The leader of Germany’s governing party has denied a rift with France after she replied to Emmanuel Macron’s plans for a “European renaissance” making it clear Berlin’s enthusiasm remains limited mainly to further integration in the fields of industrial policy and defence.

In an opinion piece for the Welt am Sonntag newspaper, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) leader, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, backed the French president’s proposal to coordinate European defence policy with the UK even after its departure from the EU, calling for a “European security council involving Great Britain”.

The 1,900-word essay Getting Europe Right, published just days after Macron outlined plans for a raft of new European agencies and initiatives in an open letter, also suggests setting up a “symbolic project” of building a common European aircraft carrier, to “express the global role of the European Union as a power ensuring security and peace”.

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But Kramp-Karrenbauer poured cold water over the social aspects of the French leader’s reform proposals, stating that “the communitarisation of debts, the Europeanisation of social systems, and the minimum wage would be the wrong approach”.

At least two of the German counterproposals run directly against the French national interest: the CDU leader implies that the European parliament’s second seat in Strasbourg is an “anachronism” to be abolished, and calls for the EU to have a permanent seat on the United Nations security council – something that can likely only be achieved by France giving up its own seat.

Kramp-Karrenbauer on Monday tried to squash any rumours of a Franco-German fallout. “There’s no rift,” she told Welt television. “The fact that the CDU has a different political view on the issue of redistribution, on the issue of completely uniform social standards … than the French is nothing new,” she said.

The detailed riposte to the French leader’s letter was unusual because it was authored by a politician who, while mooted as Angela Merkel’s likely successor, does not hold a post in the German government. The chancellor last week declined to comment in detail on Macron’s proposal.

Germany’s Social Democratic party, junior partners in Merkel’s current government, on Monday criticised the CDU leader’s restraint on the social policy dimension of Macron’s proposal.

The foreign minister, Heiko Maas, said the Christian Democrats risked “missing out on great opportunities out of diffidence”, and his SPD party colleague Achim Post pointed out that the aim to create framework conditions for an EU minimum wage were part of the two parties’ coalition treaty.

French media noted that Kramp-Karrenbauer’s response did not carry the same weight as one from Merkel, and should be considered as much a domestic play by the CDU leader as a fully fledged European strategy. Kramp-Karrenbauer was plainly playing to the conservative wing of her party, Le Monde suggested, and putting clear water between the CDU and the Greens and Social Democrats.

Nonetheless, some fundamental policy differences on Europe were evident, the paper said. “AKK shares the view of the French president that Europe must act urgently” in the face of multiple threats, it observed. “But she envisages different means to arrive at that end. For AKK it is a strong economy, not politics, that will guarantee a strong EU.”

But even if some of the CDU leader’s standpoints, including her call for a permanent German seat on the UN security council, would “annoy France”, it added, the two visions “share much common ground … What is at any rate clear is that a desire to advance the debate on Europe’s future has now been expressed, on both sides of the Rhine.”

Lucas Guttenberg, deputy director for Berlin’s Delors Institute thinktank, said it was noteworthy how little mention was made of the European commission in either Macron’s or Kramp-Karrenbauer’s proposals.

“If you read both proposals closely, there are some convergences and overlaps where you might not expect them,” Guttenberg told the Guardian. “The message seems to be: if more Europe, then through an intergovernmental approach. If I was in Brussels, I would be worried about that.”