Hilde Mattheis
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Hildegard "Hilde" Mattheis ( Gudelius, born 6 October 1954) is a German teacher and politician of the
Social Democratic Party of Germany The Social Democratic Party of Germany ( , SPD ) is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the party's leader since the 2019 leadership election together w ...
(SPD) who served as a member of the
Bundestag The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet (assembly), Diet") is the lower house of the Germany, German Federalism in Germany, federal parliament. It is the only constitutional body of the federation directly elected by the German people. The Bundestag wa ...
from 2002 until 2021.


Early life and career

Mattheis was born 1954 in the West German town of
Finnentrop Finnentrop is a ''Gemeinde'' (municipality) in Olpe district in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Geography Finnentrop is situated in the Sauerland, near the forks of the rivers Bigge and Lenne. Finnentrop shares borders with Sundern and Eslo ...
and became a teacher.


Political career

Mattheis entered the SPD in 1986 and is since 1995 member of the chairmanship of her party in the state association of
Baden-Württemberg Baden-Württemberg ( ; ), commonly shortened to BW or BaWü, is a states of Germany, German state () in Southwest Germany, east of the Rhine, which forms the southern part of Germany's western border with France. With more than 11.07 million i ...
. Mattheis first became a member of the German Bundestag in the 2002 national elections, representing
Ulm Ulm () is the sixth-largest city of the southwestern German state of Baden-Württemberg, and with around 129,000 inhabitants, it is Germany's 60th-largest city. Ulm is located on the eastern edges of the Swabian Jura mountain range, on the up ...
. Throughout her time in parliament, she served on the Committee on Health. In that capacity, she was her parliamentary group’s
rapporteur A rapporteur is a person who is appointed by an organization to report on the proceedings of its meetings. The term is a French-derived word. For example, Dick Marty was appointed ''rapporteur'' by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Eur ...
on issues including
elderly care Elderly care, or simply eldercare (also known in parts of the English-speaking world as aged care), serves the needs of old adults. It encompasses assisted living, adult daycare, long-term care, nursing homes (often called residential care), ...
and
psychiatry Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of deleterious mental disorder, mental conditions. These include matters related to cognition, perceptions, Mood (psychology), mood, emotion, and behavior. ...
.Guy Chazan (January 16, 2018)
SPD failure to deliver German healthcare reform riles party base
''
Financial Times The ''Financial Times'' (''FT'') is a British daily newspaper printed in broadsheet and also published digitally that focuses on business and economic Current affairs (news format), current affairs. Based in London, the paper is owned by a Jap ...
''.
From 2002 until 2005, she was also a member of the Committee on Petitions. Within the SPD parliamentary group, Mattheis belonged to the Parliamentary Left, a left-wing movement. From 2005 until 2007, she was part of the parliamentary group’s leadership around chairman Peter Struck. She was part of internal working groups on health (from 2002), migration and consumer protection (from 2019). In 2009, Mattheis came in second only after Nils Schmid in an internal party vote on the leadership of the SPD in Baden-Württemberg; she subsequently became one of his four deputies. In the negotiations to form a ''
Grand Coalition A grand coalition is an arrangement in a multi-party parliamentary system in which the two largest political party, political parties of opposing political spectrum, political ideologies unite in a coalition government. Causes of a grand coali ...
'' of
Chancellor Chancellor () is a title of various official positions in the governments of many countries. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the (lattice work screens) of a basilica (court hall), which separa ...
Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German retired politician who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. She is the only woman to have held the office. She was Leader of the Opposition from 2002 to 2005 and Leade ...
's Christian Democrats (CDU together with the Bavarian CSU) and the SPD following the 2013 federal elections, she was part of the SPD delegation in the working group on health policy, led by
Jens Spahn Jens Georg Spahn (born 16 May 1980) is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who has been a member of the lower house of the federal parliament, the Bundestag (, MdB), for Steinfurt I – Borken I since 2002. Since 2025, he ...
and
Karl Lauterbach Karl Wilhelm Lauterbach (; born 21 February 1963) is a German scientist, physician, and politician of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), who served as Federal Minister of Health from 2021 to 2025. He is professor of health economics ...
. Appointed by Federal Minister of Health
Hermann Gröhe Gottfried Hermann Gröhe (born 25 February 1961) is a German lawyer and politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who served as Minister of Health in the third cabinet of Chancellor Angela Merkel from 2013 until 2018. Early life an ...
, she served as member of an expert commission on the reform of Germany’s hospital care from 2015 until 2017. Mattheis was (together with her running mate Dierk Hirschel) a candidate for the
2019 Social Democratic Party of Germany leadership election The 2019 Social Democratic Party of Germany leadership election took place in the autumn of 2019 to elect the new leadership of the Social Democratic Party of Germany following the resignation of the Andrea Nahles on 3 June 2019. Although the lead ...
; however, she withdrew her candidacy shortly before the vote. In July 2020, Mattheis announced that she would not stand in the 2021 federal elections but instead resign from active politics by the end of the parliamentary term.


Other activities

* Workers' Samaritan Foundation Germany (ASB), Member * Education and Science Workers' Union (GEW), Member * German Federation for the Environment and Nature Conservation (BUND), Member * ''
Gegen Vergessen – Für Demokratie Gegen Vergessen – Für Demokratie (Against Oblivion – For Democracy) is a German organization promoting diversity, tolerance and democratic participation, and opposing racism, prejudice and right-wing and left-wing extremism. It focuses in ...
'', Member


Political positions

Mattheis was one of the most vocal opponents of her party’s decision to enter into negotiations to form a
coalition government A coalition government, or coalition cabinet, is a government by political parties that enter into a power-sharing arrangement of the executive. Coalition governments usually occur when no single party has achieved an absolute majority after an ...
under the leadership of
Chancellor Chancellor () is a title of various official positions in the governments of many countries. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the (lattice work screens) of a basilica (court hall), which separa ...
Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German retired politician who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. She is the only woman to have held the office. She was Leader of the Opposition from 2002 to 2005 and Leade ...
following the 2017 federal elections. Between 2018 and 2019, she was the one member of the SPD parliamentary group who voted most often against the party line.


Personal life

Mattheis and her husband live in Ulm’s Söflingen district.Jakob Resch (October 6, 2014)
Hilde Mattheis wird 60 Jahre alt und freut sich über mehr Gelassenheit
''
Südwest Presse ''Südwest Presse'' is a German daily newspaper based in Ulm, which is distributed in Ulm, Neu-Ulm, Alb-Donau-Kreis and Landkreis Neu-Ulm. It is also the name of a regional cooperative venture (called a ''Zeitungsverbund'' – newspaper compo ...
''.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mattheis, Hilde Living people 1954 births Members of the Bundestag for Baden-Württemberg Members of the Bundestag 2017–2021 Members of the Bundestag 2013–2017 Members of the Bundestag 2002–2005 Members of the Bundestag for the Social Democratic Party of Germany