Linke: program for the 2023 Bremen state election

The Left wants to attach conditions to state aid for companies. Firms that receive public money should give the state ownership stakes and influence, and make environmental and social commitments.

Some companies get money from the state. The Left wants conditions for that. The state should then get shares in the company. It should also have a say. Companies should promise jobs and wages.

The Left wants to reclassify former port land in the Industriehafen and the Hemelingen port as commercial zones so that its use can be better controlled. Heavily burdened districts such as Oslebshausen are to receive targeted compensation measures.

Bremen's west has a lot of noisy businesses. The Left wants more control over this. Old port land should become normal commercial zones. The city should buy this land. Burdened districts should get something in return.

The Left wants to support industry in Bremen and Bremerhaven in switching to climate-neutral production in order to keep companies and jobs. At the same time, the economy is to be diversified and other sectors promoted more strongly.

Bremen has big factories, for example for steel. They should become climate-neutral. The Left wants to help with money. This should keep the jobs. Other sectors should get more support too.

The Left wants a common-good economy guided by the UN Sustainable Development Goals rather than by profit. Cooperation is to replace competition, and all sectors are to be recognized for their contribution.

The Left wants a different kind of economy. It should serve people and the environment. Profit should not be the main goal. Companies should work together more. Sectors with many women should get more attention too.

The Left wants to redesign innovation funding programs and implement the Regional Innovation Strategy. Plans include a Smart Services competence center, a master plan for the circular economy, and a stronger Wirtschaftsförderung Bremen (the state's business development agency).

The Left wants to support new ideas in companies more. It will change the funding programs for this. There will be a new center for digital services. A plan for repair and reuse is also planned. Small companies should get funding more easily.

The Left wants to strengthen Bremen as an aerospace location and further develop the ECOMAT research center. Projects for CO₂-neutral flight are meant to cut emissions while securing the Airbus site and its jobs.

Many people in Bremen work in aerospace. The Left wants to strengthen this industry. Planes should fly climate neutral in the future. Bremen should do research on this. This should keep the jobs at Airbus safe.

The Left wants to support small and medium-sized enterprises with digitalization, recruiting skilled workers, and organizational development. The Senate and the economics department are to actively represent Bremen's business interests toward the federal government and the EU.

The Left wants to help small and mid-sized companies. They should get money and advice for digital technology. There is also help with finding skilled workers. The Senate should speak up for Bremen companies in Berlin.

The Left wants to support alternative forms of enterprise and create a funding program for founding commercial cooperatives. In the party's view, such businesses make the economy more resilient and contribute to innovation and transformation.

The Left wants to support special kinds of companies. These include cooperatives. Those are companies that belong to their members together. Companies for the common good should also get help. The Left says this makes the economy more stable.

The Left wants more businesses founded by women and by people with a migration background. To that end it plans neighborhood-based advice and more seed capital, grants, and equity funding for startups.

The Left wants more people to start a company. Women and people with a migration background should get special help. There should be advice right in the neighborhood. New companies should get starting money more easily.

The Left wants to allocate commercial plots on principle through Erbpacht (long-term ground leases) so that the state keeps long-term control of the land. Commercial areas are to be developed ecologically, used more densely, and mixed with housing, social, and cultural uses.

Companies need space in Bremen. The Left does not want to sell plots but lease them. That way the state keeps control of the land. Business, housing, and culture should have room side by side. There should also be space for cultural projects.

The Left wants to implement the tourism strategy and strengthen Bremen as a trade fair and convention location through better venues. The events sector is to remain diverse, and the city's marketing to skilled workers is to be developed further.

The Left wants to bring more visitors to Bremen. The trade fair and the big halls should be better equipped. There should still be many concerts and conventions. Bremen should also advertise to attract skilled workers.

The Left wants to limit commercial rents and push at the federal level for rules like the Mietpreisbremse (rent brake) to apply to commercial properties as well. The state is to buy and rent out downtown properties to gain more influence over how the area develops.

The Left wants to make downtown more lively. Rents for shops should not be too high. New federal rules should make this possible. The state should buy buildings itself and rent them out. New business ideas should get spaces to try things out.

The Left wants to promote climate-neutral ship propulsion and equip the ports with the necessary supply infrastructure. It also wants to abolish the flags-of-convenience system to protect seafarers from exploitation.

The Left wants ships that do not harm the climate. The ports should get the technology for that. Seafarers should be treated fairly. Ship owners should only get state money if their ship flies the German flag.

The Left wants wastewater disposal, drinking water supply, waste collection and street cleaning fully returned to public ownership in 2028, when service contracts with private companies expire. Fees should cover only actual costs, and all employees should be paid under collective agreements.

Private companies handle water, wastewater and trash in Bremen. Their contracts end in 2028. Then the city should take over these jobs again. Fees should go down and wages should be fair.

The Left favors closer cooperation among northern German ports with shared labor and environmental standards. It rejects deepening the Weser because of ecological risks and little benefit; dilapidated quays in Bremerhaven are to be repaired.

The Left wants the ports in northern Germany to work together. They should have the same rules for work and the environment. The Weser river should not be dug deeper. The quay walls in Bremerhaven's port should be repaired.

The Left wants to keep the food industry in Bremerhaven and expand the university of applied sciences. The local branches of state agencies and of the regional court are to stay and get more staff.

Many people in Bremerhaven work in food factories. The Left wants to protect these jobs. The university should grow. State offices in Bremerhaven should get more staff.

The Left wants state-level programs to relieve households hit hardest by rising energy prices. These include a cheaper StadtTicket (discounted transit pass), its extension to Bremerhaven, and a social tariff for electricity.

Energy has become very expensive. The Left wants to help people with little money. The StadtTicket for buses and trams should cost less. It should also be valid in Bremerhaven. Poor households should pay less for electricity.

The Left wants to address the shortage of teachers, childcare workers, and nurses with paid training that runs alongside practical work. At the same time, working conditions in these professions are to improve permanently.

There are too few teachers, childcare workers, and nurses. The Left wants to combine training and work. People train part-time and get paid for it. The jobs themselves should also become better.

The Left wants job options for everyone, including people with few qualifications or no prospects in the regular labor market. To this end, there is to be a large sector of publicly funded work that pays a living wage, and collective agreements and the minimum wage are to be enforced more strictly.

Everyone should be able to find work. Some people cannot manage a regular job. The state should pay for jobs for them. People should be able to live on this work. The state should also check that companies pay fair wages.

The Left calls for an immediate end to sanctions against benefit recipients and for substantially higher standard rates. In its view, even the new Bürgergeld (citizen's income) does not secure a minimum standard of living.

People on Bürgergeld should no longer fear cuts. These cuts are called sanctions. The Left wants to end them right away. The payments should also be much higher. They should rise with prices.

The Left calls for a price cap on food so that no one has to go hungry. Supermarkets and discounters are to be required to hand out still-edible goods close to their expiry date to people in need free of charge.

Food should not become too expensive. The Left wants an upper limit on prices. Supermarkets should give away food shortly before the expiry date. Poor people should get it for free.

The Left wants to ban energy cut-offs because it regards electricity, gas, and water as basic social rights. For benefit recipients, housing and energy costs are to be covered adequately, with electricity paid through housing costs in the future.

No one should have their electricity, gas, or water cut off. The Left wants to ban this. People on benefits should get money for electricity and heating. There should also be help to buy energy-saving appliances. Advice centers should get more money.

The Left wants to fight poverty with a cross-departmental strategy and a dedicated commission of the state government. At the same time, the social divide between neighborhoods is to be reduced by giving disadvantaged areas the best facilities.

Many people in Bremen are poor. The Left wants a commission against poverty. People affected should have a say there. Poor neighborhoods should get the best schools and services. There should be affordable housing in all neighborhoods.

The Left wants to dissolve the subsidiary "Gesundheit Nord Dienstleistungen" (GND) and bring its employees back into the municipal hospital group GeNo. They are to be paid under the public-sector collective agreement. The party rejects further outsourcing.

Cleaners and kitchen staff work for a subsidiary of the hospitals. They earn less there. The Left wants to dissolve this company. The staff should work directly for the hospitals again. They should get collectively agreed pay.

The Left wants more co-determination to accompany the social-ecological transition. Employees, companies, works councils, and policymakers are to shape change together, and the rights of workers and unions are to grow at the federal level.

The world of work is changing a lot. The Left wants workers to have a say in this. There should be talks within industries. Unions should get more rights. The Left will push for this at the federal level.

The Left wants to keep raising Bremen's state minimum wage until it secures a pension above the poverty line in old age. In the medium term it names at least €15 as the target.

Bremen has its own minimum wage. It applies, for example, to contracts from the state. The Left wants to raise it to at least 15 euros. Then the pension should later be enough to live on.

The Left wants to declare more collective agreements generally binding, for example in hospitality, and to achieve collective bargaining coverage in all public companies and their subsidiaries. A "Fair Working Conditions" unit is to monitor minimum wage and compliance with collective agreements.

Collective agreements set pay and working hours. The Left wants them to apply to more companies. All companies owned by the state should pay by these agreements. A new office should check whether companies follow the rules. Stricter conditions should apply to state contracts.

