Members of Germany’s leading parties were expected today to approve the 143-page agreement that would see a left-right coalition take power, with Angela Merkel as the country’s first woman chancellor.

A senior conservative’s participation in Germany’s proposed new left-right government was in doubt today as politicians struggled to digest the implications of a sudden leadership crisis in the centre-left Social Democrats.

German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder hopes to quell persistent dissent over his efforts to trim the generous welfare state by handing over the leadership of his governing Social Democratic Party today.