Linke on public safety

The Left wants to end restrictions on freedom of speech and freedom of assembly. In the program's view, these rights have been curtailed in recent years by bans on demonstrations, police conduct, and political influence on art and culture.

The Left wants to protect free speech. The right to demonstrate should also be protected. The Left says these rights were limited in recent years. That should stop. No one should be afraid to say what they think.

The program describes Berlin as an open and rebellious city. It criticizes bans on demonstrations, police action it calls arbitrary, and political interference in art and culture. The Left wants to end this so that no one has to fear attending a demonstration. It also opposes plans for "remigration" and wants Berlin to offer protection to everyone.

The Left wants to create a competence center against financial and white-collar crime in which prosecutors, police, customs and tax investigators work together. The program justifies this with the high annual losses the state suffers from money laundering, undeclared work and schemes such as cum-ex.

Berlin loses a lot of money to money laundering, undeclared work and tax fraud. The Left wants to set up a new center against this. Prosecutors, police, customs and tax investigators work together there. They sit in one building and use the same technology.

The plan calls for at least 20 prosecutors in a specialized prosecution office and at least 60 seconded investigators from police, customs and tax investigation. All of them are to work in one place with a single IT system; reformed staff development plans are meant to allow specialist careers. Success is to be measured by tax revenue actually collected rather than only by claims formally established. In addition, three professorships for financial and white-collar crime are to be created at Berlin universities, and a regular nationwide expert conference is to be held in Berlin.

The Left wants to set up technical competence centers that help counseling services, women's shelters and private individuals in cases of digital violence. Police and the justice system are to receive mandatory training. The party calls for strict laws against sexualized deepfakes made without consent.

Digital violence is violence through phones and the internet. The Left wants to build centers with tech experts. They help counseling services and women's shelters. Police and courts should have to take training. Fake sexual images of people should be strictly banned.

The platform describes digital violence as an area that is often legally unclear and new to investigators. The centers are to help with counseling, training, forensics and IT security in general. Alongside more protection and therapy services for those affected, the plan includes special units at the State Criminal Police Office and specialized departments at the public prosecutor's office. The rules against deepfakes are to cover both creating and spreading AI-generated sexualized content without consent.

The Left wants to end what it sees as the costly build-up of the police and redirect money to social work, crisis services and prevention. It wants to examine bringing police staffing in line with that of other city-states. According to the platform, safety comes mainly from tackling social causes.

The Left wants to spend less money on the police. The money should go to social work and crisis help. The party says poverty and hardship lead to crime. So help should start there. The fence around Görlitzer Park should go.

When aligning staffing with other city-states, extra needs arising from Berlin's role as capital are to be taken into account; the money freed up is to fund jobs in emergency and crisis services and street social work. The districts are to develop neighborhood safety plans together with residents, and street social work, park stewards and youth social work are to get reliable funding. The platform calls fences and cameras symbolic politics that merely displace crime, and the party rejects the nightly closure of Görlitzer Park. Together with experts from academia and civil society, including the abolitionist movement, alternative concepts such as multi-professional teams are to be developed that could supplement or take over police tasks.

The Left wants to strengthen the state program against radicalization, arguing that hate violence in Berlin is rising. The focus is to be on far-right and neo-Nazi structures. Those affected are to get more support and easier access to financial help.

There is more hate violence in Berlin. The Left wants to do more against it. It wants to look mainly at far-right groups and neo-Nazis. Victims should get money and help more quickly.

The platform justifies the focus by saying far-right structures pose the greatest risk of violence. Teachers and staff in youth facilities and sports clubs are to get more support from civil society organizations. The aid fund for those affected is to grow, and attacks on homeless people are to be recorded as hate crimes. Work with perpetrators is to be funded for the long term, and the outpatient clinic for victims of violence is to be expanded.

