Today in Germany: A roundup of the latest news on Monday

France 'avoided worst' with far right loss, says Scholz ally

A senior member of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's party said that France had "avoided the worst" after projections showed the far right losing the second round of legislative elections on Sunday. 

French President Emmanuel Macron, who stunned the country by calling the snap vote last month after the far right trounced his centrist alliance in EU elections, was "politically weakened", Nils Schmid said.

Estimated results showed a broad left-wing alliance becoming the largest group in France's National Assembly, with Macron's centrists in second and Marine Le Pen's far-right National Rally (RN) in a surprise third place.

Pre-election polling had put the RN in first, raising fears for the European Union's future direction with an anti-immigration, eurosceptic party potentially controlling the government of a key member.

"The worst is avoided, the RN cannot form a governing majority," Schmid, the Social Democratic Party (SPD) foreign policy spokesman in the German parliament, told the Funke press group.

Scholz's government is made up of his SPD, the Greens and the liberal FDP. But French politics is unaccustomed to such arrangements.

"The crisis isn't over, quite the opposite," said Germany's conservative FAZ daily.

"France, and with it Europe, are heading for an unstable period" with the prospect of "fragile government coalitions depending on the extremes and liable to fall at any moment", it added.

READ ALSO: What happens next in France after bombshell election results?

Could Deutschlandticket price be increased earlier than planned?

Germany's €49 local public transport ticket has around 11 million subscribers and is considered a huge success.

But the financing of the travel pass, that allows holders to use local transport across Germany, is controversial. 

State transport ministers were set to meet for a special conference in Düsseldorf on Monday to discuss this aspect. 

The price of the ticket is meant to be frozen until the end of this year. But because the federal government has not yet released promised funds, transport ministers are discussing whether the cost will need to go up before 2025, with October 1st mentioned as a possible date. 

PODCAST: Underrated German tourist spots and can the €49 ticket survive?

"I see a great danger that an unmanageable patchwork will soon emerge with areas where the Deutschlandticket can be continued and others where it must be cancelled for financial reasons," wrote the Chairman of the Conference of Transport Ministers, North Rhine-Westphalia state minister Oliver Krischer (Greens), in a recent letter to federal ministers.

"To prevent this, the only option would be to massively increase the price of the Deutschlandticket in the very short term."

Major works due to start on key Deutche Bahn routes

Major works will soon begin on Germany’s railway network. From July 15th, the day after Euro 2024 finishes, Germany’s state-owned Deutsche Bahn railway will begin major renovation work.

The work will bolster 40 of Germany's main train routes by 2030. The first will be the Frankfurt- Mannheim route, known as the Riedbahn. 

While the construction work is completed, each route will be closed for several months, something that will likely cause delays in some parts of the country.

"The Riedbahn will be the initial building block of a high-performance network," Berthold Huber, Deutsche Bahn's Director of Infrastructure, said recently in the German press.

"Nowhere else in Germany is the infrastructure currently under more strain. Around 300 local, long-distance and freight trains travel along this route every day."

READ ALSO: Where to expect disruption due to rail upgrades in Germany this year

Germany crash out of Euro 2024 as semi-finals set to get underway 

It was no doubt a sad weekend for Germany fans as the team crashed out of the competition.

Die Mannschaft did not survive their clash with Spain on Friday, losing 2-1 in Stuttgart. 

Now the remaining teams - as well as German cities - are preparing for the semi-finals. 

France and Spain go head-to-head in Munich in the first last-four clash on Tuesday, which brings together the best team at the competition so far and the best European nation at each of the last two World Cups.

England and the Netherlands meet in the second semi-final in Dortmund on Wednesday after both teams emerged victorious from their respective last-eight matches on Saturday.

June hottest on record, beating 2023 high, EU climate monitor finds

Last month was the hottest June on record across the globe, the EU's climate monitor said Monday, capping half a year of wild and destructive weather from floods to heatwaves.

Every month since June 2023 has eclipsed its own temperature record in a 13-month streak of unprecedented global heat, the Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said.

"This is more than a statistical oddity and it highlights a large and continuing shift in our climate," said the service director, Carlo Buontempo.

"Even if this specific streak of extremes ends at some point, we are bound to see new records being broken as the climate continues to warm."

READ ALSO: Older Germans 'more knowledgeable' about climate change than young people 

With reporting by Rachel Loxton