GroenLinks and PvdA continue to eagerly piggyback on the label ‘left cloud’ received from the VVD. “We do not cut back on social security, housing and care,” say GroenLinks leader Jesse Klaver and PvdA party leader Attje Kuiken in the Oostkerk, a baroque domed church, in Middelburg at their firsttownhall— the new name for their joint election rallies. A breaking point, they call it.
The two party leaders respond to Edith Schippers, the number 1 of the VVD on the Senate list, who last week interview with nu.nl hinted at cutbacks, in which she was asked what would pay for the VVD’s wish for tax reductions on labour.
Judging by the polls, the current coalition of VVD, D66, CDA and ChristenUnie will (again) not achieve a majority in the senate. That is why Rutte IV will again have to look for help from the opposition. The plans of PvdA and GroenLinks to work together in the Senate hope that they will be able to have extra influence on government policy. They even hope to become the largest group there.
The two parties are kicking off the campaign in Middelburg because Zeeland is the only province where GroenLinks and PvdA already have a joint list and joint program for the Provincial Council elections on 15 March, although this was partly born out of necessity. Individually they are so small that it is difficult to exert influence in the province where Christian conservative parties dominate.
‘Left cloud’ jerseys
VVD leader Mark Rutte and party leader Schippers opened at the end of January The Telegraph the attack on the combination of GroenLinks and the PvdA. The following weekend, at the PvdA and GroenLinks congress, Kuiken and Klaver criticized the lack of content in the Telegraaf interview. They wanted a battle of ideas, about the climate for example. Or about capital and labour. PvdA and GroenLinksers walked around elated in ‘left cloud’ sweaters, the term Rutte coined for them. In the latest state of Bearing pointer, a weighted average of three polling stations, the VVD remains the largest for the time being. The left block is not far behind.
Party leaders Kuiken and Klaver specifically want the cabinet to withdraw the proposed cuts in youth care, nursing home care, care for the young disabled and social assistance. If those cuts do continue, says Attje Kuiken, “it will be very difficult to continue working with us”. With this, the counter-attack of PvdA and GroenLinks also broadens to their ‘progressive friends’ in the cabinet: D66.
No attack on D66
Although there are many potential voters in the corner of D66 and Kaag also warned earlier that the government cannot permanently support purchasing power, Klaver and Kuiken’s aim is not to attack D66 with this, they say. “We want to break the power of the VVD. They have been the largest for thirteen years. That is why we attack them,” says Klaver. The progressive friends in the cabinet, and the other left-wing parties, are still the parties they want to work with. “We want to give D66 the chance to go left,” says Klaver. They are not afraid that they will make their ally in the cabinet small by focusing on the VVD.
GroenLinks and PvdA are also not afraid of driving the coalition into the hands of the right wing in the Senate, by calling ‘breaking points’ for negotiations about possible agreements that the cabinet will have to conclude with the opposition. Klaver: “We show: there are alternatives. Tax increases on the people who are well off, for example.”
The idea of the ‘townhall’, a concept that, like the earlier ‘meet-ups’ of GroenLinks, has come over from the United States, is that potential voters can put questions to the party leaders. The greatest concern among the Zeeland PvdA and GroenLinksers did not appear to be the imminent cutbacks. It was the decision of Rob Jetten (Climate & Energy, D66) to build two new nuclear power plants in Borssele in Zeeland. “Nuclear power plants two and three, don’t think so!”, a woman chants through the domed church. Can GroenLinks and PvdA please stop that?
“We are also against the arrival of those nuclear power plants,” Klaver responds, “and will do everything we can to reverse that decision.” He does not call it a breaking point for possible future cooperation with the cabinet.