The Labor Inspectorate warns in her annual report for the pressure that labor migration places on Dutch society and for the appalling conditions in which the migrants sometimes live. The benefits of labor migration often end up with employers, while society bears the costs, the inspectorate says in an explanation to the NOS.
According to the Inspectorate, labor migration has a strong influence on various problems in the Netherlands, such as the housing market, inequality, CO2, nitrogen and water use. These problems are exacerbated as the population increases.
The Inspectorate does not believe that labor migration should be restricted completely, but does advocate a limitation of the number of labor migrants in the Netherlands. “Within the limitations to which we have bound ourselves, there seems to be little choice other than for the Netherlands to take a stabilization of the population size as an ‘orientation’,” says Inspector General Rits de Boer.
With regard to the housing of migrant workers, the Inspectorate writes that the choice for more migration “creates increasingly miserable living situations”.
According to the Inspectorate, the Netherlands should also ask itself what sustainable labor and a sustainable labor market look like. “The ample supply of cheap foreign personnel means that there are weak incentives to innovate business processes or improve working conditions.”
vigilantes
The Labor Inspectorate also states that combating labor exploitation is sometimes “mopping with the tap open”. Some companies and employment agencies especially intimidate Eastern European labor migrants, the Inspectorate describes. “They even deploy thugs,” says project leader labor exploitation Edwin van Berkum.
The vigilantes often appear unexpectedly at migrant homes to check compliance with strict rental regulations, such as the ban on dirty dishes on the kitchen counter.
‘Whoever protests don’t need them’
Employment agencies also often bring more workers to the Netherlands than they actually need, and then send some of them back to the Netherlands. “Anyone who protests or wants to see their contract first, they don’t need them, they are too assertive. And that means: no work, no housing and no wages.”
The European Commission recently presented a new plan that should make it easier for people from outside the EU to come and work in the Netherlands. In this way, the committee hopes, among other things, to better protect migrant workers. After the presentation, the cabinet announced that there is still no response to the European Commission’s plan.
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