The Council – the highest advisory body of the cabinet – writes this in a still confidential advice to the Ministry of Finance, insiders confirm. following a report by NRC. According to the Council, so many different political commitments have now been made about compensation that it has become ‘impossible’ for the Tax and Customs Administration to comply with them on time and in full. The Council also warns of ‘imbalances’ in the compensation schemes and of unequal treatment between different groups of victims. As a result, the recovery operation has become ‘legally vulnerable’.
In doing so, the Council is expressing the criticism that has been heard for months now. After thousands of parents first became the victims of the fraud hunt by the Tax Authorities, the cabinet is now unable to repair the damage in an orderly and urgent manner. As a result, a large proportion of the aggrieved parents are still uncertain about whether they are entitled to compensation, how much compensation will be and when it will be paid. Most of the files date from the 2007-2016 period – so many parents have been waiting for clarity for many years. The cabinet itself is under constant fire in the House of Representatives because of the state of affairs.
New delay
That is what the House of Representatives and the Cabinet have brought upon themselves, the Council has noted, referring to the many promises made by the Cabinet over the past year under pressure from the House. The most important is the Catshuis scheme from the end of 2020: every parent who is considered a victim after a light check, has since been paid 30,000 euros. At least that is the intention, but it was precisely this arrangement that led to such an increase in the number of applications that the processing of the files was again delayed.
Moreover, the Catshuis scheme is only a first step. The actual damage must still be assessed for each file, but that takes a lot of time. The files are complex. The damage is often also immaterial and therefore not so easy to express in money. Moreover, this requires coordination with third parties, such as creditors, healthcare institutions, housing associations and municipalities. In the meantime, the Tax and Customs Administration is struggling with staff shortages.
In the meantime, work is already underway on compensation schemes for specific groups of victims, such as ex-partners of affected parents and people who have run into problems with other allowances, such as rent or health care allowance. New on the radar are the duped children, including the children who have been placed out of their homes in recent years. But the total group is much larger. According to the latest calculations by the cabinet, about 70 thousand children have been affected to a greater or lesser extent by the fraud hunt. State Secretary Van Huffelen of Finance promised them compensation between 1,500 and 7,500 euros last summer because they often had to grow up in problematic circumstances. However, this compensation also has to be settled on a case-by-case basis.
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