1. People seeking protection in Heidelberg have a bank account like others. With the giro account card, they can access their money. If they are not yet employed, they initially receive benefits according to the Asylum Seekers' Benefits Act. These are to be transferred to payment cards in the future, which will restrict both cash expenditures and transfers/direct debits. Goal: No transfers to family or smugglers, deterrence, reduction of "pull factors". This background for the payment card violates our fundamental rights: the prohibition of discrimination, the protection of family, personal rights.
2. The payment card is an intrusion into personal rights. Refugees are thus manipulated. Shopping in their preferred stores may not take place because setting up the card reader is too expensive for small shops. For transfers and direct debits, approval from the social welfare office is required. If there are special needs, an application must be made. 50 € cash is an amount subject to the discretion of the office. The assignment of the payment card itself is discretionary. This will not only burden the administration but also make the dependence of those affected by the office monstrous, as transparency is lost to them.
3. The aim of introducing the payment card will not be achieved anyway. The weekly report 49/2024 from DIW shows that foreign transfers are only made to a very small extent by refugees and certainly the least by those receiving benefits under the Asylum Seekers' Benefits Act because these benefits (maximum 441€) are still below the citizen’s income and certainly do not meet the requirements set by the BVerfG ruling from 2012, which stated that the minimum subsistence level should not be politically relativized. Also, reasons for fleeing naturally outweigh questions of benefits.
4. The introduction of a restrictive payment card is part of a large-scale attack on the rights of people seeking protection. The reduction of the social rights of refugees goes hand in hand with the expansion of Fortress Europe and efforts to gradually shirk responsibility for refugee protection (Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, Article 14) and obligations, not least in form of the Geneva Refugee Convention. The far-right has managed to develop a defining discourse that views people seeking protection only as a threat. Unfortunately, even democratic parties have increasingly adopted this racist narrative for years, advancing processes of desolidarity and shifting social discourse to the right. The payment card is nothing more than populist symbolic politics, catering to racism and further marginalizing, discriminating against, and controlling people seeking protection. Integration looks different!
5. The introduction of the payment card is not without alternative. NRW has introduced an opt-out regulation allowing municipalities not to introduce the payment card. Several major cities have already made use of this. But there is also resistance in Lower Saxony: although there is no opt-out regulation, the city of Hannover has declared that it will not introduce the payment card, thus confidently resisting. The municipal council has, with a majority and with the factions of CDU, SPD, and Greens, declared not to introduce the card because it is discriminatory.

We call on the factions of the Heidelberg City Council and the administration to also reject the discriminatory and pointless payment card in Heidelberg.

Initial signatories

• Bettina Bauer-Teiwes
• Angelika Binding
• Lothar Binding
• Dr. Gabriele Buschbeck
• Dr. Konrad Buschbeck
• Waseem Butt
• Ulrike Duchrow
• Prof. Dr. Ulrich Duchrow
• Heidi Flassak
• Prof. Dr. Ute Gerhard
• Dr. Jörg Götz-Hege
• Gudrun Sidrassi-Harth
• Prof. Dr. Dietrich Harth
• Dr. Susanne Himmelheber
• Zara Dilan Kiziltas
• Margret Krannich
• Maria Kühn-Ludewig
• Prof. Dr. Wilfried Kühn
• Mia Lindemann
• Sahra Mirow
• Willi Morlock
• Jean-Michel Räber
• Hilde Stolz
• Prof. Dr. Ute Straub
• Nera Vukovic-Bringezu
• Jochen Winter (Catholic Refugee Chaplain)
• Ulrich Wohland
• Bernd Zieger
• Antifascist Initiative Heidelberg
• Asylum Working Group Heidelberg e.V.
• Stop payment card! Heidelberg and Rhein-Neckar
• Designing Opportunities Heidelberg e.V.
• DIE ZEP
• FLINTA* KunstZimmer
• Women Helping Women e.V. Heidelberg
• International Women and Family Center Heidelberg e.V.
• youth [‘solid] Heidelberg
• Students against the Right Heidelberg
• Seebrücke Heidelberg
• Socialist Youth – Die Falken District Heidelberg