The Left wants to push back temporary agency work and turn it into regular employment. At the federal level, it advocates largely abolishing agency work and converting mini-jobs into positions with full social insurance.

The Left wants secure jobs for everyone. Temp agency work should hardly exist anymore. Mini-jobs should become normal jobs with social insurance. That way people should not be poor in old age. The Left will push for this at the federal level.

The Left wants to give employees financial security during continuing education. It plans a training allowance of €200 a month and a state living allowance that covers course costs and living expenses for low-skilled workers.

Further training costs time and money. The Left wants to pay 200 euros a month for it. People with little training should get even more help. The state then pays for the course and living costs. That way everyone should be able to learn more.

The Left wants to found a transition company that supports employees in changing occupation or sector. It is to advise, assist, and place them with other employers after retraining.

Some people will soon have to change jobs. The Left wants to set up a new organization for this. It advises and guides people. After retraining, it helps them find a new job. It should help early, not only when a company closes.

The Left wants to create permanent publicly funded jobs in the neighborhoods and remove time limits from existing programs for the long-term unemployed. It also wants better rules on extra earnings and stronger independent counseling for the unemployed.

Some people cannot find work for a long time. The Left wants to create jobs for them that the state pays for. The jobs should be in the neighborhoods. People on benefits should be allowed to earn more on top. There should be a complaints office that is not part of the Jobcenter.

The Left wants to test a four-day, 32-hour week as a pilot project in selected companies and have it scientifically evaluated. Flexible working time models and more childcare are meant to make work and private life easier to combine.

Many people want more time for family and free time. The Left wants to test a four-day week. That means 32 hours of work per week. Some companies will try it out. Researchers then check how well it works. There should also be more childcare.

The Left wants to push back insecure work and bogus self-employment among the solo self-employed. It supports sector-specific minimum fees and model contracts and wants to promote representation for platform workers.

Many people work alone as self-employed. Often they earn too little. The Left wants minimum fees for each sector. A fee is the payment for a job. Delivery riders should also get a group that speaks for them.

The Left wants secure, fair jobs covered by collective agreements in the port companies. Overtime should remain the exception, and negotiated wages should rise with the cost of living.

The Left wants safe jobs in the ports. Workers should be paid under union contracts. Overtime should not be normal. There should be enough staff for that.

The Left wants to upgrade occupations in which especially many women work, such as nursing care. In the party's view, better pay and more staff would reduce overload and involuntary part-time work.

In some jobs, most workers are women. Nursing care is one example. The Left wants higher pay and more staff there. The work should be less stressful.

In the longer term, the Left calls for a 30-hour week with wage compensation as the new standard employment relationship. Shorter hours are meant to distribute care work more fairly and, according to the platform, also help against skilled-labor shortages, burnout and unemployment.

The Left wants shorter working hours. Later, a work week should have only 30 hours. Pay should still be enough to live on. This leaves more time for family and care.

The Left wants to move childcare workers into higher pay grades and improve their working conditions. According to the platform, more than 20 percent of new entrants nationwide leave the profession within the first five years.

Many childcare workers quit early. The work is very stressful. The Left wants to pay them more. They should also get time for preparation and more substitute staff.

The Left wants to develop the state action plan on the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities together with those affected and have the state fund it fully. Accessibility is to be achieved faster in all areas.

People with disabilities should be able to live independently. The Left wants to remove barriers in the city faster. Public offices should give information in easy language. Groups that represent people with disabilities should get more money.

The Left wants employees in sheltered workshops for people with disabilities to receive the minimum wage. Vocational training is also to become inclusive, and a benefit for people with hearing impairments is to be introduced.

Many people with disabilities work in special workshops. They get very little money there. The Left wants them to get the minimum wage. They should also be able to learn in regular vocational schools.

The Left wants to fold outsourced public-sector subsidiaries back into their parent organizations. The platform says these subsidiaries employ mostly women, have a wider pay gap and are used to escape collective agreements.

Some city tasks are done by subsidiary companies today. People there often earn less. The Left wants to bring these companies back. Women and men should earn the same for the same work.

At the federal level, the Left advocates retirement at 65, a minimum pension of €1,200 and a pension level of 53 percent. It rejects a stock-based pension as partial privatization.

The Left wants people to be able to retire at 65. Everyone should get a pension of at least 1,200 euros. Pensions should be higher overall. The Left rejects a pension based on stocks.

The Left wants to keep paying for climate action after 2027 through a debt-financed climate fund, using the exemption clause of the debt brake. It also wants to amend the state constitution so that the cities of Bremen and Bremerhaven can take out loans again.

Climate action costs a lot of money. The Left wants a climate fund paid for with loans. The debt brake limits new debt. The fund should get an exception. The two cities should also be allowed to borrow again.

The Left wants to replace Ehegattensplitting (joint tax splitting for spouses) with individual taxation and a transferable basic allowance. Mini-jobs should become jobs with social insurance coverage. In the party's view, current tax law entrenches traditional gender roles at the expense of women's employment.

Married couples pay taxes together today. This is called spousal splitting. The Left wants to change that. Each person should be taxed alone. Mini-jobs should become jobs with social insurance.

The Left wants to remove the debt brake from Germany's Basic Law and from Bremen's state constitution. Until then, declared emergencies are to allow borrowing for climate action and the fallout of the energy price crisis.

The debt brake mostly bans the state from taking on new debt. The Left wants to abolish this rule. Bremen should be able to borrow for climate protection. It should also borrow to help with high energy prices.

The Left wants to gradually dissolve the assets of the Anstalt für Versorgungsvorsorge (AVV, Bremen's civil service pension reserve) and invest them. Public companies are to be used more for loan-financed investment, and new public property created.

Bremen keeps money in a reserve for pensions. The Left wants to spend this money step by step. It should improve schools and other buildings. The city should own more buildings and apartments itself.

The Left calls for a wealth tax of one percent on assets above one million euros and a wealth levy of at least ten percent on private financial assets above two million euros. Since borrowing is not a permanent solution, large fortunes are to contribute more.

The Left wants a tax on large fortunes. People with more than one million euros should pay one percent. Very rich people should pay an extra levy too. The money should reduce inequality.

The Left wants to tax companies' profit surges resulting from the war in Ukraine at 50 percent and introduce a digital tax for large internet corporations. The tax administration is to get more staff.

Some companies made much more profit because of the war. The Left wants to take half of that as tax. Big internet firms should pay tax where they earn money. Tax offices should get more staff.

The Left wants to reform income tax so that small and medium incomes pay less and very high incomes pay more. Tax breaks on inheriting company shares are to end, and value-added tax on staple foods is to fall to zero.

People with low or middle incomes should pay less tax. Very rich people should pay more. People who inherit large company shares should pay tax on them. Bread and other basic foods should have no value-added tax.

The Left wants Wohngeld (housing allowance) to be paid out faster and to reach more people. To that end, the housing allowance office is to get far more staff, applications are to be simplified, and income limits raised further.

Wohngeld helps people pay rent. Many do not know they can get it. The Left wants more staff at the office. Applications should become easier. More people should be able to get Wohngeld.

The Left wants to end homelessness by 2030 and make Housing First the standard approach. Under this approach, homeless people first get their own apartment along with support from social workers.

By 2030, no one should be without a home. Homeless people should first get their own apartment. They also get help from social workers. There should be separate shelters for women. No one should be evicted onto the street.

The Left wants to grant public renovation subsidies only if rent including heating does not rise and social housing commitments continue. Overall, subsidies are to be geared toward people with low incomes. Free advice and an information campaign are to be added.

Houses should be renovated. Rent including heating should not go up because of that. Only then should the state give subsidies. People with little money should get more help.

The Left wants to stop selling public land and only grant it under long-term ground leases. Buildings and land are to move into public or common-good ownership wherever possible, for example through rights of first refusal. Against vacancy, orders to use buildings as housing and, if necessary, trustee administration are to be applied.

The city should no longer sell its land. It should only lease it for a long time. The city should also buy more buildings and land. Empty buildings should be lived in again.

The Left wants socially and functionally mixed neighborhoods where daily needs can be reached within ten minutes on foot. Disadvantaged neighborhoods are to be supported and displacement prevented through neighborhood protection ordinances. By 2025, there are to be 100 public drinking fountains.

The Left wants mixed neighborhoods. Homes, shops, doctors and culture are close together there. Everything important should be within a 10-minute walk. Poor neighborhoods should get more support.

The Left wants to develop downtown Bremen into a district where people of all income levels live and work. To do so, the city is to keep or buy land and buildings and build through its own housing companies.

The Left wants to change downtown Bremen. More people should live and work there. Homes should be affordable. The city should keep or buy land and buildings for this.

The Left wants to keep rents and land prices from soaring in well-connected neighborhoods and residents from being pushed out. It plans to use neighborhood preservation statutes, conversion bans, and the city's right of first refusal.

Some neighborhoods are very popular. Rents rise fast there. The Left wants to protect renters. The city should set strict rules and buy buildings itself.

The Left wants to raise the share of municipal and cooperative rental housing considerably, ideally to half of all rental units. In its view, a large public-interest sector holds rents down, as the example of Vienna shows.

The Left wants more homes owned by the city and by cooperatives. Ideally this should be every second rental home. Then rents stay lower, the party says. The city should buy homes for this.

