SPD on public safety

The SPD wants Saxony's police to be modern and well equipped, focusing above all on working and training conditions. The higher number of training places is to be maintained.

The SPD wants the police to be well equipped. Police training should become more modern and better. Many people should keep being trained there. People should be able to trust the police.

According to the platform, people in cities and rural areas need reliable security structures and a police force they can trust. Police training and degree programs are to be modernized. The SPD points out that more officers have been trained since it joined the government and wants to continue on that path.

The SPD wants to keep modernizing Saxony's Verfassungsschutz (domestic intelligence agency) but rejects giving it additional powers. The agency should cooperate more closely with police and firearms authorities and operate under clear rule-of-law standards.

The Verfassungsschutz is a domestic intelligence agency. The SPD wants to modernize it. But it should not get more powers. It should work better with the police and gun authorities. The state parliament should oversee it more closely.

The platform justifies the modernization by saying democracy must remain able to defend itself. Better coordination with police and firearms authorities is meant to make action against enemies of the constitution more effective. Clear rules grounded in the rule of law are supposed to build trust in the agency's work. A specialist office for the Parliamentary Control Commission is to be set up to support the state parliament's oversight.

The SPD wants a statewide disaster response plan and continued investment in fire protection. Volunteers in all emergency organizations are to be treated equally. Fire departments and rescue services are to become more capable locally.

Saxony should get a plan for disasters. The state should keep paying for fire departments. Volunteer helpers should have the same rights everywhere. They should still get their pay during missions. Rescue services should also get better.

The disaster response plan is to rest on a risk and hazard analysis and also cover larger incidents below the formal disaster threshold; municipalities should, for example, draw up heat protection plans. Equal treatment of helpers, so far in place for fire departments, is to cover all emergency services, with wage compensation during missions and time off for training. The SPD wants to continue investment support for fire protection and cooperation between municipalities, and to back hub fire stations and regional needs plans. Municipalities are to be allowed by law to pay a flat fee for daytime readiness. Regional dispatch centers are to gain more medical expertise, and rescue services are to get simpler contracting and tools such as remote emergency physicians.

The SPD wants prisons to focus more on reintegration and to hire more specialist staff for this. People who cannot pay a fine should more often do community service instead of going to jail. This is meant to relieve the prisons.

Prisoners should be better prepared for life after prison. There should be more psychologists, doctors and therapists. Some people cannot pay a fine. They should more often do community work instead of going to prison.

The number of psychological, medical and therapeutic specialists in prisons is to rise. Substitute imprisonment, meaning jail time in place of an unpaid fine, is to be served more often through community service. The SPD wants to continue and expand special programs for family support and drug counseling in prisons.

The SPD wants to keep matching police staffing to the force's tasks and to prevent staff cuts. Police are to be visibly present, alongside prevention programs. At demonstrations, violent troublemakers are to be identified and stopped early.

The police should have enough staff for their tasks. This should be checked regularly. Police should be easy to see on the streets. At protests they should spot violent troublemakers early. Peaceful protesters should be left alone.

An ongoing task analysis is to determine the staffing needs of the state police. Training and degree programs are to be modernized and given a stronger scientific basis, and the police schools and the administrative college are to be better equipped. The SPD wants to respond to feelings of insecurity with police presence, prevention by the state and municipalities, and meaningful information; the Periodic Security Report will continue. In assembly law, violent individuals are to be identified early so that other participants can protest without police interference.

The SPD wants more support for people who have experienced violence and for their relatives. After sexual assaults, victims should be able to have evidence secured at a hospital even without filing a police report first.

Victims of violence should get more help. Their families should get help too. After a sexual assault, a hospital can secure evidence. You do not have to go to the police first.

Support services for victims and relatives are to grow, and the legal basis will be adjusted for this. Saxony's victims' commissioner remains the contact point for crime victims, especially after serious violent offenses. Evidence collection in hospitals is to be possible during medical care without a criminal complaint already having been filed.

The SPD wants to expand security partnerships with municipalities and continue local crime prevention programs. Older people should feel safe in their neighborhoods.

Older people should feel safe where they live. The SPD wants the state and towns to work together more on safety. Police should be seen more often in certain places. There should be more community police officers.

Police and municipal enforcement officers are to be present in a targeted way at hot spots. According to the platform, this is also meant to reduce fear of crime. The SPD wants to continue the programs for local crime prevention. It also wants to increase the number of community police officers (Bürgerpolizisten).