New left wing party threatens Schroeder

A group of left-wing activists frustrated with Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s drive to trim the country’s social programmes is creating a new party that could eat into the support base of the German leader’s Social Democrats.

Organisers of the Election Alternative – Work and Social Justice Party said they were preparing to field candidates in May’s elections in North Rhine-Westphalia in western Germany’s industrial heartland – a traditional Social Democratic stronghold that the conservative opposition is hoping to win.

The long term goal is “to widen the political playing field for the federal elections in 2006 and be voted into parliament”, said executive committee member Klaus Ernst.

Schroeder is pushing a mix of tax cuts and trims in the welfare state to revive Germany’s economy after three years of stagnation. That has angered many Germans and strained his party’s relations with its traditional union allies, but Schroeder has insisted that he will not budge from his plans.