The Left wants half of all newly built apartments to be social housing and rejects exceptions to this quota. New social housing units are generally to be acquired by the municipal housing companies.

The Left wants more social housing. Every second new apartment should be social housing. There should be no exceptions. The city's companies should buy these apartments.

The Left wants to use all available tools to limit rents charged by private landlords and to strengthen housing oversight. The ban on leaving housing vacant is to cover more buildings.

The Left wants to limit rents from private landlords. Today's limits should stay. An office should check on housing more closely. Empty buildings should not be allowed to stay empty.

Wherever new building rights are created, urban development contracts are to follow a uniform "Bremen Standard." It is to give social and urban design requirements equal weight alongside ecological ones.

New building projects should follow fixed rules. The Left calls them the Bremen Standard. They cover the environment and social needs. For example: lots of social housing and no high-rises.

The Left wants to buy out GEWOBA's private co-owners and convert the company into a GmbH (limited liability company). GEWOBA and BREBAU are to follow a rent strategy that holds prices down.

GEWOBA is a large housing company. The city owns only part of it. The Left wants the city to own all of it. Rents there should hardly rise.

The Left wants to push listed housing corporations such as Vonovia back out of Bremen's housing market and socialize profit-oriented real estate corporations in the state. It refers to Berlin's referendum "Deutsche Wohnen und Co. enteignen" (expropriate Deutsche Wohnen and Co.).

Big companies own many homes in Bremen. They want to make a profit from them. The Left wants to move these homes into public ownership. This is called socialization.

The Left wants the city to stop selling its land where possible and grant long-term ground leases instead, and to set up a municipal land fund. Public-interest users are to get land below market value.

The city should stop selling its land. It should only lease it out for a long time. A city fund should buy and manage land. Social projects should get land more cheaply.

The Left wants to keep the existing grant for families with children who buy a house or apartment. It is to be made accessible especially to single parents.

Families with children get money from the city when they buy a home. This applies only up to a certain purchase price. The Left wants to keep it that way. Single parents in particular should be able to get the money.

The Left wants the state to fund the Studierendenwerk (student services organization) much more generously to prevent higher cafeteria prices and dorm rents. In addition, 1,000 extra reduced-price dorm places are to be created.

The student services body runs cafeterias and dorms. The Left wants to give it more money. Food and rents should not get more expensive. There should be 1,000 new low-cost dorm places.

The Left wants to stop selling public land in Bremen-Nord, lease it at most, and buy additional sites. Nonprofit housing companies are to build affordable apartments there.

The city should stop selling land in Bremen-Nord. It should only lease land. It should also buy more buildings and plots. Low-cost apartments should be built there.

At the federal level, the Left advocates a sanction-free Kindergrundsicherung (basic child allowance) of currently 695 euros. Poor families are to get the most support, with the benefit falling as income rises.

Many children in Bremen are poor. The Left wants a basic child allowance. Poor children should get 695 euros. Families with more money get less. There should be no cuts as punishment.

The Left wants to fight child poverty at the state level with free services. Children and teenagers receiving basic income support are to get free admission to pools, libraries, and cultural institutions.

Poor children should be able to go to the pool for free. Libraries and culture should also be free for them. Daycare centers in poor neighborhoods should offer free breakfast. Parents should get more days off for sick children.

The Left wants more and better play areas and plans to raise city investment in them by half. Children are to be involved in the planning.

Children need good playgrounds. The city should spend more money on them. All playgrounds should be in good condition. Children from the neighborhood should have a say in the planning.

The Left wants to strengthen youth welfare office staffing and expand residential youth care places over the long term. It rejects for-profit providers, and people who suffered violence in closed facilities are to be compensated.

The youth welfare office should get more staff. There should be more places for children and teenagers in need. Companies should not make profit from youth welfare. People who suffered violence in a home should get compensation.

The Left wants to continue and expand state programs for single parents so they can complete qualifications and take up work. A new care card is meant to give people who do a lot of unpaid care work priority access and discounts.

Single parents often have a hard time. The Left wants to help them more. They should be able to finish school and training. A new card should bring benefits. The card is for people who do a lot of unpaid care for others.

The Left wants Bremen to push in the Bundesrat for a law of parentage that does not disadvantage lesbian and transgender parents. Health insurers should also pay for fertility treatment for queer families.

Some children have two mothers or trans parents. These families have fewer rights today. The Left wants to change that. Health insurance should also help them have children.

By 2025, the Left wants daycare places in every district for 60 percent of children under three and for all older children until they start school. The expansion should fail neither for lack of money nor because of the debt brake.

Bremen lacks many daycare places. Poor districts lack the most. The Left wants enough places by 2025. Every child over three should have a place.

The Left wants to create child and family centers as open contact points in the districts. They are to offer free services on health, parenting and early education. Existing open services such as play houses are to be kept and expanded.

The Left wants centers for children and families in the districts. They offer free help and advice. Parents can meet there. There should also be more family midwives.

The Left wants childcare to be available early, late and for parents with irregular working hours. Home-based childcare (Kindertagespflege) is to be better paid and expanded so that it helps shift workers, for example.

Some parents work early, late or in shifts. The Left wants suitable childcare for them. Each district should have one center for that. Childminders should be paid better.

The Left rejects for-profit daycare operators and construction by private investors. At least every second new daycare center should be built by the public sector; operators should be municipal, non-profit or parent associations.

The Left does not want companies to make profit from daycare. The city should build at least every second new daycare center itself. Daycare should be run by the city, non-profits or parent groups.

The Left wants to secure funding for open youth work in all districts and equip it better. Young people should get more room to organize themselves and more say, for example through youth councils.

Young people need places where they feel safe. The Left wants well-equipped youth centers in all districts. Young people should also be able to organize things themselves. They should have more say.

The Left does not want to extend the existing "Schulkonsens" (cross-party school pact), which it says has blocked reforms. Instead, an inquiry commission is to work out how Bremen can break the link between social background and educational success.

In Bremen, success at school depends a lot on the family. The Left wants to change that. A commission should make a plan for it. Schools with many problems should get the most money and staff. Every child should get a daycare place.

The Left wants swimming lessons to start as early as second grade and wants PE in schools to be guaranteed. Swimming courses canceled because of the COVID pandemic are to be made up.

Children should learn to swim earlier. Swimming lessons should start in second grade. Canceled courses should be made up. PE should more often be taught by trained PE teachers.

The Left wants to introduce a training fund into which all companies pay. Larger firms are to contribute more than small ones, and companies that do not train are to help finance those that do, so that every young person gets a chance at an apprenticeship.

There are too few apprenticeship places in Bremen. The Left wants to set up a fund. All companies pay money into it. Big companies pay more than small ones. The money helps the companies that train. That way more young people should get a place.

The Left wants to guarantee career guidance and internships for everyone from eighth grade on and to expand outreach counseling. Language-sensitive exams and more affordable housing are meant to make it easier for apprentices to graduate and manage daily life.

All students should get to know jobs from grade 8 on. They should also be able to do internships. Advisers should go to young people in the neighborhoods. Exams should use simpler language. There should be more cheap housing for apprentices.

The Left wants to make training at vocational schools, for example for nursing and childcare professions, free of charge and paid. The off-the-job training networks are to be developed further, and there are to be more part-time apprenticeships and more women in dual vocational training.

Bremen needs many new skilled workers for nursing and childcare. Training at vocational schools should cost nothing. Trainees there should get paid. There should be more part-time training. That helps people who look after children or care for relatives.

The Left wants training for daycare professionals to be paid throughout and wants more training places to fix the staff shortage. Career changes and recognition of foreign qualifications should become easier.

Daycare centers lack trained staff. The Left wants to pay people during training. That way more people should learn the job. Foreign qualifications should also be recognized more easily.

The Left wants smaller daycare groups and more staff per child, starting in disadvantaged neighborhoods. All daycare centers should be inclusive, and the federal Sprach-Kitas (language daycare) program should be continued and expanded.

The Left wants smaller groups in daycare. A group should have 15 children. That helps children learn to speak better. Children with and without disabilities should go to daycare together.

The Left wants to let Bremen's cross-party school agreement expire in 2028 and convert the Gymnasien (academic-track high schools) into inclusive schools for everyone. In its view, today's school system cements social division and slows innovation.

Bremen has academic high schools and comprehensive schools. The Left wants to change that. All children should go to one kind of school together. The academic high schools should become schools for everyone.

The Left wants to abolish homework that students are required to do outside school hours. Schools should also be supported if they want to move away from written tests and grades.

The Left wants no more mandatory homework at home. Children should do their tasks at school. Schools should also be able to try other ways than grades.

The Left wants to give elected school bodies more decision-making powers and involve students more in shaping lessons. School hours and forms of learning are to become more flexible.

The Left wants schools to decide more for themselves. Students should have more say in lessons. School for teenagers should start at 9 a.m. The fixed 45-minute lessons should become more flexible.

The Left wants to extend digital equipment in schools: tablets for social workers and assistants as well, smartboards, Wi-Fi and IT staff. Teachers should no longer have to administer devices.

The Left wants more technology in schools. Social workers and assistants should also get a tablet. Classrooms should get digital boards. IT staff should take care of the devices, not teachers.

