Due to a mistake by a Member of Parliament of the ChristenUnie coalition party, a narrow majority of the House of Representatives voted for a substantial structural increase in the salaries of healthcare workers on Tuesday.
A motion by PVV leader Geert Wilders got 69 MPs behind him in a roll-call vote, while 67 MPs voted against. The question is whether the cabinet will implement the motion.
Member of Parliament Stieneke van der Graaf (ChristenUnie) accidentally voted in favor of the motion, she says. Earlier motions with the same purport from the PVV and the SP have not been accepted in roll-call votes in recent months.
Wilders was relieved after the vote. “This is great news,” he said. Prior to the corona debate in the House of Representatives on Wednesday, he wants a letter from the cabinet about how it intends to implement the motion.
The question is whether the cabinet will implement the motion. The government parties agree that health workers deserve a salary increase, but have been resisting motions seeking to achieve this for months because the plans are currently “too expensive”.
In mid-August, the parties walked away from a first vote on the subject, while the following day the motion was rejected. Opposition parties then accused the cabinet, among other things, of “being ashamed of themselves”.
On Tuesday, 136 of the 150 members were present during the votes.
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