BONN, TUESDAY. The stork has apparently taken a permanent holiday from Deutschland, leaving the Fatherland with a birth rate that makes the Sahara look positively fertile. And as the German population shrinks faster than a wool jumper in a hot wash, the old divisions are poking their heads up like unwelcome garden weeds. What is happening to the land of efficiency, order, and suspiciously good bread? It is collapsing under the weight of its own demographic despair, that is what.
According to a report so dry it could have been written by a Bavarian accountant, eastern Germany is now practically a retirement home with pretensions of nationhood. Towns in the former GDR are emptying out faster than a pub at closing time. The young, the ambitious, and the vaguely sentient are all fleeing west, leaving behind a population of pensioners and tumbleweeds. Meanwhile, in the prosperous south, factories are humming along, but the workers are all imported from Spain and Italy. The result is a country that looks like a patchwork quilt sewn by a blind drunkard: rich bits here, desolate bits there, and no one sure how to hold it together.
But wait. There is a silver lining, or so the Brits would have you believe. Across the North Sea, His Majesty’s Government has been praised for its ‘stable’ immigration policy. Yes, you heard that right. The same country that brought you the Windrush scandal, the hostile environment, and a Brexit that was basically a national nervous breakdown is now being held up as a model of calm, measured population management. The irony is so thick you could spread it on toast.
The praise comes from a think-tank with a name like ‘Institute for Sensible Things’, which has determined that Britain’s approach to immigration is ‘stable’. I can only assume this means they have not yet set fire to a migrant detention centre or declared war on Norway for sending too many au pairs. In a world of chaos, mere non-catastrophe is apparently considered a triumph. If this is stability, then I am the Queen of Sheba.
But back to Germany. The real problem is not just the shrinking population but the fact that the country is splitting again along the old East-West fault line. The Berlin Wall may have fallen in 1989, but the mental walls are still standing tall. The East is still poorer, angrier, and more likely to vote for parties that make Nigel Farage look like a moderate. The West is still richer, smugger, and more likely to lecture the East about its ‘backwardness’. And with fewer young people to bridge the gap, the chasm is growing wider.
What is to be done? The German government has proposed more nurseries, tax breaks for parents, and a scheme to import Italian nonnas to do childcare. But the real issue is that Germans have simply decided that babies are too much bother. Why have children when you can have a Porsche, a holiday in the Maldives, and a dog that costs less than a mortgage? The German dream has become a solo affair, and the country is paying the price.
Meanwhile, Britain’s ‘stable’ immigration policy is not so much a policy as a series of panicked reactions. Points-based system here, Rwanda deportation scheme there, and a general air of ‘we have no idea what we are doing’ that somehow passes for competence. But apparently, compared to Germany’s demographic death spiral, looking vaguely confused is a success.
So there you have it. Germany is shrinking and splitting, while Britain is praised for not actively imploding. Somewhere, a civil servant is polishing a medal that says ‘Least Worst’. And the rest of Europe watches on, hoping that the stork might remember its way back to Berlin before the country becomes one giant hospital ward for the elderly.
As I drain my gin and look out over the grey waters of the Rhine, I can only wonder: when did ‘not a complete disaster’ become the highest of aspirations? Probably around the same time we all started believing that a government that does not actively harm you is a good one. Welcome to the new normal. It is stable, it is shrinking, and it is absolutely bonkers.
