His fame as an enlightened VVD member has accelerated him. ‘The more asylum seekers, the better,’ said Eric van der Burg five years ago, as alderman in Amsterdam. For two months now, he has been State Secretary for Justice and Security in the Rutte IV cabinet and responsible for national asylum and migration policy. His statement at the time does not appear to have been a rejection.
On Wednesday, Van der Burg came to the House of Representatives for a first debate with the standing parliamentary committee, which will keep a close eye on him in the coming years. There are still about thirty letters from his predecessor, Ankie Broekers-Knol, asking for discussion with the House. But it is of course mainly about the new circumstances that have been dominating the world for the past fourteen days. More than two million Ukrainians have left their country since the Russians invaded.
Generous reception
As soon as he has been given the floor, Van der Burg appears to adopt a completely different tone than Broekers-Knol. He immediately turns against the word ‘refugee flow’. He wants to avoid that, because it can evoke ‘anxiety images’. People from Ukraine will be received ‘generously’, whether they have a Ukrainian passport, had a residence permit there or happened to be in Ukraine when the war broke out.
To Sylvana Simons from Bij1, who asks a question about this, he says: ‘It makes no difference whether you look like Mrs. Simons or look like me. Headscarf, Muslim, dark colour: you will be taken care of, no misunderstanding.’ Van der Burg adds that while Ukrainians may apply for asylum, he hopes they will not. For the simple reason that it is not necessary, and because such an application would put further pressure on the overloaded asylum system.
Ukraine borders four European Union countries, within which Ukrainians are allowed to travel freely, and ‘reception in the region’ has always been the mantra in the EU. This means that the EU is now ‘the region’ and the Netherlands must prepare for the arrival of many Ukrainians. This immediately identifies the difference with Syrians and Afghans: they could not travel freely, their ‘region’ was different, and if they wanted to stay in the Netherlands, they had to rely on the asylum policy.
No limit
Since Tuesday, the Netherlands has set up a crisis organization that is separate from asylum reception and is currently aiming for 50,000 reception places. Joost Eerdmans of JA21 wants to know whether that is also the limit. Or is 100 thousand the limit? Maybe 200 thousand? Van der Burg does not have the answer. ‘If soon there will be 50 thousand Ukrainians here and number 50,001 comes in, then we will not say: you sleep outside. Spending the night in a sports hall is bad, especially for women and children, but less bad than in a house where Russians throw bombs. If you now see the efforts of Poland and Moldova in terms of reception, it is impossible for us to give a final number.’
What the State Secretary does assure the House is that there is currently no plan for redistribution within the EU. “Ukraine’s neighbors don’t ask for that and say they can do the job themselves.” That is also the reason that the Netherlands will not actively pick up Ukrainian refugees.
In addition to ‘refugee flows’, Van der Burg has even more terminology from debates about refugees and asylum seekers in which he falters. The word ‘lucky seekers’, for example. ‘Every person is a fortune seeker’, he says philosophically. Van der Burg also does not adopt the standard description of the asylum policy as ‘strict but fair’. ‘Righteous, yes, but strict? There’s something punitive about that, and that doesn’t bother me a bit. Anyone can apply for asylum. Strictness is an issue among people who misbehave, such as in the asylum seekers’ center in Budel. That’s outrageous.’
At the end of the debate, Van der Burg receives compliments from Think MP Tunahan Kuzu. The new state secretary ‘breaks through all kinds of frames’ and that is why the introduction to Kuzu was ‘pleasant’. PVV MP Gidi Markuszower has a very different experience. ‘This is not even VVD light, this is worse than GroenLinks. This State Secretary is the attracting force in person.’
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