How the coalition stands after the blow

While leaders of some government parties tried to sound fairly optimistic on Wednesday evening after the electoral landslide, the mood changed a few days later. The latest prognosis of the ANP shows that the Rutte IV cabinet is in danger of losing another seat in the Senate: from the current 32 to 22 seats. This makes the power base of the coalition even more shaky and the options for support for the coalition agreement more limited. With fifteen seats, the combination of GroenLinks/PvdA is just too small to help the cabinet get a majority – how unthinkable it was that VVD and CDA would want to go ‘left’ in the remaining term of office.

One sensitive dossier has already been completely jeopardized in the new political relations: nitrogen policy. With BBB’s breakthrough in both the provinces and the senate (expected to hold seventeen seats), it is not very likely that the agreements on this in the coalition agreement will remain intact. Prime Minister Rutte and CDA leader Wopke Hoekstra already hinted at this on Friday. The cabinet, said Hoekstra, cannot “consequentially continue on the content and style of the major dossiers”. Rutte spoke of an “inevitable impact” on existing government policy. For the time being, only D66 seems to want to hold on to the coalition agreement that was reached so laboriously, certainly in the field of nitrogen and climate. Paul van Meenen, the new party leader in the senate from June, said against on Monday WNL: “It seems to be very special, but that [akkoord] I still want to hold on.”

Yet all coalition parties are struggling with the results of the Provincial Council elections. A tour.

VVD
Has the Rutte effect worn off?

The VVD, which lost two of the twelve seats, maintained that it was not too bad for two days: a “limited loss”, party leader Mark Rutte tried on Wednesday evening. “We are still a big party.” The next morning, VVD campaign manager, MP Thierry Aartsen, also said that he was “not dissatisfied”. But on Friday afternoon, in his weekly press conference, Rutte suddenly saw things differently. At the time, he was “very dissatisfied with the election result.” He also said: “I wanted to grow, we lost seats and now I think we have the worst result since Toxopeus was leader of the VVD. And that was a long time ago, so I’m incredibly disappointed about that.”

The VVD is usually good at keeping quiet when other parties have lost even more and are openly suffering. But there is cause for concern: Rutte made an enormous effort in the campaign, and yet that does not seem to have had any effect on the result. In that light, what Aartsen said at the so-called campaign breakfast with other campaign leaders, the day after the elections, stood out. When asked whether the next election campaign was with Rutte again, he said: “Then he will first have to see for himself whether he feels like it, to put himself forward as a party leader. And then we as VVD will then think about it, whether we still feel like it.” Could it be any less enthusiastic?

CDA
Dissatisfaction, and not just about Hoekstra

CDA members agree on one thing: something has to change. But there are different opinions about what should be done differently.

On Friday, the CDA association council met in a digital session. In the two-hour conversation, which always takes place after elections and had been planned for some time, all provincial department chairs were allowed to have their say. One had started about the story of the CDA, which was not clear or was not well communicated. The other about Wopke Hoekstra, who would not function well as party leader. Another about the faction in the House of Representatives, which would not be visible enough. Those present say that there was no clear red line: the dissatisfaction and concerns are about many things, the proposed solutions are flying in all directions. On Tuesday evening they will meet again, then physically. The second session is a continuation of the first. Monday afternoon there was still no agenda.

Wopke Hoekstra himself said on Friday that he has “the energy and confidence of the party” to continue as party leader. Yet in recent days there have been strong doubts both in front and behind the scenes about his ability to lead the party. When asked about Hoekstra’s position and whether the CDA should continue to participate in the cabinet, party leader in Utrecht Mirjam Sterk said on Friday at On 1: “We cannot continue as if things were peaceful and peaceful and as if things were going well.”

D66
The call for ‘2035’ is now also heard in Kaag’s party

Now that D66 is in danger of losing a second senate seat, the party is clinging to the game that still has to be played in the elections to the Senate at the end of May. That is a political horse trade with (half) residual seats. “I will wait and see,” said future group leader Paul van Meenen on Monday morning WNL.

In terms of content, D66 did not seem to be very concerned after Wednesday either. “A majority of voters voted in favor of the nitrogen policy,” said campaign manager Hanneke van der Werf on Thursday. On the evening of the results, other MPs repeated what the party so often stated in the campaign: BBB may want to do things differently with nature management, but there are European rules and court rulings.

In the meantime, there is criticism of this course among the rank and file, especially in the provinces where D66 lost parliamentary seats.

Wim van Wegen, party chairman of D66 in the municipality of Noordoostpolder, is critical of the tone his party adopted on nitrogen. “D66 is too armored, too rigid. That raises dissatisfaction and we have dealt with that.” Unlike Hague leaders, he believes that his party should now also take a critical look at its own nitrogen position. And yes, also to the government’s target to halve nitrogen emissions by 2030. “If 2035 is more workable and has broad support, we should not keep closing the door on it.”

Christian Union
‘BBB supports agricultural agreement’

In front of and behind the scenes of the ChristenUnie, the mega profit for BBB is a ‘clear signal’. A government must be subservient to its citizens, and the election results now show: that is what the party is lacking.

When climate and farmers’ protests came together in The Hague on the Saturday before the elections, the supporters of the ChristenUnie could be found at both protests, party leader Mirjam Bikker said that day. And that describes exactly the complicated situation in which the ChristenUnie finds itself. Bikker thought that the Netherlands had “been sitting back too long” on climate policy. She spoke of “young people who lose heart”. At the same time, the party looks back with regret on the controversial ‘nitrogen map’ that was suddenly presented by the cabinet in June, and Bikker wants to involve farmers as much as possible in the negotiations about their future.

That is a difficult job for the CU’s own Minister of Agriculture, Piet Adema. He hopes to conclude an agricultural agreement with the agricultural sector, industry and environmental organizations in April. Adema said hopeful during the results evening last week: “BBB supports me in any case with the agricultural agreement.”

The ChristenUnie will go from four to two seats in the Senate, as it stands now. About 11 percent of the ChristenUnie voters of the past parliamentary elections have sought refuge with BBB.