Josef Winkler (politician, 1974)

Josef Philip Winkler at the GRÜNEN regional council on September 17, 2017 in Berlin

Josef Philip Winkler (born April 5, 1974 in Koblenz ) is a German politician ( Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen ). He has been state chairman of Bündnis90 / Die GRÜNEN Rhineland-Palatinate since December 10, 2016 . From 2002 to 2013 he was a member of the Bundestag and from 2009 to 2013 deputy chairman of the Bundestag parliamentary group Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen and responsible for working group 3 - Democracy, Law and Social Policy.

Life

education and profession

Winkler, whose mother comes from the Indian state of Kerala , trained as a nurse after graduating from high school in 1993 at the Goethe-Gymnasium in Bad Ems , which he finished in 1997 with an exam . From 1997 to 2002 he worked as a nurse in departments and facilities for orthopedics and geriatric psychiatry .

Party career

Winkler became a member of the Greens in 1990 as a schoolboy. From 1991 to 1993 he was spokesman for the board of the Rhein-Lahn district association . From 2001 to 2008 and from 2011 to 2013 he was a member of the party council of the Rhineland-Palatinate regional association of Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen. In December 2016, he was elected chairman of the state as part of an early election of the state executive. He was re-elected in December 2018.

Membership and mandates

From 1994 to 1999 and from 2004 to 2007 Winkler was a member of the city ​​council of his hometown Bad Ems. From 1994 to 1999 he was also chairman of the green parliamentary group in the Bad Ems municipal council. From 1999 to 2003 and 2004 to 2009 he was a member of the district council of the Rhein-Lahn district , where he was at times also chairman of the Green parliamentary group . Since the local elections in 2014 he has been chairman of the Greens parliamentary group in the district council. On January 24, 2019, he was elected, appointed and sworn in by the Bad Ems - Nassau municipal council as the fourth honorary councilor, who was elected, appointed and sworn in on January 1, 2019 based on a state law.

From 2002 to 2013 Winkler was a member of the German Bundestag . Since 2009 he has been deputy chairman of the Bundestag parliamentary group Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen and responsible for their working group 3 - Democracy, Law and Social Policy. During this legislative period , Winkler was the spokesperson for refugee policy and for church policy and interreligious dialogue for the Bundestag parliamentary group Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen. Before that, he was migration policy spokesman from 2002 to 2009 and democracy policy spokesman for his parliamentary group from 2002 to 2005.

Josef Winkler was a member of the Interior Committee (2002 to 2013), a deputy member of the Petitions Committee (since 2009, previously a member and chairman from 2002 to 2009) and a deputy member of the committee for election review, immunity and rules of procedure (2009 to 2013).

Winkler was chairman of the Indo-German parliamentary group of the German Bundestag and chairman of the German-South Asian parliamentary group. Winkler had been a member of the German Bundestag's delegation to the Interparliamentary Union since 2003 and a member of its executive committee from 2011 to 2013. The delegation of the 18th German Bundestag to the IPU, chaired by Bundestag President Norbert Lammert, appointed Josef Winkler an honorary member of the delegation in 2013.

Josef Philip Winkler entered the Bundestag in 2002, 2005 and 2009 via the Rhineland-Palatinate state list.

Other engagement

Josef Winkler was a member of the parliamentary advisory board of the German Foundation for World Population , and was a member of the board of the Action Community. V. and member of the board of trustees of the Theo Zwanziger Foundation. In his home town of Bad Ems, he is the artistic director of the CasaBlanca cabaret, and he is the senator of the Bad Emser Carnival Society. V. and Honorary Helper of the Niederlahnstein Carneval Association.

Winkler headed subject area 2 - Political and ethical basic questions of the Central Committee of German Catholics (ZdK), of which he was a member from 2008 to 2014, he was a member of the board of trustees of the Christian-Islamic Society . V., was a member of the board of trustees of the Leo Baeck Foundation , was a member of the diocesan assembly of the Diocese of Limburg (since 2004), was a member of the board of trustees of the Catholic German Women's Association and was a member of the scientific council of the Catholic Academy of the Archdiocese of Berlin. He was a member of the advisory board of the Foundation of the Barmherzige Brüder in Trier, is a member of the jury for the Catholic Prize against Racism and Xenophobia (awarded by the German Bishops' Conference) and was a member of the board of trustees of the Association of Friends of the Maria Benedictine Abbey e. V.

