Prien plans €1.6bn parental allowance cut, caps maintenance advance at 16 amid backlash

Parental allowance scaled back

The family ministry’s single largest spending item, the Elterngeld, costs roughly €7.5 billion per year. Under the draft bill currently being circulated among ministries, the total payment period would shrink from 14 months to 12. To receive the full 12 months, fathers would have to take at least three months of leave, up from the current two, a rule meant to encourage paternal involvement. The ministry projects savings of €1.6 billion by 2030.

Many parents experience discrimination at work when they apply for parental leave, and fathers report this even more often than mothers.

Ferda Ataman, the Federal Anti-Discrimination Commissioner, pointed to a 2022 study commissioned by her office showing that 30 percent of fathers and 24 percent of mothers encountered derogatory reactions from superiors when announcing their leave. She warned that if the reform reduces mothers’ allowance to nine months while fathers drag their feet, women will face a double disadvantage: professional setbacks and greater financial dependence. She called for “family care” to be added as a protected ground in the General Equal Treatment Act.

Maintenance advance cut to age 16

The state maintenance advance compensates children when one parent, overwhelmingly the father, fails to make support payments. Last year the federal government paid out roughly €3.3 billion for some 855,700 cases, but recovered only about 18 percent from defaulters. Under Prien’s plan, eligibility would end at 16 instead of 18, partially reversing the 2017 reform that had removed a 72‑month cap and extended the benefit to adulthood. A ministry spokesman noted that the German system already provides the longest payment period in Europe, with comparatively high amounts and low barriers to access; most other European states either lack a comparable benefit or limit it to a few months and tie it to additional conditions.

It cannot be that in Germany 80 to 85 percent of the fathers concerned get off scot‑free; they must be held more accountable.

The reform was mandated by a June 2026 joint agreement of the federal and state governments, Prien told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, and she defended it as a necessary “painful rollback” forced by the “dramatic budget situation.” Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil (SPD) had previously called on his cabinet colleagues for a “joint effort of strength” to consolidate the budget, and the maintenance advance’s fourfold cost explosion since 2017 made it a prime target.

Tougher enforcement, including driving bans

Alongside the cut, Prien wants to strengthen collection. The bill would allow administrative authorities to impose driving bans on defaulting parents without a court order, a measure some critics call a distraction. The minister is also urging the states to centralize recovery; Hamburg, for example, is establishing a central office to lift its current 12 percent recovery rate. The SPD’s children’s commissioner Truels Reichardt described the meagre return as “a crying injustice.”

Political and institutional backlash

The plan is drawing fire from coalition partner SPD and the opposition. Manuela Schwesig, Minister President of Mecklenburg‑Vorpommern and the architect of the 2017 expansion as then‑family minister, called the cuts “wrong,” arguing they penalize single parents and their children. The SPD and the Left Party warned that stripping support at 16 would push vulnerable families into basic income support, eroding the intended savings. Child welfare organizations cautioned against deepening inequality, and Ataman urged the government to protect parents from workplace discrimination.

Next steps

The draft legislation is in inter‑ministerial coordination and has not yet reached cabinet. Prien is aiming for a 1 January 2027 entry into force.