Believe me, no one in the SPD will allow Merkel to win the elections. There's no chance that we will make this woman, with such radical economic views, chancellor.

If the Union puts conditions on the talks then they will be over very quickly and then there will be a pause until the Union has returned to its senses.

There will not be a 'grand coalition' at any price. The Social Democratic signature of the election manifesto must be clearly recognizable in the coalition agreement.

This doesn't make our job any easier.

There are only three elections, and they are obviously in very different parts of the state. But we, hopefully, will be able to glean some information from the results of these elections.

We have drawn lessons from the previous elections and we are cautiously optimistic that glitches will be reduced to a minimum.