The Left wants to give the Police and Citizens' Commissioner more staff and investigative powers of his own. Members of the public are to be allowed to film police operations and to demand that a bodycam be switched on. This is meant to increase democratic oversight of the police.

The Left wants more checks on the police. The police ombudsman should get more rights and more staff. Everyone should be allowed to film police operations. People should also be able to demand that officers turn on their body camera.

The commissioner is to have legally guaranteed access to police files and data, explicitly including bodycam footage, in order to investigate unlawful violence. Officers are to be required to tell people at the start of a measure that they can have the camera activated and view the footage; when weapons are used, the camera is to start automatically. The party also wants to promote independent research on the police and improve how the force deals with its own mistakes. Initiatives such as the Campaign for Victims of Racist Police Violence (KOP) are to receive support.

The Left wants to scrap the designation of certain areas as "crime-burdened places" as well as weapons-ban zones. In the party's view, the special police powers that apply there enable discriminatory checks. Police are to issue a written receipt for every check in the future.

In some places in Berlin, police can check people without a reason. The Left wants to end these special rules. It says police there often check people because of how they look. Police should hand out a note stating the reason for every check.

The platform names video surveillance and checks without specific cause as the special powers tied to these places. The receipt is to record the reason and the legal basis for identity checks and searches. Additional units such as the hot-spot and presence unit are to be scaled back at these locations. The money freed up is to go into social infrastructure.

The Left wants to curb the surveillance powers of the police and the Verfassungsschutz (domestic intelligence service) and will not support new ones. It rejects state spyware, biometric matching against publicly available data and AI analysis software such as Palantir's. Data protection oversight of police data is to be strengthened.

The Left wants less surveillance by police and the domestic intelligence service. Police should not use spy software on phones and computers. They should not match faces with pictures from the internet either. People should find out more easily what data the police hold on them.

The platform justifies its rejection of state spyware by saying the security gaps kept open for it endanger society. Its rejection of biometric matching and AI-based data analysis applies as a matter of principle. Oversight of police data storage is to be strengthened particularly in light of the nationwide linking of police data systems. People are to get easier access to information on what was collected about them and who retrieved it for what purpose.

The Left wants to allow tasers only for special police units. Instead, multi-professional teams outside the police are to help people in acute mental health crises. The central detention facility is to be modernized.

Tasers are devices that give electric shocks. The Left wants only special police units to use them. People in a mental health crisis should get help from separate teams. These teams are not part of the police.

According to the platform, early experience shows that tasers do not reduce the use of firearms and carry risks for both the people affected and officers. The crisis teams are to be connected to emergency call centers and work closely with the district social-psychiatric services. Police training on dealing with mental health crises is also to be improved. The platform says the central detention facility currently fails to meet human rights standards; the party also wants to look into ways of taking fewer people into custody.

The Left rejects the latest reform of Berlin's police law (ASOG) because it permits biometric and AI-assisted surveillance. It wants to fight the reform by legal and political means and revise the entire law. It also opposes large-scale business inspections targeting migrant-run shops.

Berlin changed its police law. The police can now watch people more, also with computer programs. The Left is against this. It wants to rewrite the law. Human dignity should come first.

The platform announces that the party will use every legal and political means against the ASOG reform. The law as a whole is to be reviewed with a focus on human dignity and protection from discrimination. The Left rejects the so-called "1,000 pinpricks" strategy, in which migrant business owners are inspected with a large police presence, as blanket suspicion. Inspections by the public order office or customs should not serve to enable police investigations without a court warrant. A case-tracking statistic is to link police work with the outcomes of later criminal proceedings and make it verifiable.

The Left wants to improve working conditions for emergency personnel so that the state of Berlin is an attractive employer. Overtime is to be clearly limited, psychological support guaranteed, and buildings renovated faster.

Police and firefighters should get better working conditions. There should be less overtime. Staff should get help for their mental health. Buildings should be repaired faster.

