The 25 mayors of the Security Council have promised the temporary reception places for asylum seekers requested by the cabinet from 1 July to 1 October. A spokesperson for the Security Council confirms this NRC† The cabinet previously called on the security regions to provide extra reception for asylum seekers in order to relieve the burden on the application center in Ter Apel, where asylum seekers have been forced to spend the night on chairs for weeks.
The 25 security regions each want to look for 225 extra emergency shelters, although a number of regions have said they are not sure whether this will work. It is also the intention that the municipalities jointly provide 7,500 temporary homes for status holders, so that more flow is possible from asylum seekers centers. According to the ANP news agency, the cabinet has pledged 40 million euros to make this possible. In addition, the government sends thirty officials to each security region to help set up the reception locations.
Last week, State Secretary Eric van der Burg (Asylum, VVD) announced that about three hundred asylum seekers from the overcrowded reception center Ter Apel are moving to a new reception center in another municipality. This was the outcome of the first consultation of the crisis team to improve the flow of asylum seekers, in which the chairmen of the 25 security regions are also involved.
The crisis team met again on Monday, but the cabinet and the security regions did not yet reach an agreement. According to Mayor Theo Weterings van Tilburg (asylum portfolio at the Association of Dutch Municipalities), the consultations came to a standstill, among other things, because the regions wanted the cabinet to do something about the extra reception places.