Asylum seekers are prohibited from sleeping outside on the grass at the application center in Ter Apel. The ban is likely to come into effect this weekend.
The ban will take effect as soon as a ‘ticket system’ goes into effect. This means that asylum seekers receive a number as soon as they arrive at the application center, after which they can go to the location in Zoutkamp in Groningen.
Asylum seekers now often sleep outside on the grass and refuse to go to an emergency shelter because they are afraid of losing their place in the queue, says State Secretary Eric van der Burg (Asylum). “A perverse incentive”, says Van der Burg. With the introduction of this ticket system, asylum seekers do not lose their place in line and the need to spend the night outside is eliminated. The mayor of Westerwolde, which Ter Apel falls under, must issue that ban.
With the system, new asylum seekers receive a number to which an appointment is linked to return to Ter Apel for the registration and identification procedure. Transport to Zoutkamp and to Ter Apel on the day of the appointment will be provided.
The cabinet is working on a bill to enforce a better distribution of asylum seekers among municipalities. Van der Burg emphasizes that he has often knocked on the door of mayors in vain with the request to use shelters that were available in those municipalities to accommodate the asylum seekers who have to sleep in the grass there. He often got zero on the bill. “If municipalities say no, I don’t have the power to persevere.”