He had warned again and again, said Bruno Bruins. As chairman of the board of the UWV, he saw early on from the highest administrative ranks how cuts to the benefits agency would be disastrous and how the Fraud Act labeled innocent citizens as fraudsters. And time and time again, the political reaction was the same, as was evident from the story of Bruins, who was interrogated on Friday by the parliamentary inquiry committee on Fraud Policy and Services: they listened politely, and then continued on the same path.
In recent days, ministers such as Henk Kamp (VVD) and Paul de Krom (VVD), who as minister and state secretary oversaw the Fraud Act, said that in their view the legislation had provided sufficient room for leniency if people got into trouble. The committee of inquiry wanted to know on Friday whether senior officials close to the implementation also saw it that way. The message from Bruins, also VVD, was clear: no. He sounded the alarm louder and louder when he saw how things were going wrong. But no one listened.
Bruins gave several examples of this rigid political attitude. For example, as chairman of the UWV in 2012, he had to implement “massive” cutbacks, making personal contact between job seekers and UWV virtually impossible. At the same time, the website werk.nl, the intended replacement for personal contact, was not yet working properly. And unemployment also rose. The result: citizens ended up with their finger stuck in the door.
According to Bruins himself, it was a “message not to be missed”. He had warned not only Minister Henk Kamp of these risks, but also senior officials at the Ministry of Social Affairs and Employment and the House of Representatives.
It led to nothing. “The political space to make fewer cuts was not there. Everyone left it at that.”
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In the same 2012, Bruins warned again, this time about the upcoming Fraud Act, which immediately punished administrative errors by benefit recipients with a fine. Bruins: “We thought the fine regime was far too strict.” Not only because the fines became much higher, but also because the regime punished every mistake as fraud. “UWV wants to impose fines if people deliberately bottle things up. But it is usually a mistake, because people who apply for benefits are in a vulnerable and unstable period.”
She had Bruins crying at her desk
Bruins had had them at his desk, sometimes crying. People who, after losing their job, had little emotional space to properly arrange their affairs, did not speak the language, or could not find their way around official terms or the new UWV website. While groceries had to be bought, the children were taken to school.
Actually, the UWV should have been a “supportive hand in their backs,” Bruins said. “We wanted to be able to give a warning, not an immediate fine. Because we believe that most people are good.”
But again the UWV was rejected. The same happened after the highest court declared the merciless fine policy unlawful on November 24, 2014. The “smile” with which Bruins received the ruling quickly disappeared. The UWV immediately proposed to reimburse all 66,000 people with an unjustified fine. Bruins: “If you want to make a clean sweep, you have to do it right the first time. We thought we could restore some of the confidence of citizens in the government.” The UWV had also informed the ministry that a “significant portion” of those people had reported financial problems to the UWV.
But PvdA member Lodewijk Asscher, who succeeded Henk Kamp as minister in the autumn of 2012, decided to waive only the 6,000 fines that were still subject to objection and appeal. Bruins: “The motivation was that otherwise it would cost too much money and that you would be setting a precedent.” He had been angry, Bruins confirmed. “I thought it was unfortunate and unjustified. But after the House agreed, it was a closed book for us. And many Dutch people were left empty-handed.”
The message from Bruins, who left as chairman of the board in 2017, was clear: nothing could stop the House or cabinets from continuing the harsh fraud policy. Not even the warnings from the organization that could have known and predicted what the consequences would be for vulnerable citizens. And what his interrogation also made clear was that Bruins ultimately always moved with the political wind.
A version of this article also appeared in the September 16, 2023 newspaper.