The Left wants to keep redistributing money and staff, based on social data, toward schools in poorer neighborhoods. The aim is equal educational opportunities for children disadvantaged by poverty or a migration background.

The Left wants to give more help to schools in poor neighborhoods. Two staff members should be in each lesson there. These schools should become all-day schools first. Lunch at all-day schools should be free for all children.

The Left wants to keep developing the school system toward one common school for all children and give schools more staff and support for this. Refugee children are also to enter regular school life quickly.

The Left wants all children to learn together. This includes children with disabilities. Schools should get more help and more staff for this. Refugee children should join regular classes quickly.

The Left wants a training drive to recruit more teachers, educators and social workers, and wants teachers' working time recalculated. In the short term, lateral entry and relief measures are to help.

Schools lack many skilled staff. The Left wants to train more people for these jobs. Teachers should be less overloaded. Their working time should be calculated anew.

The Left wants to adjust school location planning to birth numbers and found additional schools instead of overcrowding existing ones. School buildings are to be publicly owned and not rented on a large scale.

The Left wants to build new schools. Existing schools should not get too full. School buildings should belong to the city. The city should not rent them from private companies.

The Left wants to revise curricula and establish work against racism, antisemitism and discrimination based on gender identity as a task across all subjects. Teachers are to receive training for this.

The Left wants more civic education in schools. Schools should work against racism and hatred of Jews. Germany's colonial past should also be taught. Teachers should get training on these topics.

The Left calls for at least €1,000 more per vocational student per year to reach the level of the other city-states. Vocational schools are to be renovated or rebuilt and geared toward joint teaching.

The Left wants more money for vocational schools. It should be at least 1,000 euros more per student each year. The buildings should be rebuilt or repaired. Refugees and young people with disabilities should learn together with everyone else.

With a new science plan, the Left wants to raise the basic funding of Bremen's universities to at least the national average. The former private Jacobs University is to receive no more tax money.

The Left wants more money for Bremen's universities. They should get as much as the German average. The private university in Bremen-Grohn should get no tax money.

The Left wants university staff to be employed on permanent contracts as a rule after completing a doctorate. Teaching assignments are to be limited and better paid, and student assistants covered by a collective agreement.

Many researchers only have temporary contracts. The Left wants to change that. After their doctorate, they should usually get permanent jobs. Adjunct teachers and student assistants should also get better conditions.

The Left wants to make it easier to get into university, especially for children from non-academic families. It rejects numerus clausus admission limits, wants to scrap administrative fees and calls at the federal level for parent-independent BAföG (student aid) as a full grant.

The Left wants more people to be able to study. This should also be easier without the Abitur school diploma. University fees should be dropped completely. Students should not have to pay back their student aid.

The Left wants to create additional study places, above all in teacher training, health professions and social work. Gender research is also to be strengthened.

The Left wants more study places. This applies mainly to future teachers and to social work. Midwives should also get better training. Research on gender should be strengthened.

The Left wants to achieve four-way parity in university bodies, meaning equal voting weight for the four status groups. Student representative bodies are to be allowed to speak on general political issues.

At universities, committees decide many things. The Left wants all four groups to have the same number of votes there. Students are one of these groups. Their representatives should be allowed to speak on all political topics.

The Left supports moving part of the University of Bremen to the city center. A health campus is also to be set up there.

The Left wants to bring part of the university to the city center. All possible buildings and sites should be checked for this. The university should have a say early on. A health campus should also be built in the city center.

The Left wants to bring the private Constructor University into Bremen's public university system and end public money for it as a private institution. In Bremen-Nord, public daycare centers, elementary schools, and youth and cultural facilities are also to be strengthened.

There is a private university in Bremen-Nord. The Left wants to make it part of the public universities. As a private university it should get no more state money. There should be more public daycare centers. Schools and youth clubs should get more staff.

The Left wants older people to be able to live in their own home and familiar neighborhood for as long as possible. To that end, local care and support services are to be built up, including public home care, starting in poorer neighborhoods.

Old people should be able to live at home for a long time. For this, help should be available nearby. The city should build up its own home care service. There should be new forms of housing for older people. The city should put up 1,000 new benches.

The Left wants to push at the federal level for a wage-replacement benefit for family caregivers equivalent to Elterngeld (parental allowance). It is meant to cushion financial hardship during the care period and contribute to a fairer distribution of care work.

Many people care for relatives at home. They often earn less then. The Left wants a caregiver allowance like the parental allowance. It replaces part of the wage. People should get it for 12 or 24 months.

The Left wants to give priority to nonprofit providers in elder care and, in the long run, transfer homes owned by financial investors to public hands. In its view, the profit motive leads to worse care and overburdened staff.

Many nursing homes belong to big companies and investors. The Left thinks this is wrong. Nursing homes should belong to the city or to nonprofit groups. The office that inspects the homes should get twice as many staff.

The Left wants to turn long-term care insurance at the federal level into full-coverage insurance so that people in nursing homes no longer have to use up their savings. A generally binding collective pay scale is to apply to all care workers.

Care in a nursing home is very expensive. Many people have to spend their savings on it. The Left wants care insurance to pay all costs. All care workers should be paid by a collective agreement.

The Left wants to create neighborhood health and care centers under public ownership, starting in districts hit hardest by poverty. Doctors, nurses, social workers, midwives and counselors are to work there under one roof. According to the program, the goal is to reduce health inequality between poor and wealthy districts.

Poor districts often have too few doctors. The Left wants to build new health centers there. The centers should belong to the city. Doctors, nurses, midwives and counselors work together there.

The Left wants to set up and expand midwife centers in the districts and create more university places for midwives. Through the Bundesrat (the chamber of the states), it seeks a nationwide solution for midwives' liability insurance. The program sees care at risk because of low pay and high insurance costs.

Many pregnant women cannot find a midwife. The Left wants more midwife centers in the districts. There should be more university places for midwives. The costly insurance for midwives should get new nationwide rules.

The Left wants to fund research on illnesses that mainly affect women. According to the program, medicine long treated the male body as the norm, which created knowledge gaps. An information drive is meant to raise awareness among medical staff and the public.

Medicine studied mostly men for a long time. So less is known about women's illnesses. The Left wants to fund more research on this. It also wants to inform doctors and the public better.

The Left wants a law that ensures Bremen has enough facilities for counseling on and performing abortions. According to the program, women often face long waits or have to go to other states.

Women in Bremen often wait a long time for an abortion. Some have to travel to another state. The Left wants to change that with a law. There should be enough clinics and counseling.

The Left wants to make the anonymous health voucher for people without legal residence status permanent. Language barriers are to be overcome with interpreters whose costs are covered. The program sees the right to health for people with a migration background restricted by hurdles.

Some people live in Bremen without valid papers. They can see a doctor with an anonymous health voucher. The Left wants to keep this for good. Interpreters should also help at the doctor's and be paid for.

The Left wants to remove barriers for people with disabilities in doctors' offices, hospitals and other health facilities. Examination equipment, communication and information are to be adapted to their needs. Their self-determination in care and inpatient facilities is to be guaranteed.

People with disabilities often have a hard time at the doctor's. The Left wants to remove obstacles in offices and hospitals. Information should come in plain language. People should be allowed to bring their assistants.

The Left wants to plan outpatient and inpatient care together instead of strictly separating the two. The new hospital plan is to rest on an analysis of needs in Bremen, Bremerhaven and the surrounding area. According to the program, the restructuring must lead neither to job cuts nor to outsourcing.

Doctors' offices and hospitals are planned separately today. The Left wants to plan both together. First, needs should be studied closely. Nobody should lose their job in the restructuring.

The Left wants to abolish hospital financing through flat per-case fees and replace it with funding that covers actual needs. It aims for a hospital system in public ownership without a profit motive. Bremen is to launch a Bundesrat initiative for this.

Hospitals now get a fixed amount per treatment. This is called a per-case fee. The Left wants to abolish it. Hospitals should get as much money as they need. They should belong to the state and make no profit.

The Left wants to keep state funding for hospital investment permanently at today's level, which the program says has doubled since 2019. The city is also to take over loans of the municipal hospital group GeNo for its partial replacement building.

Hospitals need money for buildings and equipment. The state gives twice as much today as in 2019. The Left wants to keep it that way for good. The city should also take over debts of the municipal hospitals.

The Left wants to concentrate emergency care in a few central, well-equipped emergency rooms at specialized hospitals. For cases that are not life-threatening, there are also to be evenly distributed outpatient sites. This is meant to use scarce staff better and relieve emergency rooms.

Bremen has eight emergency rooms. The Left wants a few large and very good ones. For milder cases, there should be emergency practices nearby. That gives staff more time for the seriously ill.

The Left proposes a workload compensation scheme for nurses in the municipal hospital group GeNo that amounts to a 35-hour week without loss of pay. This is meant to make the profession more attractive. Alongside it, the party calls for a hiring drive and more training.

Nurses in hospitals have a very heavy workload. The Left wants to cut their working hours. They should work 35 hours a week. Pay should stay the same. More nurses should also be hired and trained.