Overtime would be allowed only during exceptional staff shortages, to be achieved mainly by changing deployment plans for demonstrations and fan gatherings. Structures at the police and fire department are to be reviewed and duplicate structures removed; the entry-level grade for firefighters is to be raised. Training is to be modernized and supplemented with civic and fundamental-rights education. The platform calls for lasting psychological support with supervision, more police medical care, and recognition of post-traumatic stress disorder as a consequence of an on-duty accident. De-escalation at demonstrations is also meant to protect staff, and the fire department is to gain more women and more diversity.

The Left wants higher-grade police officers to continue being trained at the Berlin School of Economics and Law (HWR). It rejects plans to move this training entirely to a police academy supervised by the interior administration.

Many police officers in Berlin study at a university. The Left wants to keep it that way. Some want to move the training to a police academy. The Left is against this.

According to the platform, the Berlin model combines practical police training with academic qualification and a focus on fundamental rights. Training at the HWR is to be strengthened relative to the police academy. The focus should be on officers who think independently, reflect on their work, and act democratically. Initial and continuing training are to be evaluated regularly by independent researchers and be subject to democratic oversight.

The Left wants to protect freedom of assembly more strongly against state restrictions and improve Berlin's Freedom of Assembly Act. The ban on face coverings and so-called protective gear at demonstrations is to be dropped entirely, and the assembly authority would no longer be part of the police.

People are allowed to protest. The Left wants to protect this right better. People should be allowed to cover their faces at protests. The police should no longer decide about protests. Another office should do that.

The law and how authorities apply it are to be revised based on an evaluation by the HWR and with input from civil society and researchers. Unrelated grounds for restrictions, such as bans on certain languages, and police measures with a deterrent effect are to be ruled out. Travel to and from a demonstration and accompanying facilities are also to be protected. Conditions should be communicated in time so that those affected can challenge them in court. The Left rejects police pain-compliance holds because it considers them incompatible with the ban on torture. The platform also condemns police violence and what it sees as disproportionate interference at pro-Palestinian demonstrations and climate protests.

The Left wants to abolish Berlin's Verfassungsschutz (domestic intelligence agency) as a secret service. It would be replaced by a research-based information and documentation center that uses only public sources. In the party's view, the agency harms the rule of law more than it helps.

The Verfassungsschutz is a secret service. It watches enemies of democracy. The Left wants to close it in Berlin. A new office should replace it. That office should work openly and do research, without secret methods.

The platform argues that informants and secrecy rules in particular hinder prevention, investigation, and prosecution. The new body would sit outside the interior administration and be modeled on the Thuringian Institute for Democracy and Civil Society in Jena. It would document neo-Nazi, racist, antisemitic, and other anti-constitutional activities, be allowed to cooperate with third parties, and take part in public debate. Until the agency is dissolved, the Left wants better rights to information, fewer powers, and more oversight. The state parliament and the courts should be able to review the agency's work in full.

The Left wants to equip the professional fire department so that it can meet required response times and staffing levels. To that end, more people are to be trained and hired, and stations and vehicles renewed.

The fire department should reach people fast enough. It needs more staff for that. The Left wants to train and hire more people. More women should join too. Stations and vehicles should be repaired.

The rescue service is to be relieved of tasks that are not strictly necessary, without lowering crew qualifications in emergency care. The repair backlog for stations and vehicles is to be cleared quickly. Enough staff and space are to be provided for training; for this, the new fire and rescue academy at the former Tegel airport is to be built quickly. Volunteers in the fire service are to get more support, including on compensation, benefits, and deployment conditions.

The Left wants to draw lessons from attacks on the power supply, which in its view exposed weaknesses in civil protection. It calls for investment in resilient grids, clear crisis plans, emergency shelter, and an emergency fund for those affected. Help should also reach people who cannot look after themselves.

In a big power outage, many people need help. The Left wants Berlin to be better prepared. There should be emergency shelters. People affected should get money for their costs. Helpers should visit people at home.

