Nothing is more bland than to say when you have a good idea: ‘Why did you only come up with that now?’. Or: ‘It should have been done sooner’.
Yet that was the reaction of State Secretary Hans Vijlbrief to the report of the Institute for Mining Damage Groningen (IMG), which was published on Thursday. It contains a series of recommendations to make damage repair in Groningen ‘easier, more humane and milder’.
That should have happened sooner. A lot earlier. But let ‘The Hague’ pick up the gauntlet as soon as possible, the cabinet has to make decisions. Don’t expect that before May, after the discussions about the report of the Parliamentary Inquiry Committee on Gas Extraction in Groningen, which is as thick as it is hard as nails.
The IMG thinks that about 5 to 10 billion euros is needed to repair all the damage in Groningen. That is not yet very concrete, but the proposed approach deserves praise. It may be that people who are not damaged by earthquakes still receive money. Rather than setting up a whole bureaucracy to check which crack was caused by which earthquake.
This has been the case in recent years, with the result that only 25 cents of every euro for Groningen was available for damage repair. The rest went to the bureaucracy.
With those 5 to 10 billion for damage repair, ‘The Hague’ is still a long way off. In addition, billions are still needed to reinforce buildings in Groningen. Otherwise we will continue to recover. And finally, there is the Debt of Honor, which was discussed in the report of the committee of inquiry. How many billion is needed to pay it off? Say it.
Meanwhile, the House of Representatives is discussing future mining (oil, gas and salt extraction, geothermal energy, storage of hydrogen, etc.). Of the proceeds from this, 20 or perhaps 30 percent should benefit the region. See, that should have been done sooner. After all, 60 years of gas extraction in Groningen left the state with 363.3 billion euros.