The government is failing to take in asylum seekers with residence permits, according to a report by the Advisory Council on Migration. There are big differences between the municipalities.

“The government has created a housing crisis for status holders,” says Monique Kremer, chairwoman of the migration advisory board. “The housing shortage is not caused by status holders, but they suffer from it.”

The emigration of asylum seekers with a residence permit from asylum seeker centers has stagnated since 2018. Last week, October 12, there were about 17,500 status holders at the shelter, and that number is growing.

The Advisory Board sees three causes for this: the housing shortage, the crisis in the asylum system and a number of bottlenecks in the implementation and design of migration policy at the municipal level. The combination of these circumstances makes the timely accommodation of residents in municipalities a major challenge.

This chart shows how the group of status holders staying in asylum reception is growing:

According to the Advisory Board, beneficiaries should again be a statutory priority category, as was the case until 2017. “The central government is thus sending a signal to the municipalities that the accommodation of those entitled to benefits is important to them,” says Kremer.

As accommodation for status holders is not going well, the council advises governments to continue investing in flexible housing solutions. Municipalities should develop these and the state should invest in them in the long term.

The municipal target is based in part on forecasts of influx and this forecast is only adjusted twice a year. That too is a problem. Forecasts in consecutive periods can vary widely; For example, the target for the first half of 2021 was twice as high as for the previous six months.

What is currently going wrong in the Ter Apel registration center? Check it out in this video:

The forecasts for this year were underestimated and the current admissions crisis is also making housing more difficult, as orientation is only given for a short time. The Migration Advisory Board wants the municipalities to be informed more frequently and more quickly about discrepancies between the forecasts and the actual number of people entitled to stay.

Not bad

Nevertheless, the municipalities are not doing badly this year, says the council. In 2021, municipalities will have admitted more than 10,000 more status holders than in 2020. In the first half of 2022, the total was almost 12,000. They have thus achieved their goal and caught up a (modest) part of their long-term deficit.

In the past, not all municipalities have given enough apartments to status holders. Kremer: “After the high influx in 2015, the municipalities accommodated 40,000 status holders in one year, but then the attention of all governments waned.” The figures show that in 2018 and 2019 relatively few status holders got a home.

A total of around 17,500 status holders are still waiting for a home. While waiting for an apartment, most still live in an asylum seekers’ center, where they fill vacancies from asylum seekers who are still in the application process.

If they all had an apartment, the emergency shelter could be closed, which is why the Secretary of State continues to urge the municipalities to hurry up with the apartment search. All municipalities must contribute to the housing of the beneficiaries in proportion to their population. Some have been working diligently on it for some time, while others are lagging enormously behind.

Important for integration

In principle, the Central Office for the Reception of Asylum Seekers assigns the status holder to the municipality as soon as it decides that an asylum seeker is allowed to stay in the Netherlands. After that, the municipality has a maximum of fourteen weeks to organize a house. The Advisory Board states that this is only possible in half of the cases.

Chairman Kremer emphasizes how important it is to accommodate status holders quickly. “You cannot begin naturalization until you live in your final municipality. From that moment you can come out of the pause in an asylum procedure,” she says. “If it takes a long time before housing is available, this has negative consequences for the beneficiaries, but also for society. I’m not just talking about the uptake issues, which are in the news a lot right now, we’re harnessing the potential of a large portion of the population that’s untapped.”

In a reply, State Secretary Van der Burg stressed that it had previously been agreed with the municipalities that they would take in 20,000 status holders by the end of the year. According to the State Secretary, the very large number of status holders is one of the reasons why the reception capacity is under pressure.

He reiterates that he hopes to table a bill this week to distribute more fairly the reception of asylum seekers in the Netherlands. This law has been discussed in the coalition for some time, so far without concrete results.