The new right-wing government in the Netherlands has suffered a significant setback to its get-tough policy on immigration with the surprise decision by the Senate to oppose the declaration of an “asylum crisis” – which would have allowed ministers to bypass parliament.
In a Senate vote on Tuesday evening, the four-party coalition, led by Geert Wilders’s Freedom Party, believed it could depend on the support of the three right-wing Christian parties – the Christian Democrats, SGP and Christian Unity – but instead all three voted with the opposition.
The declaration of a crisis would allow the government to unilaterally introduce more restrictive measures, such as a freeze on new asylum applications, a limit on the number of family members to accompany a successful applicant, and more basic interim living conditions.
It would allow ministers the kind of free hand in a crisis last seen when Covid-19 restrictions were imposed in the Netherlands in March 2020 using much the same administrative process.
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The government – which marked 100 days in power on Wednesday and has been repeatedly described as “hanging by a thread” – sees the crisis declaration as just one plank of its radical policy to finally tackle the rancorous issue that sank the third Mark Rutte coalition last year.
The other plank was its recent notification to the EU that it wishes to opt out of the new asylum and immigration pact collectively agreed by the 27 member states in June after three years of arduous negotiation.
Together, those two elements will give the Netherlands the toughest immigration policy in its modern history, according to the asylum minister, Marjolein Faber of the Freedom Party.
While the latest vote in the Senate, the upper house of parliament, does not prevent the government from pressing ahead with the crisis declaration, it does give warning that when the legislative underpinning of the declaration is presented to parliament – usually some three months after implementation – it could be scuppered.
Prime minister Dick Schoof acknowledged this when he commented on Wednesday morning that the vote was “an important signal” that had to be taken into consideration by his cabinet.
Ms Faber said on Wednesday afternoon however that despite the Senate view that a crisis declaration was “undesirable”, she remained on course.
“I have the government programme – and I am simply going to implement that”, she told reporters.
In reality, the main problem for the coalition now is likely to be the position of one of its own members, New Social Contract (NSC), which has said it will not support a crisis declaration if the move is opposed by the Council of State, which vets all new legislation.
That scenario would put the coalition in immediate jeopardy.
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