The city government is to develop an emergency shelter plan that is affordable for low earners too; free hotel rooms for people in need and the use of places run by the state refugee office are to be examined. The emergency fund would quickly reimburse lodging and other costs. Through district volunteer agencies and civil society groups, helpers could visit and inform people at home. Civil society organizations and spontaneous volunteers are to be integrated into disaster response, including clear insurance coverage. Care facilities are to follow preparedness standards for disasters.

The Left wants Berlin's authorities to be better staffed and organized for disasters. It plans a rollout plan for emergency contact points in the districts and neighborhoods, a review of vulnerable spots in the power grid, and up-to-date emergency plans for the administration.

The Left wants Berlin to be better prepared for disasters. The authorities should get enough staff for this. The districts should have places where people can get help in an emergency. The power grid should be better protected. Schools and daycare centers should get emergency plans too.

A rollout plan is to be drawn up for the planned 44 disaster-relief hubs ("Leuchttürme") and 147 neighborhood information points, and the districts are to receive staff and their own budgets for this. Poorly protected power grid facilities that matter greatly for supply are to be systematically recorded, and additional redundancies and stand-alone grids are to be created around important facilities. Emergency plans of public authorities, including alert chains and crisis teams, are to be reviewed regularly, and schools and daycare centers are to get plans for care and teaching. Where needed, alternative places for people in need of care, including transport, should be available, and welfare associations should be involved in emergency shelter concepts. At the federal level, the Senate is to push for benefit rates that cover the recommended emergency supplies.

The Left wants to give the white-collar crime units of Berlin's public prosecutor's office more staff and a better organization. The platform sees white-collar crime, corruption, and abuse of office as a major danger to the state and to trust in it.

The Left wants to do more against white-collar crime. That includes tax fraud and corruption. Corruption means that someone takes bribes. The prosecutor's office should get more experts for this.

Alongside qualified prosecutors, business and IT specialists are to be hired who can trace money flows internationally online. The platform points to tax losses from tax offenses in the tens to hundreds of billions nationwide and to Germany's falling score in Transparency International's corruption index, from 81 points in 2015 to 77. In the party's view, law enforcement should not focus on petty offenses committed by poor people.

The Left wants prison sentences to be imposed and served only in exceptional cases and wants to put open prisons back at the center. The party considers jail time in place of unpaid fines (Ersatzfreiheitsstrafe) unjust because, in its view, it only hits poor people, and wants to curb it.

The Left wants fewer people to go to prison. Some people go to jail because they cannot pay a fine. The Left thinks this is unfair and wants it to happen less often. Prisoners should be better prepared for life after release.

Jail time for unpaid fines is to become rarer through diversion programs such as "Day by Day" and otherwise be served only in open prisons; its usefulness is to be studied scientifically, possibly followed by an initiative at the federal level. The party rejects electronic ankle monitors as a safeguard for relaxed prison conditions. The housing units in the Tegel and Moabit prisons are to be modernized further, cultural and sports programs expanded, and cuts made by the CDU-SPD Senate reversed. Prisoners are to get more access to the digital world. The party wants to counter prison overcrowding systematically and improve working conditions for prison staff.

The Left wants to strengthen prison staff through supervision, further training, and better pay. Anonymous, independent reporting offices are to be set up or expanded to counter corruption, abuse of power, and improper treatment. The platform regards motivated staff as a precondition for successful rehabilitation.

The Left wants to help people who work in prisons. They should get counseling and training. They should also earn more money. There should be reporting offices. People can report problems there without giving their name.

The platform calls for supervision and further training for prison officers across all facilities. Measures against corruption, abuse of power, and improper treatment are to be developed together with staff and updated regularly, including anonymous and independent reporting offices. Pay should reflect the responsibility and strain of the job. The Left backs the higher-grade prison service career track and wants to expand it step by step. Independent nonprofit providers are to receive targeted funding, since the party argues that cutting their programs would cost more than it saves.

