Politics•10 Sep ’23 21:59 Author: Eric van den Berg
Former MP Karen Gerbrands (PVV) received at least 15,000 euros more salary than she was entitled to because the Tax Authorities were not aware of her additional earnings, according to research by BNR.
Gerbrands was part of the PVV faction in the House of Representatives several times between 2010 and 2018. She also served on the Hague city council, where she was also group leader.
Former PVV MP Karen Gerbrands. (AP)
As a Member of Parliament, Gerbrands was obliged to declare the income she received from council work to the tax authorities. Documents that BNR previously requested on the basis of the Open Government Act (Woo) show that the Tax Authorities have not received any notification from Gerbrands for 2018.
Only Member of Parliament who benefited from not reporting
As a councilor, she earned almost 30,000 euros that year in addition to her parliamentary salary of more than 108,000 annually. Legally, this means that she should have paid back around 15,000 euros. However, that never happened, according to inquiries with the House of Representatives. The PVV MP is thus far the only parliamentarian who demonstrably benefited because the Tax Authorities were not aware of her additional earnings.
Gerbrands initially denied to BNR that he was wrong. She is said to have ‘properly’ reported the income from her council work and therefore had her Chamber salary reduced. However, after contacting the Tax Authorities, Gerbrands says that this notification ‘did not arrive’. “I’m really sure that I filled it out and returned it, but that is of no use to me,” Gerbrands said by email. ‘It’s all very annoying.’ Gerbrands has promised to report the incident and to accept the financial consequences.
Gerbrands worked in dual roles for years
The Woo documents that show that Gerbrands earned too much money only extend to 2018. However, the PVV member had already been in both the Hague city council and parliament for years. According to Gerbrands, a discount on her salary was correctly calculated for that earlier period.
However, Gerbrands does not want to submit documents that prove this because she finds the question ‘very suggestive’. “Things went wrong in 2018, so that will probably have been the case for the rest of the period,” Gerbrands writes. ‘No, I don’t want to answer that question.’
2023-09-10 20:00:02
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