On the day she was supposed to be about talking with the Greens on the formation of a coalition German Chancellor Angela Merkel found she also had questions to answer about cash for policy-making.
On Monday the EU decided to further modify CO2 emission rules for cars due to come into force in 2020, in part due to German pressure. Germany’s trinty of BMW, Mercedes and to a lesser extent Volkswagen pollute more than average.
On Tuesday parliamentary records revealed BMW’s majority-shareholding Quandt family donated nearly 700,000 euros to Merkel’s CDU just days before the decision.
The car industry employs some 740,000 people in Germany alone.
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