchanges and statewide monitoring of discrimination in the housing market are to be supported. Integration policy is to become a cross-cutting task with clear responsibilities and transparent funding, giving the state and municipalities planning security.

The Greens want to set up a central state office that bundles integration, immigration and returns and relieves municipalities. A state integration law is to lock in firm rules and structures.

The Greens want a new state office. It handles integration, immigration and returns. Returns means that people have to leave the country. A new law should set firm rules for integration. Families should be able to join their relatives more easily.

According to the platform, asylum law can only be enforced effectively if it is organized centrally and with legal certainty. The integration managers in municipalities will stay, joined by statewide quality standards and regular reporting. Easy-access counseling, meeting places, social services and family support are to be strengthened, and an expansion of independent advice centers will be examined. The Greens will press the federal government to allow family reunification for adult children again. The Common European Asylum System (CEAS) is to be implemented in the state with priority given to human rights.

The Greens see language and work as the keys to participation. They want to expand language courses and interpreting, recognize qualifications faster and secure a right to stay for well-integrated people in work or training.

The Greens want more German courses for immigrants. Degrees from other countries should be accepted faster. People who work here and support themselves should be allowed to stay. Refugees who went through hard times should get more help.

The Greens expect the federal government to provide enough German courses, while in the state professional interpreting is to grow, especially in education and health care. Skills are to be assessed and training started while people are still in initial reception. Plans include courses alongside work, more child care, services for refugee women and better pay for teachers. Requirements for proving formal qualifications are to be lowered appropriately. The federal skilled immigration law is to be kept, including the Spurwechsel (switching from the asylum track to a work-based residence status). Psychosocial care for particularly vulnerable refugees will be expanded further.

The Greens want to identify refugees with special protection needs early and give them targeted support, for example families, children and traumatized people. They will examine deportation stops for vulnerable groups and state-run admission programs. They reject detention-like housing under the EU asylum reform (GEAS).

Some refugees need special protection. These include children, families and people with mental trauma. The Greens want to find these people early and help them. They will check whether the state can stop deporting such people. They reject housing that is like a prison.

The plan calls for mandatory violence-protection plans in every facility, systematic screening for protection needs, and reliably funded psychosocial care. Information is to be passed to municipalities in line with data protection rules so that support continues. For refugee women, the Greens seek new rules in the federal Gewalthilfegesetz (violence assistance act). Municipalities that see themselves as safe harbors and want to take in additional refugees voluntarily are to receive support. The party wants to fund refugee aid initiatives and organizations and defend them against attacks; new psychosocial services are planned for victims of hate crime.

The Greens want successful integration to count for more when deciding whether a person may remain. Families, children, young people and people with jobs should not be deported. Those who commit serious crimes and reject the Basic Law, by contrast, should have to leave.

The Greens want this: people who are well integrated should be more likely to stay. Families, children and young people should not be deported. The same goes for people who work. People who commit serious crimes should leave the country.

The party stands by the Härtefallkommission (hardship commission), which can recommend a right to stay in individual cases. It also wants to keep promoting acceptance of church asylum. Integration is to carry more weight in residence decisions than it does now. For people who commit serious crimes and turn against the constitutional order, the program calls for an obligation to leave.