Thierry Baudet did not want to interfere with the most important debate of the year for ten hours. The leader of Forum for Democracy is the only one of all twenty group leaders to interrupt the first few speakers on the first day of the General Political Reflections. When it’s his turn just after 8 pm – he gets priority because his wife is about to give birth – he manages to completely disrupt the debate within twenty minutes.
With comments about St. Anthony’s College in Oxford, the university where Finance Minister Sigrid Kaag studied. That is a training center “for spies”, says Baudet. „The proof of the connection of the secret services, Marxism and the global deep state”. Decide on this the entire cabinet demonstratively to leave the plenary hall, an unprecedented act of protest. Kaag is one of the first, followed quickly by all her colleagues in section K. Prime Minister Rutte seems to be the last to notice the action, but eventually leaves.
Chamber chairman Vera Bergkamp suspends the meeting because she finds the indirect accusation against the party leader of D66 “inappropriate”. Moreover, a debate in which the House of Representatives calls the government to account cannot take place if no one from the cabinet is present. In the corridor, Minister Hugo de Jonge (Wonen, CDA) says that, as Minister of Health, he had to listen “for two years to that conspiracy madness” and that it “leads straight to threats”.
Continued debate with only Rutte
After a fifteen-minute suspension, after consultation with chairman Bergkamp, only Prime Minister Rutte will return to the cabinet box. He says that Baudet has crossed the line of “what you find befitting in the parliamentary debate”. Rutte indicates that he is the only one of the cabinet who wants to remain seated under certain conditions, so that the debate can continue.
To this, chairman Bergkamp asks Baudet whether he wants to withdraw the words he addressed to Kaag. “We have agreed not to play on the person and not to make any suspicions.” Because the FVD leader refuses this, Bergkamp definitively deprives Baudet of the floor and excludes him from the rest of the meeting. The President of the House, who was often accused last year of not taking firm action when a debate threatened to derail, now has the support of the majority of the other group chairmen for this equally unprecedented decision: a red card for a party leader during a plenary debate. The General Reflections will be continued after the dinner break, without Baudet.
When PvdA party leader Attje Kuiken is allowed to respond to Baudet’s suspension, she heaves a sigh. “Up until this point, this was a debate about people who can no longer afford their groceries.” Before the incident with Baudet, the first day of the General Political Reflections was very substantive.
Also read: Where does the money go? Everywhere, to avert the crises of the Netherlands
War in Ukraine
When VVD party leader Sophie Hermans draws attention to the devastation of the “senseless war” in Ukraine at the beginning of her speech on Wednesday morning, Caroline van der Plas of the BoerBurgerBeweging is very quickly at the interruption microphone. She finds it “an insult” for Dutch citizens that Hermans does not mention their high energy bill. “My perspective is purely the Netherlands, the country is on fire.” Hermans replies that she has immediately stated that the consequences for the Dutch are “very severe”. “Excuse me for putting this in the international perspective as well.”
The discussion between the two MPs showed where political and ideological clashes between parties on the first day of the debate. In the midst of the current energy crisis, should the government only focus on purchasing power for the Dutch in the short term, or should it also continue to draw attention to solidarity with Ukraine in the coming months and years? D66 party chairman Jan Paternotte thought it was “crazy” that the mobilization of hundreds of thousands of reservists, announced by Vladimir Putin on Wednesday morning, was only discussed after a few hours of debate. “I hear a little too often in this room: it’s not our war,” said Paternotte. He asked the cabinet to come up with “solid new arms support” for Ukraine in the short term.
Purchasing power and high energy bills were, as expected, the main topic of the debate. It was difficult for the opposition on Wednesday to blame the cabinet for not doing anything about it. The measures announced by the cabinet on Budget Day are unprecedented in scope. Never before has a government repaired the looming poverty trap of hundreds of thousands of households for so much money. A tax cut of more than 17 billion in the budget for next year, supplemented at the last minute with the introduction from November of a price ceiling for energy bills worth another 10 to 15 billion euros.
The cabinet is allocating “a lot of money”, GroenLinks leader Jesse Klaver had to admit. The purchasing power package contains “a lot of good things”, said Lilian Marijnissen of the SP. Party leader Attje Kuiken of the PvdA: “It is good that the cabinet has finally taken a step in the right direction.”
The criticism that remained in the marathon debate: the purchasing power package is coming too late, the plan for the energy bill too and has not yet been worked out. And for too many groups the government is still doing nothing or too little, such as SMEs that also consume a lot of energy – bakers, saunas – and public institutions such as primary schools and libraries. On Thursday it should become clear whether Prime Minister Mark Rutte (VVD) still sees financial room to meet those wishes of the House.
A version of this article also appeared in the newspaper of September 22, 2022