ARD-DeutschlandTREND

Statements regarding the government

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Satisfaction with Guido Westerwelle

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German foreign ministers: „…represented Germany well in the world.“

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Voting intention March 2010

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The support for the Federal Government stagnates at a low level in March. At present, 27 percent (1 point less than in January) are satisfied with the work of the black-yellow coalition. In the meantime, a majority doubts that the Union and the FDP are still a good fit. The critique is not primarily based on the on-going disputes within the coalition, which are considered as fairly normal. It is, however the FDP which is evaluated critically and seen as the party within the government which considers its own interests to be more important then the general success of the government. In addition, eight in ten have the impression that yellow-black lacks a clear concept for their joint governance. This impression is even intensified by the moderating and cautious acting of Chancellor Angela Merkel. The Germans would like here to provide more explicit directions for the coalition government.

As in the previous month the list of the most popular and top-ranking politicians is headed by the Minister of Defence Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg and Chancellor Angela Merkel. In contrast, only one quarter of the Germans positively evaluates the FDP Vice-Chancellor and Foreign Minister. Guido Westerwelle suffers further losses and now ranks next to last.

In his role as FDP party chairman, he initiated a discussion about Hartz IV which is seen as something important by German citizens. Three in four positively evaluate that he brought this topic to the agenda. 60 percent support his opinion that there is too much talk about the ones obtaining Hartz IV and too little about the ones paying for it. However, a majority doubts that the level of the Hartz IV payments is too high: As a consequence, a majority believes that the FDP party leader just wanted to make a mark at the expense of the socially deprived (55 percent). The current discussion thus helped to revive the long standing prejudice against the FDP as a cold-hearted party when it comes to the interests of the socially deprived (53 percent; +7).

Regardless of the current distance of the many voters to the FDP and its politicians, the Liberals were able to stop the downside trend of the last months. Currently the FDP would achieve 10 percent of the vote, a gain of two points compared to February. The Union could count on 36 percent as in the previous month. The SPD (25 percent) and the Greens (14 percent) would each loose one point. The Left Party would receive 11 percent; all other parties together would get 4 percent.

These are the main results of ARD-DeutschlandTREND in March, conducted by Infratest dimap on behalf of ARD-Tagesthemen and five daily newspapers. In a representative survey among eligible voters in Germany, 1.000 persons were questioned by telephone January 1st and 2nd, and 1.500 from January 1st to 3rd for the voting preference poll. The survey design allows for generalization of results to the German voting population, with an error margin of 1.4 to 3.1 percentage points.