The House of Representatives reacted indignantly to the customer satisfaction survey by the Tax and Customs Administration about, among other things, the indexation system. Some of the statements, which NU.nl has seen, are guiding and biased, according to a large part of the House. There is a fear that support will be created to tackle fraud once again.
“It is unbelievable how suggestive and leading these questions are,” says GroenLinks MP Tom van der Lee.
“It is not scientifically sound, completely unbalanced and there is no reference whatsoever to the fact that the Tax and Customs Administration itself has undermined and damaged trust,” said Van der Lee. He therefore does not want anything to be done with the results. “The results are by definition unreliable.”
SP member Renske Leijten wonders for what purpose these questions were formulated. “With these kinds of statements you predispose to label people who make a small mistake as fraudsters. You have to leave that bias out.”
Independent MP Pieter Omtzigt does not call the investigation neutral. “This is about fraud, but not about the fact that the Tax and Customs Administration has broken the law for years. The questions in the same survey were neutral last year.”
Some striking statements where respondents can indicate whether they agree or disagree
- It is difficult to rule the country when people cheat with allowances
- I am proud that the Netherlands has an allowance system
- Being honest about fees is the right thing to do
- It is unfortunate that society is harmed by people who deal unfairly with allowances
- It’s disappointing that some people cheat with fees
“Have they learned nothing then?”
About the statement ‘It is difficult to rule the country if people cheat with allowances’, says Omtzigt: “Suppose 90 percent agree with this, then you can easily draw the wrong conclusion.”
PvdA member Henk Nijboer denounces the statement ‘It is a pity that society is being harmed by people who deal unfairly with allowances’.
“It is pretended here that the problems with the childcare allowance are the fault of the allowance parents,” says Nijboer. “But it’s the other way around. The parents have been destroyed by the tax authorities. Painful.”
Leijten finds it remarkable that the Tax and Customs Administration seems to be protecting itself against the crackdown on fraudsters.
“Everyone wants fraud to be detected. But the point is that this happened far too strictly in the allowance scandal. After all the apologies from the Tax Authorities, the cabinet now comes these questions. Have they learned nothing then?”
Renske Leijten and Pieter Omtzigt during an earlier debate
Renske Leijten and Pieter Omtzigt during an earlier debate Photo: AP
Farid Azarkan of DENK suspects that the tax authorities are mainly busy cleaning up their own streets.
“The Tax and Customs Administration has a huge image problem. There is institutional racism in the organization. That’s quite a bit. You used to be proud when you worked at the Tax and Customs Administration, now it’s a racist mess, so to speak.”
Also questions from coalition
There are also questions from the coalition about the research design. “Words like ‘difficult’, ‘fair’ and ‘regret’ appeal to a sense of justice. I understand that people experience that as guiding”, says Inge van Dijk (CDA).
For Folkert Idsinga (VVD) it is still unclear how the questions contribute to the customer satisfaction survey. “I am curious about the response and the results,” says the VVD member. D66 did not want to respond, the ChristenUnie says it has no time for a reaction.
All parliamentarians emphasize that there is nothing wrong with doing research, as long as it is careful, neutral and representative.
‘Not the impression that the tax authorities are interested in image’
Peter Lugtig, associate professor at Utrecht University and expert in the field of questionnaire research, sees these kinds of statements more often in science, but there must always be a balance.
“Of course you don’t want only the positive questions to prevail. If you want to do a research properly, you have to balance your questions.”
In this case, Lugtig sees that people may be inclined to give a certain answer. “I don’t have the impression that the Tax and Customs Administration is really interested in his image, but is more looking for positive confirmation.”
He calls the fact that there are no statements about leniency towards benefit parents as “skewed”.
Tax authorities: questions are not guiding
The survey, the Fiscal Monitor, has been conducted every year since 1994 and will run until the end of this month.
The Tax and Customs Administration wants to know whether the service is improving or deteriorating with the results, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Finance said in a written response. “But also how trust in our organization is developing and how tax morality is doing.”
The questions that MPs are so surprised about measure tax morale. “Part of tax morality is people’s attitudes to fraud and how they view tax or benefit fraud.”
The questions were tested by a research agency. According to the ministry, this did not show that the questions are guiding. “The tax monitor is constantly developing and the Tax and Customs Administration/Benefits is open to changes and improvements.”