buoy. That’s what my kids say when I come up with a serious story. buoy… (To my horror, that’s how they write it.) The word sang in my head Wednesday, Accountability Day. The Court of Audit will then publish its investigation into government accounting and government policy. Is the money well spent and wisely spent?
This day should be the counterpart of Prinsjesdag, when we hear beautiful political promises. We will read what became of it on Accountability Day. Super interesting, but Accountability Day is a bit like your pension. Brave souls will immediately say it’s important, but only true geeks will really delve into it.
The Court of Auditors was strict on Wednesday. For three years in a row, the government’s accounts have not been sufficiently in order. That failure rightly receives a lot of attention. But another point made by the Court of Auditors deserves equal attention: is the money being spent wisely? It sometimes proves complicated to interest the House and Cabinet for this. And that’s a shame.
Take the 8.5 billion euros that the previous cabinet earmarked for education. That money was supposed to remedy learning disadvantages that arose during the corona crisis. It was the “largest one-off investment in education ever,” according to the Court of Auditors. The promises were also big: it was supposed to help “everyone who was trapped by the pandemic.”
And? Success? The Court of Auditors came this week with the judgement for which she warned last year: we cannot find out. Because the ministers had not formulated clear goals and no indicators to measure progress. Schools were not asked to report in a simple and uniform way about what they did with the money. “Why is there no interest in what is happening in reality?” the President of the Court of Audit asked the House of Representatives on Wednesday.
Well you can say: giving money to schools unconditionally is a blessing. Without maddening demands about the administration. But that misunderstands both a principle and a reality. The principle: the expensive obligation to find out whether people have also been helped. Anyone can sprinkle money, but we expect more from a government. Tax money is always scarce. Or should be.
The reality: a bucket of money can also take the goal further away. This is how drivers complained NRC that schools in deprived areas had more difficulty attracting teachers due to the corona billions. They lost the competition with schools full of ‘easy’ students. The money may therefore have increased the inequality of opportunity. I’m up for grabs, because later on there was an allowance for teachers at risk schools. And vulnerable students are catching up.
The point is: it’s one big mush now. We don’t know what the billions accomplished. So there is nothing to learn. That is extra wry, because there is much to improve in education. Children are getting worse at language and math. Inequality has grown. With such problems, why wouldn’t you want to know what helps against learning disabilities?
The new minister now promises to get better. The Court of Auditors calls its response a breakthrough† I’ve said before: money seems to be plentiful now, but it won’t always be that way. All those billions must now be spent carefully so that when money becomes scarce again, we know what to do with it to stay give out.
Marike Stellinga is an economist and political reporter. She writes about politics and economics here every week.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of 21 May 2022