On the morning of the VVD congress, Saturday in Halfweg, Mirjam Pauwels still did not believe in victory. She is an alderman for the VVD in Assen and came to defend the motion that called on MPs from her party to change the cabinet’s nitrogen plans. Pauwels counted on fierce resistance to her motion.
It worked anyway, and according to her that proves how important VVD members consider the problems of the countryside. And so perhaps also: that the MPs do not ‘feel’ what the nitrogen plans mean for the countryside. “Lives are being destroyed.” It was in the nick of time: 49 percent of the VVD members in Halfweg did support their own minister Christianne van der Wal (Nature and Nitrogen). The party is there, you would think, so deeply divided about it.
Also read: Unprecedented expression of dissatisfaction at VVD about nitrogen policy
Opponents of the motion say that’s okay. They believe that Pauwels and the other applicants played it smart. With a lot of attention in advance, and a strong group of speakers at the congress itself. According to some insiders, the convention has even been “hijacked.”
The behavior of former Member of Parliament Helma Lodders was particularly surprising to the ministers and state secretaries in the front row, and it caused enormous irritation among many VVD members: she stood up for the supply companies in the agricultural sector that are being ‘destroyed’. by the plans. She did not mention that she is now a lobbyist for traders in livestock and livestock transport.
Nitrogen Separation Line
But is it really not that bad with the nitrogen dividing line in the VVD? Polls show: no. Research agency I&O Research only asked voters whether they agree with the statement that the livestock should be halved and the government should buy out farmers to achieve this. Among the supporters of the VVD, 25 percent agree and 46 percent do not.
VVD faction now has to choose where her loyalty lies
Initiates see a dichotomy emerging. There is an older, conservative group, which is hard on asylum, migration and climate – the recognition that there is a climate crisis came late to the VVD. And there is a younger group that is climate-conscious and believes that the nitrogen problems are too great a brake on housing construction.
The supporters of the VVD are reasonable evenly distributed between urban and rural areas† VVD leader Mark Rutte likes to say that it proves that the VVD is still a real ‘people’s party’. If you think like that, then perhaps the unrest at the congress was a popular scene. But according to Pauwels from Assen, the resistance stands for much more. She sees an “instinctual accumulation of files” in the north of the Netherlands. Such as the gas extraction with ‘the mistakes’ in the settlement of the damage, but also the ‘huge job loss’ due to the (correct) decision to stop gas extraction. “We are not Calimero, but the infrastructure is thin and we always have to fight a little harder than others.”
Pauwels is concerned, she thinks that the VVD underestimates how great the resistance is. “I have the impression that a lot of farmers from our membership base have already left.” Although you can also hear in the VVD that the party is actually gaining members because of the ‘realism’ shown by the party top.
grip
What seems to be certain: that the top is losing control of the game. You rarely see open division in the VVD. Through its own research, the party usually knows very precisely what is going on, and therefore also how far its own politicians can go. In addition, the party benefited greatly from the popularity of Mark Rutte as crisis leader in the corona time. But according to Peter Kanne of I&O Research, confidence in Rutte has “been declining for a while”. “The goodwill he received for his leadership in the corona crisis is completely gone.”
For a long time, the VVD was above 30 seats in polls. In the latest poll by I&O, this weekend, there are 24 seats, a loss of 4. The Rutte effect seems to have worn off. You can hear more and more often from VVD members that he will definitely stop after this cabinet term – which may already make his authority in the party less great. But there is no obvious successor yet. And so the opponents of the nitrogen plans seemed to have the tide: a narrow majority did not care about the fierce defense of the plans by Member of Parliament Thom van Campen. Perhaps it is also significant that the audience hardly talked about the intimidation Van der Wal had to deal with on Friday evening – farmers unexpectedly stood in front of her house.
The councilor of Pauwels will end this week, she is considering a sequel. Is she interested if Caroline van der Plas (BBB) calls? “I don’t have that inclination yet.”