The Left wants to plan doctors' practice seats by district rather than for the city as a whole. Planning is to take into account factors such as poverty, unemployment and care needs. The program cites a lack of general practitioners and specialists in poorer districts.

Poor districts lack doctors. Today, planning covers the whole city at once. The Left wants to plan for each district separately. Poor districts should get more practices.

The Left wants Bremen to push at the federal level to remove the legal basis for practices run by private investors. The party is mainly opposed to private equity firms in outpatient care. In the state, a transparency register is to disclose ownership.

Some doctors' practices belong to financial firms. The Left does not want that. The federal government should ban such practices. In Bremen, a register should show who owns practices and care facilities.

The Left wants psychiatric care without coercion and violence and more outpatient care so that fewer hospital stays are needed. This includes a crisis service that can be reached around the clock and also visits people. The state law PsychKG is to be reviewed to see how protection from forced treatment can be strengthened.

The Left wants psychiatric care without coercion and violence. People with mental health problems should get more help outside the hospital. A crisis service should be reachable day and night. There should be enough therapy places.

The Left wants to further expand the public health service (ÖGD) and gear it toward health promotion and prevention. Federal money from the pact for the public health service is to be used for this. A health plan for Bremen is meant to coordinate existing prevention programs better.

The public health service includes the local health offices. The Left wants to expand it further. It should help people stay healthy. There should be more staff for this. A plan should link all services better.

The Left wants to relieve family caregivers through more professional care and local counseling. Municipal health and care centers and the “Pflege im Quartier” (care in the neighborhood) concept are meant to make care work more of a public task.

Many people care for their relatives themselves. Most of them are women. The Left wants to help them. There should be more care services close to home. The city should also be planned better for families.

The Left supports legalizing cannabis and selling it in a controlled way with strong youth protection, and wants further decriminalization in Bremen. Addiction is to be met with help, education and prevention rather than repression.

The Left thinks the ban on cannabis has failed. Cannabis should be legal and sold under control. People who use drugs should not be treated like criminals. People with addiction should get help.

The Left wants to expand substitution programs for people addicted to drugs and set up a diamorphine clinic for the most severely addicted. Bremen should also get a drug-checking service to reduce risks from contaminated substances.

The Left wants more help for people addicted to drugs. They should be able to get substitute drugs from a doctor. There should be a special clinic for people with severe addiction. It gives them pure diamorphine, which is medical heroin. People should also be able to have their drugs tested.

The Left wants to develop pilot projects for the controlled dispensing of crack. It also calls for tolerance zones and permanent rest and consumption rooms instead of merely pushing the drug scene away from the main station.

Many people use the drug crack near Bremen's main station. The Left wants to test handing out crack in a controlled way. There should be fixed rooms where people can rest and use drugs. The party does not want to just push people away from the station.

The Left wants to keep the municipal hospital group Gesundheit Nord (GeNo) financially secure. Its restructuring should neither worsen care nor burden staff; the federal government should reorganize hospital financing.

Gesundheit Nord runs city hospitals in Bremen. The Left wants it to get enough money. Care for patients should not get worse. Nurses should earn more.

The Left wants to make meals in daycare centers and schools free and shift public canteens to regional, seasonal, and organic food. In the party's view, healthy eating should not depend on income.

The Left wants free meals in daycare centers and schools. The food should be healthy and come from the region. There should be less meat. The city should have drinking fountains everywhere.

The Left wants to turn the Bremen-Nord hospital into one offering the full range of medical care and keep its care for premature babies. Access to pediatricians and specialists is also to improve.

The Left wants to expand the hospital in Bremen-Nord. It should offer all important treatments. The unit for premature babies should stay. There should be more children's doctors and specialists.

The Left wants to preserve and expand the public Reinkenheide hospital in Bremerhaven. To counter a looming shortage of doctors, it calls for a framework plan based on actual need.

Bremerhaven has one public hospital. The Left wants to keep and expand it. Bremerhaven will soon lack doctors. The Left wants a plan to fix that.

The Left wants to bring conditions for all refugees closer to those applied to people from Ukraine. This includes easy access to housing, work, education, and health care, and generous use of legal leeway on residence status.

Refugees from Ukraine got help quickly. The Left wants this for all refugees. They should easily get housing, work, and schooling. They should also be able to see a doctor. The authorities should let as many as possible stay.

Districts such as Gröpelingen or Blumenthal, where many immigrants and refugees first settle, are to receive preferential support. At the same time, other districts are to take on a larger share of integration.

Many new people arrive in certain districts. They find their first home there. The Left wants to give these districts extra help. Other districts should also take in new people.

The Left wants to ease the recognition of qualifications obtained abroad and expand related counseling. According to the program, many people in Bremen cannot work in their trained profession because their qualification is not recognized.

Many people learned their job in another country. In Germany their qualification often does not count. The Left wants to make this easier. There should be more advice. Courses for missing skills should also continue.

The Left wants to remove barriers and disadvantages for people with a migration background in the labor market and promote their potential in a targeted way. Counseling centers for mobile EU workers and against workplace discrimination are to be permanently funded.

People with a migration background often have a harder time at work. The Left wants to change that. There should be more language mediators. These are people who help others understand. Advice centers against exploitation should get permanent funding.

The Left calls for permanent residence status for people persecuted because of their gender or sexual orientation. Refugee women who have experienced violence should also get an unrestricted right to stay and dedicated shelters.

Some people flee because they are queer. Queer means, for example, lesbian, gay or trans. The Left wants them to be allowed to stay for good. The same should apply to refugee women who suffered violence. They should get safe housing.

The Left wants to reduce disadvantages for people with a migration background in daycare, school, training and work. Victims of labor exploitation are to receive a humanitarian right to stay.

Immigrants often have worse chances at school and at work. The Left wants to change that. Job applications should more often be checked without names. People who were exploited at work should be allowed to stay in Germany.

The Left wants legal escape routes and a Bremen state admission program for people at risk in Afghanistan. Refugees from Ukraine without a Ukrainian passport should be treated the same as those with one.

The Left wants safe and legal ways for people to flee. Bremen should take in people from Afghanistan who are in danger. This includes relatives of people living in Bremen. People fleeing Ukraine should have the same rights, whatever passport they hold.

The Left rejects classifying countries as safe countries of origin and points to Roma, who rarely receive protection. It wants political asylum for whistleblowers and a humanitarian right to stay for victims of violence and exploitation.

Germany treats some countries as safe. People from those countries almost never get protection. The Left is against this rule. People who expose wrongdoing should get asylum. Victims of violence and exploitation should be allowed to stay.

The Left wants refugees housed in small, decentralized units instead of large shared shelters, and moved into their own apartments early. Bremen itself should build and convert properties for this, for example through a public agency.

The Left does not want big shelters for refugees. They should live in small housing units all across the city. They should get their own apartment as soon as possible. Bremen should build and convert buildings itself for this.

The Left rejects the central initial reception center on Lindenstraße in its current form because it considers it too large. It wants to keep shrinking the facility and spread it across several sites.

Bremen has one large first shelter for asylum seekers. The Left thinks it is too big. It wants to make it smaller and spread it over several places. People who are especially at risk should be housed safely from the start.

The Left wants refugee shelters designed like apartments, with privacy, private bathrooms and kitchens. The inviolability of the home should apply there too, and every shared shelter should have a violence-protection plan.

Shelters for refugees should be like apartments. There should be a private bathroom and a kitchen. No one may simply enter the rooms, not even the police. Every shelter needs a plan to protect people from violence. There should be more staff and interpreters.

The Left wants more money and staff for counseling, guide programs, German learning sites and translation help for refugees. Government tasks should not be permanently shifted onto volunteers.

Refugees need advice and help when they arrive. The Left wants more money and more staff for this. The state should not leave this work to volunteers. Young refugees should be able to finish school even as adults.

The Left wants people without German or other EU citizenship to be able to vote for the district councils as well. The condition would be five years of residence in Germany and currently living in Bremen.

Some people in Bremen have no German or EU passport. Today they cannot vote for the district councils. The Left wants to change that. People who have lived in Germany for five years and live in Bremen should be able to vote.

The Left wants to achieve equal pay and higher employment among women mainly through better childcare. In addition, the state government is to develop its own strategies against labor-market discrimination of people with a migration background and people of diverse gender.

Women should earn as much as men. More women should be able to work. This needs enough childcare, also in the late afternoon. Other groups should also get equal chances at work.

The Left calls for abolishing Section 218 of the criminal code, thereby legalizing abortion in principle. It wants to introduce a Bundesrat initiative for this. Doctors who perform abortions should clearly be free from criminal liability.

Abortion is part of the criminal code today. Section 218 sets the rules. The Left wants to abolish this section. Abortions should be legal in principle. Bremen should demand this in the Bundesrat.

The Left wants to upgrade occupations with a high share of women and ease women's access to better-paid fields such as IT. The state strategy on gender fairness and equal pay is to be implemented and support for single parents expanded.

Women often earn less than men. The Left wants to improve jobs where many women work. More women should work in well-paid jobs, for example with computers. Single parents should get more help. This includes flexible childcare.

The Left wants to implement a strategy against unequal pay between women and men that involves all government departments. More women should work in jobs with social insurance coverage and in skilled and leadership positions.

