It’s just unfair. That’s what Gary Yanover thought when his daughter moved back in with him temporarily in 2013 with her ‘almost labrador’ and in the following months he received a dog tax assessment from the then coastal municipality of Noordwijkerhout. Municipalities a few miles away did not levy a dog tax. Legal inequality, thought Yanover.
He sent a letter to the council, but received no response. Yanover then started a petition that – in consultation with a legal adviser – grew into a citizens’ initiative. He was allowed to address the House of Representatives. “But nothing constructive happened with it.” Now, a decade later, the dog tax still exists.
This week, the Rathenau Instituut submitted a study to the House of Representatives on petitions (requests to the government to do or refrain from doing something) and citizens’ initiatives (the possibility to submit topics to the House of Representatives). According to the research institute, the functioning of these instruments can be improved: think more about the citizen and set up a separate counter in the House where they can go.
Disillusionment
The right to petition is older (1798) than universal suffrage and has been in the Constitution since 1815. The citizens’ initiative has existed since 2006. About one hundred petitions and five citizens’ initiatives reach the House of Representatives every year. The citizens’ initiative in particular leads to “disappointment, disillusionment and cynicism” among citizens, says Rathenau researcher Djurre Das. This has to do with the strict requirements that the House sets before a citizen is allowed to explain his or her subject in the plenary hall.
He estimates that about two-thirds of the initiatives are declared inadmissible, the House does not publish figures on this. It takes a lot of effort to submit a citizens’ initiative. “According to the petitioners, it is disproportionate to what it causes.”
The fact that so many citizens’ initiatives are declared inadmissible is due to the strict requirements. The subject may not have been discussed in the House of Representatives in the past two years. In addition, 40,000 signatures must have been collected. Researcher Das spoke to people who had been collecting them for years, only to find out sometimes only late in the process that the signatures should also have been provided with the corresponding names and addresses.
The Chamber checks the validity of the signatures by contacting the signatories. The citizens’ initiative on the dog tax almost died on this demand. Many signatories did not respond to the letter sent to them by the Chamber asking for a copy of their passport or ID. Yanover: “After those years, people had moved. I tracked them down myself.”
And even if they managed to end up behind the podium of the plenary hall, the initiators are still not positive, because they were only allowed to give an introductory talk. The debate that followed was up to the House. Subsequently, the House does not vote on the initiatives, only on motions that are submitted during the debate. Das: “Are they really waiting for us, initiators wondered.”
Lobbyist
Petitioners are generally satisfied with the petition. They are usually received by members of parliament in the central hall of the House on Tuesdays before question time. “People like the direct contact with the physical presentation of the petition,” says Das. He does see that interest groups in particular offer petitions, individual citizens less often.
Every month, the website Petities.nl lists 100 to 200 new petitions addressed to the House of Representatives. Ultimately, only 100 of these are presented to the House each year.
It is also not that easy to find your way to the MPs, says Marrit van Exel, who herself presented a petition. “You need entrances in The Hague to have influence.”
After the death of her husband and later her daughter, Van Exel noticed a discrepancy: after a birth, people are legally entitled to leave, but not in the event of a death in the family. She wanted to urge the Chamber to change that.
Van Exel came into contact with a lobbyist, who helped her on her way in The Hague. The SGP took up the subject. “Thanks to them, we had a round table discussion two days after our offer.” She hopes it will lead to a change in the law.
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Ticket booth
Reinder Rustema, the founder of the website Petities.nl assists many petitioners. He believes that the House of Representatives should keep providers of petitions and signatories better informed of what it is doing with the proposals. “Even a no with a good explanation is satisfactory for many people.”
The Rathenau Instituut also proposes improvements. The House could set up an online platform where citizens can find information about citizens’ initiatives and petitions. Another idea: a special parliamentary committee that is politically responsible for handling petitions. Or a desk at the House that supports citizens. And in general, the advice to the House is: “Think more from the citizen’s point of view.”
President of the House Vera Bergkamp said at the presentation of the Rathenau advice that the House is “further working out the recommendations in official terms”. A parliamentary committee will talk about it later.
Now that he is no longer busy with his citizens’ initiative all day, Yanover mainly does volunteer work. For example, he helps people who are in debt restructuring or who are having trouble with their administration. He paid the dog tax. A few tens.