The Netherlands in a stalemate after the breakup of the government The Netherlands in a stalemate after the breakup of the government

After the collapse of the Dutch government in the dispute over migration policy, Prime Minister Mark Rutte is expected by King Willem-Alexander on Saturday. The head of state interrupts his vacation and returns to the Netherlands so that the prime minister can explain the situation to him in Kasteel Huis ten Bosch near The Hague.

Rutte had already written to the king on Friday evening and offered the resignation of the cabinet. This was preceded by crisis consultations in which the leaders of the four coalition parties could not agree on a compromise on the tightening of asylum practices that the cabinet was striving for.

The differences of opinion between the government parties on the issue are unbridgeable, Rutte said in the evening. He regretted this move, but this was “a political reality”. Rutte left it open whether he would run again in a new election. The fourth right-liberal government has been in power since early 2022. Rutte himself was Prime Minister of the Netherlands for almost 13 years. Observers say new elections are unlikely to take place until November.

The crux of the evening crisis consultations in The Hague was a restriction on the family reunification of refugees who are already in the country. Rutte’s right-liberal party VVD had called for the restriction. For other parties, the demand went too far.

The Netherlands is struggling with a mainly self-made asylum crisis: to save money, the government had cut staff and places in reception centers. The waiting time for the processing of asylum applications has become longer and longer. In addition, the general misery on the housing market means that there are hardly any free spaces in the homes.

Amid a major crisis of confidence in Dutch politics, the asylum conflict is also seen as a pretext for the breakup of the government. The four-party government hardly takes any decisions on many of the important issues that concern the Dutch.

This standstill is unlikely to be resolved before new elections are held – fears were already expressed on Friday night. In addition to migration policy, people in the Netherlands are also concerned about the housing shortage, the energy transition and climate policy. One of the major conflicts is the future of agriculture given the announced environmental regulations.

That the break-up of the coalition will slow down the work of the remaining cabinet will become apparent next Monday: instead of paying a working visit to the Groningen region, which is being affected by the consequences of natural gas extraction, Rutte will be present unscheduled to answer parliamentary questions. respond to the crisis. Business associations are already urging that important decisions about the labor market and the purchasing power of the population cannot be postponed. (sda/dpa)