Women often earn less than men. The Left wants to change that. All government offices in Bremen should work together on it. More women should have good, stable jobs.

The Left wants to quickly implement the state action plan on the Istanbul Convention, the European treaty against violence toward women. It calls for more money for prevention and education, training for police and the justice system, and a ban on so-called knockout drops.

Many women experience violence, often at home. The Left wants more money for protection and education. Police and courts should be trained better. Knockout drops should be banned.

The Left wants more places in women's shelters and a central office that allocates them. For homeless, addicted and prostituting women, safe spaces, counseling and emergency sleeping places are to be expanded.

Women's shelters protect women from violence. The Left wants more places there. One central office should hand out the places. Women without a home should also get protection and help.

The Left wants to fund meeting places, counseling centers and cultural institutions for girls, women and queer people on a permanent rather than temporary basis. Grants should allow staff to be paid according to collective agreements.

Bremen has meeting places and counseling for girls and women. The Left wants to give them money for the long term. Staff there should be paid under union contracts. Women in politics should also get more support.

The Left wants to declare International Women's Day on March 8 a public holiday in the state of Bremen.

March 8 is International Women's Day. The Left wants this day to be a public holiday. Then most people have the day off.

The Left wants to permanently fund and expand counseling, education and cultural programs for queer people. Medical care for trans and intersex people is to be improved.

The Left wants more services for queer people. Counseling and school education programs should get long-term funding. Trans people should get better medical help. Bremerhaven should get a meeting place for queer youth.

The Left wants a state law that broadens protection against discrimination, creates a right for associations to sue and enshrines participation rights for migrant self-organizations. Public housing companies are to allocate apartments under transparent rules.

The Left wants a new law against unfair treatment. Associations should be allowed to go to court for affected people. Immigrant groups should get fixed rights to have a say. Public offices should use more languages and plain language.

The Left wants the state of Bremen to become climate-neutral by 2038. To get there, the goals and recommendations of the state's climate inquiry commission are to be implemented, also to preserve industry and jobs.

Bremen and Bremerhaven should be climate-neutral by 2038. That means they release almost no harmful gases. A commission made proposals for this. The Left wants to carry out these proposals.

The Left wants to pay for the investments in Bremen's climate action plan from a climate fund for which the state takes out special loans. The fund is also meant to finance measures for social and economic compensation so that the path to climate neutrality is fair.

The Left wants a climate fund. That is a big pot of money for climate action. The state of Bremen should borrow money for it. The money should also help people with low incomes.

The Left wants to set up a municipal energy company for Bremen's decentralized supply that does not aim for returns. Public companies are to play a central role in the shift to climate neutrality because, in the program's view, private firms cannot be bound to political goals.

The Left wants a new energy company. It should belong to the city. It should run soundly but not make profits for owners. Public companies should play a big role in climate action.

The Left wants the state to support the conversion of Bremen's steelworks to climate-neutral production using green hydrogen. According to the program, the steelworks causes about half of the state's CO₂ emissions. Bremen and Bremerhaven are also to be developed as a hydrogen region.

The steelworks in Bremen emits a lot of CO₂. The Left wants to convert it. It should run on green hydrogen. The state should provide money for this.

The Left wants solar panels on all technically suitable roofs and facades and a solar mandate for municipal housing companies. For wind power, new priority areas are to be designated and old turbines replaced with stronger ones. Bremen should take direct stakes in offshore wind farms.

The Left wants much more power from sun and wind. City-owned housing companies should have to build solar panels. Old wind turbines should be replaced by stronger ones. Bremen should take part in wind farms at sea.

The Left wants a state heating law and a state heating plan. The annual renovation rate is to rise from 1.35 to 3.2 percent, and passive houses are to become the standard for new buildings. The program argues that nearly a third of CO₂ emissions come from buildings.

Buildings cause a lot of CO₂. The Left wants a law for climate-friendly heating. Many more houses should be renovated each year. New houses should need very little energy.

The Left wants uniform action plans for climate resilience in Bremen and Bremerhaven, to be implemented in the next legislative term. Dikes are to be raised faster, surfaces unsealed and cool places created. Social conditions are to be a focus because, according to the program, heat and heavy rain hit densely built, unrenovated districts hardest.

The climate is already changing. There is more heat and more heavy rain. The Left wants to prepare the cities for this. It wants higher dikes, more green space and cool places. Poorer districts should get special attention.

The Left wants to involve the public early in the shift to climate neutrality through a campaign and participation formats. All districts are to have repair cafés and material exchanges permanently funded by the city. The party also wants more places where people do not have to spend money.

Climate action brings a lot of construction work. The Left wants to inform people early and let them have a say. Every district should have repair cafés. People fix broken things together there. The city should pay for this.

The Left wants to implement Bremen's hydrogen strategy and the projects of the climate pact and to fully fund the subsidized hydrogen projects. To produce green hydrogen, offshore wind power is to be expanded massively, including jointly with other northern German states.

The Left wants to use hydrogen as energy. This should make the steel plant climate neutral. That needs a lot of green electricity. So more wind turbines should stand at sea. Bremen should work with other northern states on this.

The Left wants to advance energy-efficient building renovation through funding programs. New buildings are always to have photovoltaics on the roof, and renewable energy is to be factored into commercial investments.

The Left wants buildings to use less energy. There will be funding for this. New buildings should always have solar panels on the roof. Companies should also plan for green energy in new buildings.

The Left wants universities to develop binding sustainability strategies, fit their roofs with solar panels and undergo energy renovation. University construction is to be a budget priority and financed through special programs.

The Left wants universities to protect the climate. All roofs should get solar panels. Old buildings should be renovated. Special programs should provide the money for this.

The Left opposes handling climate investments through public-private partnerships. Instead, a municipal planning company working across departments is to plan and carry out the projects.

Bremen wants to spend a lot of money on climate protection. The Left wants the city to plan these projects itself. A city-owned planning company should do this. Private firms should not profit at the city's expense.

The Left wants to bring the district heating networks back under municipal ownership and found a new city-owned energy utility. The platform sees district heating as central to the energy transition and says it requires major network expansion.

District heating brings heat to homes through pipes. The Left wants the city to own these pipes again. Bremen should also start its own energy company. This should speed up the energy transition.

The Left wants a circular economy in which more than 99 percent of raw materials are recycled in the future. The program cites scarce raw materials for the energy transition as well as environmental damage and human rights violations in mining.

Wind turbines and solar panels need raw materials. Mining them often harms nature and people. The Left wants to reuse almost all raw materials. Bremen should build the facilities needed for this.

The Left wants to protect the green belt around Bremen and allow no further development in undeveloped outlying areas. Parks, trees and allotment gardens are to be preserved and expanded, paved surfaces unsealed and the municipal environmental service given more funding.

A green belt of nature surrounds Bremen. The Left does not want any more building there. The city should have more parks, trees and allotment gardens. Allotment gardens should not become commercial land. The city's environmental service should get more money.

The Left wants Bremen's biodiversity strategy to be continually updated and carried out. Pesticides should no longer be used in Bremen, gravel gardens should disappear, and paved surfaces should be opened up and planted.

The Left wants to protect more animals and plants in the city. Bremen should stop using pesticides. Gravel gardens should stay banned. More areas should become green.

The Left rejects deepening the Lower Weser, arguing that the expansion harms the river and its tributaries ecologically. The deepening of the Outer Weser now applied for is to be the final stage.

The Left does not want to make the Lower Weser deeper. It says this harms the river and its wildlife. The Outer Weser should be deepened one last time only. Smaller rivers should become more natural again.

The Left wants Bremen to become a city built around the circular economy by 2038. At the same time, noise limits should not be loosened and illegal dumping should be stopped.

By 2038, Bremen should throw away less and reuse more. Broken devices should be repaired more often. Noise rules should stay strict. Illegally dumped trash should be removed quickly.

The Left wants to end experiments on primates at the University of Bremen and push at the federal level for stricter animal welfare law. Animal testing is to be handled far more restrictively.

The Left wants no more experiments on monkeys at the University of Bremen. Laws that protect animals should become stricter. Selling animals online should be banned. Animals should be kept and transported in better conditions.

The Left wants to introduce a mandatory certificate of competence, including dog training, for dog owners. Bremen's animal shelter should get reliable, sufficient funding, and public dovecotes are to be set up for city pigeons.

People who keep a dog should show they know how. This includes dog training classes. The animal shelter in Bremen should get more money. Pigeons should get their own shelters in the city.

The Left opposes expanding the Grauer Wall landfill in Bremerhaven and wants to plan a replacement site. It sees dangers to groundwater and residents and demands that less waste from outside be accepted.

Bremerhaven has a landfill. It is supposed to get bigger. The Left is against this. It sees dangers for groundwater and for neighbors. The party wants to look for another place for the waste.

The Left wants an agricultural transition toward organic farming and land-based livestock keeping. Conventional farms are to be won over through subsidies, and former peatlands are to be rewetted.

The Left wants more organic farming in Bremen. Farmers should get money and help to switch. Pesticides on fields should stop. Old peatlands should become wet again. That helps the climate.

The Left wants to end food waste and make "Containern" (taking discarded food from store dumpsters) exempt from punishment. Institutional catering is to switch to a diet with few animal products.