The Left wants prisoners to receive the minimum wage in jobs covered by social insurance for their work inside prison, so that they are not released in debt. Programs in custody should be geared to inmates' needs, and people released should not end up homeless. The party wants to reverse restrictions imposed by the CDU-SPD Senate on inmate representation, prison newspapers, and cultural activities.

Prisoners work in prison. The Left wants to pay them the minimum wage for it. That way they leave prison without debt. Nobody should have to live on the street after prison. Newspapers and theater in prison should get more room again.

Besides the minimum wage with social insurance, the platform lists extra help for inmates facing language barriers, enough nursing staff and suitable facilities for older inmates, and better suicide prevention. Structures to prevent homelessness after release should also cover people leaving pretrial detention. The party sees inmate councils, independent prison newspapers such as "Der Lichtblick," theater projects, and cultural events as part of rehabilitation and as a link to the outside world. The prison advisory council and the advisory boards of individual facilities are to be strengthened. The Left wants to ease overcrowding in pretrial detention by speeding up criminal proceedings, with more judges and more staff for forensic analysis of evidence.

The Left wants to remove offenses typically linked to poverty from criminal law, above all riding without a ticket, and to do so without any replacement penalty. Fines should be dischargeable through community service, and legal aid should be available in criminal proceedings. The party argues that criminal law and criminal procedure hit people with little money especially hard.

The Left wants to stop punishing people for riding without a ticket. This should also apply to other offenses caused by poverty. People who cannot pay a fine should be able to do community work. Poor people should get money for a lawyer. The Left says criminal law hits poor people harder than rich people.

Section 265a of the Criminal Code is to be struck without downgrading the act to an administrative offense, since the party believes that would only shift the problem. Community service is to become a legally regulated way of enforcing fines in place of jail time for unpaid fines. A warning with a suspended penalty should be usable more often, and fast-track proceedings and summary penalty orders are to be critically reviewed, also with regard to consequences for residence status. Outside of white-collar and organized crime, proceeds of crime that no longer exist should not be confiscated if that would prevent rehabilitation; for juveniles, the educational principle should generally rule this out. The Left wants to monitor the federal reform of procedural codes so that disadvantaged groups do not lose rights.

The Left rejects blanket measures and collective punishment against soccer fans and wants fewer police deployed at matches. Fan projects are to get more funding, and their staff a right to refuse to testify. The party wants to keep standing sections, affordable tickets and the 50+1 rule.

The Left wants to protect soccer fans better. There should be no punishment for whole groups of fans. There should be fewer police at matches. Fan projects should get more money. Standing areas and cheap tickets should stay.

The party sides with fan scenes and opposes commercialization and surveillance in professional sports. Police powers are to be reduced. People working in fan projects or fan legal-aid groups should be allowed to refuse testimony in court because of the special trust involved; the platform cites Section 53(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure. The 50+1 rule ensures that clubs in German professional soccer keep the voting majority over investors. The Left also wants to back fans' work against discrimination, racism and anti-queer hostility, explicitly including smaller clubs and other sports.

The Left calls for a ban on all militant neo-Nazi organizations and for disarming right-wing structures. Prosecutors and investigators are to shift their priorities more toward pursuing these groups.

The Left wants to ban militant neo-Nazi groups. Right-wing groups should have to give up their weapons. Prosecutors and investigators should focus more on these groups.

As examples of groups to ban, the program names Der Dritte Weg, the DJV, the NPD, and Die Heimat. All existing legal tools are to be used to prevent, prosecute, and solve right-wing crimes, above all to protect marginalized groups. The program says the Verfassungsschutz (domestic intelligence service) has so far tended to hinder the fight against these organizations. Prosecutors and investigators are therefore to reallocate staff and focus and cooperate more closely across state lines. Special attention goes to links into the police, security agencies, and special units.