It is or was entirely voluntary work without remuneration.

Political positions

refugee policy

During his time as a member of the Bundestag, Winkler opposed a “devastating” and “unworthy” “European policy of isolation”, in which refugees in transit states outside the borders of the European Union remain defenseless in a lawless area. He criticizes the fact that the European governments are constantly setting new and higher hurdles instead of creating legal possibilities for the safe entry of refugees. According to Winkler, this resulted in thousands of deaths every year trying to reach the coasts of Europe. Winkler demands solutions that are based on humanity and human rights. At the federal level, Winkler called for the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act to be abolished , as it aims to discriminate against people. He also criticized detention pending deportation in Germany as being ordered too often and for too long and often carried out in the wrong place, namely together with offenders. He calls for a fundamental reform of detention pending deportation in Germany and the handling of rejected asylum seekers. In autumn 2012, Winkler accused Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich and the CDU / CSU of "irresponsible panic-mongering" in connection with the increasing number of asylum seekers. According to Winkler, the Minister of the Interior falsified the number of asylum seekers, bottlenecks in accommodation were caused by himself and the verbal armament in the debate was largely due to the state election campaigns in Lower Saxony and Bavaria.

Church politics

Winkler is committed to "the separation of state and church, as regulated in the Basic Law with the limping separation, which means that the churches and the state have a lot to do with each other." He sees a consistently secular state on the other hand, critical: One should not jeopardize a respectful interaction that has been cultivated for decades, according to Winkler, believers should not be forced to withdraw more into private life. Winkler sees many similarities but also differences between his party Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen and the Christian churches, for example in terms of family image or in dealing with homosexuality. Winkler is co-author of the author's paper Echter Aufbruch, formulated by several green politicians on the occasion of the Catholic Day in 2012 . In the paper u. a. A democratization of the Catholic Church , changes in the relationship between the church hierarchy and believers, a reform of the church tax , an upgrading of the work of women in the church, tolerance and equality in dealing with homosexuality as well as a committed ecumenical dialogue are called for. There was media attention and a lot of criticism for the idea of ​​introducing a “cultural tax based on the Italian model” instead of the church tax. Implementation of such plans appears to be difficult as this would require an amendment to the Basic Law: In 2007 lawyers from the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) described a similar tax model as incompatible with Article 140 of the Basic Law . For Islam , Winkler calls for legal equality with other religions in Germany.

Web links

Commons : Josef Philip Winkler  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Website by Josef Philip Winkler
• Biography at the German Bundestag
• CV ( Memento from October 15, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
• Josef Winkler on parliamentwatch.de

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Josef Philip Winkler ( Memento from December 3, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
2. ^ Asylum in Europe, Bündnis 90 / Die Grünen parliamentary group (PDF file; 315 kB), page 4 f.
3. ↑ http://www.gruene-bundestag.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/2012/juli/asylbewerberleistungsgesetz-abschaffen_ID_4384713.html
4. ↑ http://www.gruene-bundestag.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/2012/september/verschiebungshaft-in-deutschland-zu-viel-zu-lange-am-falschen-ort_ID_4385163.html
5. ↑ http://www.tagesschau.de/inland/asylbewerber124.html ( Memento from October 14, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
6. ↑ http://www.josef-winkler.de/der-aboptere/fluechtlingspolitik/artikel/2546/67a3c2423c/index.html
7. ↑ http://www.dradio.de/dlf/sendung/tagfuertag/1751066/
8. ↑ http://www.dradio.de/dlf/sendung/tagfuertag/1751066/
9. ↑ Josef Winkler: For state aid and religious education ( Memento from February 10, 2013 in the web archive archive.today )
10. ↑ "Real Awakening - A Contribution to Dialogue in the Catholic Church", online under "The Spirit of God dwells in us" (1 Corinthians 3.16) josef-winkler.de, May 13, 2012 (PDF file; 121 kB), Retrieved May 16, 2012.
11. ↑ vg. Culture tax instead of church tax? Südwest Presse Online, May 30, 2012, accessed October 29, 2012.
12. ↑ Alternatives to the church tax ekd.de ( Memento from May 9, 2012 in the Internet Archive ), accessed on May 16, 2012.
13. ↑ http://www.josef-winkler.de/fileadmin/user_upload/pdfs_antraege/2009-antraege/Diskussionspapier_Islam.pdf