The Left wants less food to end up in the trash. People who take food from store dumpsters should not be punished. Schools and cafeterias should serve less meat. Food should come from the region where possible.

The Left wants to require food retailers to give unsold goods to food banks instead of throwing them away. It also calls for regional cycles in food production and stronger intervention against the market power of large corporations.

Stores often throw food away. The Left wants stores to give this food to food banks. Food banks hand out food to poor people. More food should come from the region. Big companies should have less power.

The Left wants urban development to start at the neighborhood level and set up low-car blocks there. The city center is to become a place for living and studying with a social mix.

Fewer cars should drive in some neighborhoods. People there get more space on the street. People should live and study in the city center. Poor and rich people should live there together.

The Left wants to cut car traffic by at least 30 percent by 2030; at least half of what remains should be electric. To that end, public transit is to be usable without a ticket and expanded faster. The expansion targets are to be set out in a mobility law.

The Left wants fewer cars on the roads. Buses and trams should be usable without a ticket. The network should grow faster. A new law should set the goals.

The Left wants less private car traffic and more public transit, walking, and cycling, and wants to enshrine this in a mobility law. The debt brake is to be suspended to pay for the necessary investments.

The Left wants fewer cars in the city. More people should use buses, trains, and bikes. A new law should set this down. Bremen should be allowed to borrow money for the costs.

The Left wants buses and trams in Bremen to be usable without a ticket from June 1, 2024. This is to be funded through higher property and business taxes plus federal money.

The Left wants buses and trams in Bremen to be free. This should start in June 2024. Two taxes should go up to pay for it. People with more money would pay more.

The Left wants to create a fast transit network that works without a subway and links places where many people live or work. A planning contract is to be put out to tender in the coming legislative term.

Bremen has no subway. Buses and trams are often slow. The Left wants a fast network without a subway. Experts should draw up a plan for it.

The Left wants to enlarge the transit network with new and extended tram lines, more S-Bahn stops, cross-town links, and ferries on the Weser. Poorly connected neighborhoods are to get priority.

Some districts have poor bus and train connections. The Left wants to build new lines. Trains should run more often. Ferries on the Weser river should be added too.

The Left wants more passenger, freight, and long-distance traffic on rail and plans to expand and reactivate lines for this. Freight is to shift from trucks to rail and water.

The Left wants more trains for people and goods. Some routes should get more tracks. Old routes should reopen. Fewer goods should travel by truck.

The Left wants to give pedestrians and cyclists more room and names zero traffic deaths ("Vision Zero") as the top goal. Protected bike lanes, faster cycling routes, and shorter waits at traffic lights are to help.

The Left wants more space for people on foot and on bikes. No one should die in traffic anymore. Bike lanes should be safe and wide. Traffic lights should turn green faster.

The Left demands a 30 km/h speed limit in the city, combined with physical traffic calming. On autobahns, a nationwide limit of no more than 120 km/h is to apply.

The Left wants a speed limit of 30 in the city. Big roads with four lanes keep a limit of 50. On highways the limit should be 120 at most. Fixed speed cameras should check this.

The Left wants to reduce the car's share of traffic by narrowing roads, removing a quarter of parking spaces, and making downtown car-free. The freed-up space is to be used for sidewalks, green areas, housing, and playgrounds.

The Left wants fewer cars in Bremen. Wide roads should become narrower. One in four parking spaces should go. Downtown should be car-free. The space should be used for green areas, paths, and homes.

People aged 60 and over are to get a lifelong free transit pass and monthly free taxi rides if they deregister their car. The program argues that many older people rarely use their car but still need it for certain trips.

Many older people rarely drive anymore. The Left makes them an offer. People over 60 who give up their car ride buses and trams for free. They also get free taxi rides every month.

Once the A 281 is finished, the Left rejects any further new or widened autobahns in Bremen and opposes continuing the A 20. It cites the protection of peatlands that store CO₂.

The Left wants no new highways in Bremen. Only the A 281 should still be finished. The A 20 should not be built further. Otherwise important peatlands would be destroyed.

The Left demands resident-only parking across the whole city with a socially acceptable base fee. A roundtable, a plan from the transport authority, and a municipal towing service are to tackle parking on sidewalks.

The Left wants parking for residents only across the city. The price should be fair. Big, heavy cars should pay double. Cars should no longer park on sidewalks.

The Left supports the EU-wide end of new non-climate-neutral cars from 2035 and wants to expand charging stations. It rejects subsidies for hybrid vehicles and for cars running on e-fuels or hydrogen.

From 2035, no new gasoline or diesel cars should be registered in the EU. The Left agrees with this. It wants more charging stations for e-cars and e-bikes. Hybrid cars should no longer get subsidies.

The Left rejects closing the passenger area of Bremen's airport or privatizing the airport. It cites business travel, international logistics chains, and the airport's status as critical infrastructure.

The Left wants to keep the airport in Bremen. Passengers should still be able to fly from there. The airport should belong to the city. The Left does not want to sell it to private companies.

The Left wants to renovate port infrastructure in Bremen and Bremerhaven and raise the share of rail transport. The northern German ports are to cooperate as one system instead of competing, so that logistics chains become climate neutral as quickly as possible.

The ports are important for Bremen. The Left wants to renew old port facilities. More goods should travel by train. The ports in the north should work together. Big ships should have to use electricity from land while in port.

The Left wants to improve public transit in Bremen-Nord. Buses are to be timed to connect with trains and serve outlying areas at frequent intervals, and a fast ferry on the Weser is to be added.

The Left wants better buses in Bremen-Nord. Buses should wait for the train. Remote neighborhoods should also get frequent buses. A fast ferry should run on the Weser river.

The Left sees the internet as a basic right and wants freely accessible Wi-Fi in public spaces. The rollout of 5G and fiber is to speed up without neglecting disadvantaged neighborhoods.

The Left wants free Wi-Fi in public places. That way everyone can go online, even with little money. Fast internet should be available everywhere, including poorer neighborhoods. Local trains should have Wi-Fi.

The Left wants to create a fund that helps people with low incomes buy digital devices. Education on digital skills and data protection is to be supported in order to narrow the digital divide.

Some people cannot afford a computer or a phone. The Left wants to help them with money from a fund. There should be courses on using digital technology. All classrooms should get Wi-Fi.

The Left wants dealings with government offices to be possible online and fax machines abolished in the administration. Software built with public money should be freely available as open source, and the administration should become less dependent on Microsoft products.

The Left wants people to be able to reach government offices online. Offices should send each other emails instead of faxes. Software paid for by the state should be free for all to use. The administration should depend less on big software companies.

The Left rejects upload filters, data retention and the EU's planned chat control. It wants to anchor net neutrality in law through a Bundesrat initiative and strengthen the state data protection authority.

The Left is against storing everyone's connection data. It is also against scanning private chats. On the internet, all data should travel at the same speed. This should be written into law. Bremen's data protection office should become stronger.

The Left wants to abolish the designated danger zones in which police may carry out checks without specific suspicion. It justifies this by pointing to racial profiling, meaning checks based on appearance.

In some areas, the police may check anyone without a reason. The Left wants to abolish these areas. It says the police check people with dark skin more often. That should stop.

The Left calls for a state strategy against far-right violence involving all government departments. It also wants a central reporting office and a specialized prosecutor's office for hate speech, plus permanently funded education and counseling projects.

The Left wants a state plan against far-right violence. Victims of online hate should be able to turn to one central office. A special prosecutor's office should pursue such cases. Projects against hatred of Jews and racism should get lasting funding.

The Left wants community-oriented police with modern equipment and enough staff, arguing that safety must not depend on income. It also holds a concept of security that includes prevention and social justice.

The police should have enough staff and good equipment. Bremen should train more officers. Overtime should be paid out soon. There should be fewer weapons in private homes.

The Left opposes more video surveillance without specific cause, state spyware and wider use of tasers. Independent bodies, rather than fellow officers, should investigate police officers.

The Left does not want more cameras without a reason. The state should not secretly break into computers. When police officers make mistakes, an independent body should investigate. Experts should be present when people are in a mental crisis.

The Left calls for dissolving the Verfassungsschutz (domestic intelligence agency). It argues that preventing danger and fighting terrorism are police tasks and that the agency has repeatedly put protecting its sources above people's safety.

The Verfassungsschutz is a domestic intelligence agency. The Left wants to abolish it. It says the police can do these tasks. Until then, the law for the agency should become stricter.

The Left wants to make deradicalization and prevention programs addressing Islamism permanent and expand them. The same approach is to apply to evangelical groups whose work the party describes as sexist and anti-queer.

The Left wants more programs against religious extremism. Teachers should get help from civil-society groups. This applies to Islamism and to strict Christian groups. Such groups should get no public money.

The Left wants to staff the professional fire service so that it meets its targets for emergency medical response and firefighting. Volunteer fire brigades, disaster protection, the public order service, and citizen service offices are also to get more funding or staff.

The Left wants more staff for the fire service. Firefighters should arrive fast enough. The public order service should get more jobs too. City offices should work faster.

The Left wants courts and prosecutors staffed well enough for cases to move quickly. At the same time, support for crime victims, victim-offender mediation, and programs to avoid imprisonment are to be expanded.

