The Story

Germany’s right-wing press are up in arms after an ‘avowed’ cyclist has taken a seat on the board of the country’s mightiest car company.

Julia Hamburg, leader of the Greens in Lower Saxony, has become a board member at Volkswagen as part of the coalition deal that was signed between the Social Democrats and the Greens after last month’s state election.

The 36 year old does not own a car and instead prefers to cycle to work in her home town of Hannover.

The state government has two seats on the board of VW, of which it is the largest shareholder. The other one goes to state premier Stephan Weil.

And those two seats come with considerable influence. The state government has a veto over decisions of special strategic relevance, such as opening new factories.

In the past Hamburg has been critical of VW’s operations in China, where it has a factory in the Xinjiang province, home to the oppressed Uyghur people.

The factory helps "the Chinese leadership to tr…