:quality(80)/cdn-kiosk-api.telegraaf.nl/f8d98a2a-27fa-11eb-824d-0218eaf05005.jpg "Interrogation of benefits affair: ‘A wall of denial’ | Inland")
Follow the hearings live below via the tweets from reporter Leon Brandsema.
This week it is mainly the official top turn to be heard under oath, next week prominent politicians will visit.
But the interrogations Monday morning with Eva González Pérez, the lawyer who brought the affair to light. Her partner was the owner of the Eindhoven childcare agency Dadim, which turned out to be the pivot in the now infamous CAF 11 case. About 300 clients of that agency were labeled as fraudsters by the tax authorities, with about 90 percent this turned out to be incorrect.
“I saw things that I found strange,” explains Gónzalez Pérez why she delved into the case. The surcharge of the Dadim customers was stopped and they had to provide proof that they were entitled to the money. But the people who submitted the documents were then not told anything until a new rejection followed.
‘No motivation’
“Those letters were not motivated,” says Gónzalez Perez. According to her, it only stated that people had not provided enough data and the evidence was not complete. “But that was not a motivation. The decision did not say what people did not submit. It was a very general letter saying: you have no right, we checked everything, it was incomplete. ”
In cases won by Gónzalez Pérez, the tax authorities repeatedly appealed. According to the lawyer, this went under the heading ‘if we are proven wrong, we will know it again’. “I had the feeling here: it’s just an outing,” she says.
Archive image: duped parents of the benefits affair on the Plein near the Lower House.
Ⓒ ANP
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According to Gónzalez Pérez, the tax authorities also left things on the shelf for a long time. “The tax authorities always asked for an extension. There are a number of files that they passed through. And the whole bulk behind it stood still for another 2 years. ” And because people did not receive their file, they could not see what they had done wrong, the lawyer pointed out. For a description of the course of the process ‘I refer directly to the book’ The Process ‘by Kafka’, says Gónzalez Pérez.
The lawyer spoke with a variety of top civil servants and even then State Secretary Snel (Finance), who stepped up to this file. But she summarizes the tone of the conversations as ‘annoying’ and ‘not so pleasant’. “I think I have had a conversation with every employee of the Tax and Customs Administration”, says Gónzalez Pérez, who says he has run into ‘a wall of denial’. She has the feeling that Snel really did not realize what the problem was. “But I think everyone else got it.”
Prominent politicians
During the rest of this week, mainly civil servants are interviewed. Remarkable is the last-minute interrogation on Tuesday of an official who already wrote an explosive memo in 2017 that stated that the actions of the Tax Authorities were not acceptable. That memo was circulated throughout the top of the tax authorities, but no one took action.
Then next week it will be the turn of a choice of prominent politicians. Prime Minister Rutte and the current ministers Hoekstra, Van Ark and Wiebes, among others, are heard under oath, as well as PvdA party leader Asscher. Former state secretaries Snel and Weekers must also come by.
With the exception of Rutte, they all come to talk about their time as a member of government at Finance or Social Affairs, the ministries that respectively implement and policy on childcare allowance. Rutte himself chaired a special committee in his previous cabinet that set up the strict approach to fraud.
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