ANPThe temporary home of the Senate
NOS Nieuws•vandaag, 20:06
Normally, the members of the Senate operate in relative secrecy, but in the coming days, most eyes in politics in The Hague will be focused on the Senate. On the agenda is the controversial dispersal law, which, according to the outgoing cabinet, should lead to a more fair distribution of asylum seekers and status holders among the municipalities and to relieve the burden on the registration center in Ter Apel.
So many speakers have registered that two days are set aside for the discussion of the law. Tomorrow the senators will speak, the day after tomorrow the outgoing cabinet will respond.
Relationships changed
It is far from certain whether the law will also receive a majority in the Senate after the House of Representatives. Politics in The Hague is deeply divided over the proposal. State Secretary Eric van der Burg (Asylum) submitted the law, but his own VVD is against it.
This was also the case when the old House of Representatives voted in favor just before the November 22 elections. With the support of opposition parties such as GroenLinks, PvdA, SP, Volt, Denk and the Party for the Animals, the proposal was adopted by 81 against 66 votes. Political relations in the House of Representatives have now changed so much that the law would now be voted down there.
For this reason, the parties that are talking about the formation of a new cabinet (PVV, VVD, NSC and BBB) made another attempt to postpone further consideration of the law. But because the House of Representatives is not actually allowed to interfere with the work of the Senate, that call was watered down. Ultimately, the House of Representatives only expressed ‘the wish’ that the dispersal law will not be introduced for the time being.
Great role for little ones
The outgoing cabinet quickly announced that it did not want to cooperate with that wish and that is why the dispersal law will be introduced tomorrow therefore on the agenda in the Senate. It has 75 seats, so 38 votes are needed for a majority.
If all factions that voted in favor in the House of Representatives now do the same, that would be 36 seats. But the opponents from the House of Representatives also do not have a majority in the Senate: they do not get further than 37 seats.
And this seems to leave a crucial role for two senators from parties that are only represented in the Senate: Martin van Rooijen of 50Plus and Auke van der Goot of OPNL, a partnership of regional parties.
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Martin van Rooijen (50Plus)
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Auke van der Goot (OPNL)
It is still unclear what the two senators think about the bill, but they can help both supporters and opponents gain a majority. They will both probably not speak until late tomorrow evening.
‘Very exciting’
Only next Tuesday, when the vote on the bill is scheduled, will it become clear exactly how things are going. “It will be very exciting,” State Secretary Van der Burg acknowledged last Friday. “If you compare the Senate and the House of Representatives, it is not clear what the outcome will be.”
He remains moderately optimistic: “It is simply important that people who come to the Netherlands are fairly distributed across the country. In recent weeks we have seen again how Ter Apel and the province of Groningen are taking their responsibility and thus bearing the burden for the whole of the Netherlands.” .And that is no longer possible.”
Great division
The interest groups of the municipalities and provinces, the VNG and the IPO, are in favor of the distribution law, but there is often a lot of resistance at local level. A large number of municipalities voluntarily do not provide sufficient reception capacity. They say they do not have a suitable place for an asylum seekers’ center and that the government should be able to force municipalities to accommodate asylum seekers, many local politicians consider an inappropriate infringement of municipal sovereignty.
In the House of Representatives this is echoed by parties such as the PVV, VVD, NSC, BBB and JA21. They think that the nuisance that currently mainly affects Ter Apel will soon occur throughout the Netherlands. Instead of the dispersal law, they mainly want to focus on limiting the influx of asylum seekers, although they have different ideas about how this should be achieved.
It is also unclear whether the opponents in the House of Representatives will also vote against it in the Senate. Members of the Senate have their own task and are not expected to do too much politics. They must mainly look at the quality of the law and whether it is implementable and enforceable.
This could lead to senators from, for example, the VVD or the BBB voting differently and thus helping the dispersal law gain a majority. That makes the matter even more spicy, because in the meantime the leaders of those parties are talking about a new cabinet with the PVV. They have no sympathy for the distribution law at all.
2024-01-14 19:06:36
#Senate #dispersal #law