The Left wants faster court cases. Courts should have enough staff for that. Victims of crime should get more advice and help. There should also be more ways to avoid prison.

The Left wants to abolish Ersatzfreiheitsstrafen, meaning jail time for people who cannot pay a fine. The program calls them socially unjust and expensive. Offenses such as blasphemy are also to be removed from the criminal code.

Some people cannot pay a fine. Today they must go to jail instead. The Left wants to end that. Blasphemy should also no longer be a crime.

The Left wants to pay inmates the minimum wage for their work and give them pension credits for it. Education, counseling, and therapy in prison are to be expanded to prevent reoffending.

Many prisoners work in prison. The Left wants to pay them the minimum wage. They should also earn pension rights. Young prisoners should find it easier to finish school.

The Left wants a parity law so that women make up at least half of the members of the state's parliaments. It argues that women have so far been underrepresented there.

There are fewer women than men in parliaments. The Left wants a law against that. At least half of the members should be women.

The Left rejects compulsory service for young people. Instead, voluntary service programs should become more flexible, attractive and visible so that all young people have access to them.

Some people call for a mandatory service year for young people. The Left is against it. It wants to improve voluntary service instead. All young people should be able to do such a year if they want.

The Left wants people without a German passport to receive full voting rights after five years of residence. In the party's view, anyone who lives here permanently and is affected by the laws should also have a say in them.

Many people in Bremen have no German passport. They are not allowed to vote. The Left wants to change that. Anyone who has lived here for five years should be allowed to vote.

The Left wants to declare May 8 a public holiday in Bremen. It calls it the day of victory over fascism.

World War II ended in Europe on May 8, 1945. The Left wants this day to be a public holiday in Bremen. People would then have the day off.

The Left wants to recruit more staff for the administration, schools, daycare and nursing, and make public service more attractive financially. Collective pay settlements are to be passed on to civil servants in full.

The Left wants more people to work for the state. Bremen should train more people itself. Civil servants should get the same raises as other public employees. Jobs that are hard to fill should come with bonuses.

The Left wants a separate Bremen freedom of assembly law that strengthens the rights of demonstrators and assembly organizers. The ban on face coverings at protests should be dropped or at least reduced to an administrative offense.

The Left wants a new law for demonstrations in Bremen. It should protect the rights of participants. Police should have to cooperate with organizers. Covering your face at a protest should no longer be a crime.

The Left wants citizens to be able to bring their own complaints before Bremen's state constitutional court. In addition, the word “race” is to be removed from the state constitution and replaced with a ban on racist discrimination.

Bremen has its own constitutional court. The Left wants ordinary people to be able to file cases there. The word “race” should be taken out of Bremen's constitution. It should instead ban racist discrimination.

The Left wants to strengthen the Beiräte (district advisory councils) in Bremen's neighborhoods. They are to decide local matters themselves rather than just be consulted, get more budgets of their own, and be better equipped.

Bremen has district councils. These are elected groups for each part of the city. The Left wants to give them more power. They should decide things themselves and manage more money. Members should get tablets and fixed monthly payments.

The Left wants better conditions for volunteer work. Funding applications are to become simpler, grants are to run longer than one year, and a shared house for volunteer organizations is to be created.

Many people in Bremen volunteer. The Left wants to make their work easier. Clubs should have less paperwork. Funding should be promised for more than one year. There should be a house for volunteers.

The Left wants to reform Bremerhaven's city leadership. The mayor is to be elected directly by the people, and full-time department heads are to be chosen for professional qualification rather than by coalition quotas.

The Left wants to change Bremerhaven's city government. People should elect the mayor themselves. Department heads should be chosen for their skills. Party membership should not decide.

The Left rejects the 100-billion-euro package for the Bundeswehr and wants to stop arms exports via Bremen through a state law. Arms manufacturers are to switch to civilian, ecologically sensible production, backed by a conversion fund.

The Left is against more money for weapons for the army. No more weapons should be shipped abroad from Bremen. A state law should make sure of this. Companies that build weapons should make other things. A fund should help them do so.

The Left rejects nuclear sharing and calls for the nuclear weapons to be withdrawn from Büchel. Bremen should press at the federal level for this and for Germany to join the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

US nuclear weapons are stored in Germany. The Left wants these weapons removed. Germany should join a United Nations treaty. This treaty bans nuclear weapons. Bremen should push the federal government to do this.

The Left wants to keep the civil clause in the higher education law and retain the ban on recruitment by military youth officers in schools. Domestic deployments of the Bundeswehr should happen only in disasters; civilian relief organizations are to be expanded.

The army should not advertise in schools. Universities should not do research for the military. Inside Germany, the army should only help in disasters. Civilian helpers like the federal relief agency should become stronger. Universities should do more research on peace.

The Left wants to use the port operations law to ban the shipment of arms and ammunition through Bremen's ports. In this way it aims to hinder arms exports approved by the federal government.

Weapons are shipped through the ports in Bremen. The Left wants to ban that. A state law would be changed to do so. The party wants to slow down weapons sales abroad this way.

The Left wants to found a Bremen memorial sites foundation to develop the concept of Nazi-era remembrance and look after memorial sites. Crime sites and structures from that period are to be explained more clearly and artistically reworked.

The Left wants to set up a foundation for memorial sites in Bremen. It should take care of remembering the Nazi era. Places of Nazi crimes should become better known. There should also be a place about the persecution of queer people.

The Left wants unlawfully acquired objects in Bremen's museums fully returned to their societies of origin. Streets with colonial references are to be renamed, and colonial traces in the city made visible and put in context.

Bremen's museums hold things that were stolen in colonial times. The Left wants to give them back. Streets named after colonial criminals should get new names. Residents should not have to pay for this. The Bismarck statue should be changed by artists.

The Left wants to introduce regular free-admission days at museums and anchor culture in all city districts. Space for culture is to be planned into new development areas, and new rehearsal rooms for bands are to be created.

The Left wants everyone to be able to enjoy culture. Museums should be free on some days. New neighborhoods should have space for culture. Bands should get new rooms to rehearse. Open-air parties should stay allowed.

The Left wants to further increase public funding for culture. Projects that operate continuously are to receive permanent institutional funding, project grants are to grow, and a stipend program for artists is to continue.

The Left wants to spend more money on culture. Projects that work regularly should get lasting funding. Projects by women should get at least an equal share. Artists should keep getting stipends. Applications should be simple.

The Left wants to introduce exhibition fees for visual artists at publicly funded venues. Minimum fees in project funding should be adequate and honored, and fees at the Volkshochschule (adult education center) should rise.

Artists should be paid when museums show their work. This should apply to venues that get public money. Teachers at the adult education center should get higher fees. More art on public buildings should bring new commissions.

The Left wants to develop cultural education through a framework plan and expand cooperation between cultural practitioners and schools. The city library is to get more staff as a meeting place.

The Left wants a plan for cultural education. Artists and schools should work together more. Projects should only need one application at one office. The city library should get more staff. It is a place where people meet.

The Left wants Radio Bremen funded according to need, the broadcasting fee made more socially fair and advertising removed from public broadcasting. It also calls for reforms in transparency and oversight and for press subsidies kept at arm's length from the state.

The Left wants to keep Radio Bremen and public broadcasting. The broadcasting fee should be fairer to people with less money. Public channels should no longer show ads. Broadcasters should be more open and better supervised. Newspapers should get support without the state steering them.

The Left wants to repair gyms and district sports grounds through a renovation program. At the same time, more freely accessible sports equipment and exercise areas are to be created in public spaces.

Many gyms and sports fields are in poor shape. The Left wants to repair them. There should also be more outdoor sports equipment. Anyone can use it for free.

The Left wants to cover club fees for people with low incomes and create a sports funding program for recipients of welfare benefits. Clubs are also to get more support for integration, inclusion, and diversity.

Sports clubs cost money. Some people cannot afford that. The Left wants to pay their fees. Children should be able to go swimming for 1 euro.

The Left wants more sports and activity areas for young people and better conditions at places where people party. Young people should also find affordable housing more easily.

The Left wants more places for ball sports, skating and BMX. Where young people party, there should be toilets and support teams. Young people should find a cheap apartment more easily.

The Left wants to secure older people's participation through short, barrier-free routes, digital training alongside continued non-digital access to authorities, and a law on seniors' participation. Local services and multigenerational housing are to counter loneliness in old age.

The Left wants to make life easier for older people. They should be able to learn how to use the internet. Public offices should stay reachable by phone or in person. Meeting places in the neighborhood should help against loneliness.

The Left wants Bremen to develop its own sustainability strategy and update it regularly. It should cover how the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals are implemented in the state and Bremen's contribution to global development.

The United Nations has 17 goals for a better world. The Left wants a plan for how Bremen reaches these goals. Bremen should renew the plan again and again. A report with numbers alone is not enough for the party.

The Left wants to strengthen consumer protection with more public money. Plans include more neighborhood contact points and advice, a better-funded consumer advice center, and ad-free daycare centers and schools.

The Left wants to protect consumers better. Consumers are people who buy or use things. There should be more advice in the neighborhoods. The consumer advice center should get more money and staff. Daycare centers and schools should have no ads.