A number of (former) politicians of the PvdA and GroenLinks, including Job Cohen, Diederik Samson and Hedy d’Ancona, have joined the other party. She and dozens of other PvdA and GroenLinksers are doing this to strengthen cooperation between the two parties, with a merger as the ultimate goal. The party members have united under the name Red Greenthat the memberships of the (former) politicians on Tuesday announced.
Active politicians, including aldermen Linda Voortman (GroenLinks) and Dennis de Vries (PvdA) in Utrecht and Nathalie Kramer (GroenLinks) and Hein de Haan (PvdA) in Leeuwarden, have also joined the other party. The double membership of the prominents is unusual and according to the PvdA the statutes even forbidden.
RoodGroen persuaded politicians and prominent figures to take this step in the run-up to party conferences of the PvdA and GroenLinks in Den Bosch next Saturday. The initiative seizes these conferences as a moment to ask the parties to hold a membership referendum on a joint list of candidates and an election program for the next parliamentary elections. The action group will also ask the parties to draw up a joint election program for the European elections. RoodGroen thus wants “one strong, left-wing movement” to arise that “no one can ignore”.
Also read this article about how GroenLinks and the PvdA to conquer the Senate
Together one senate faction
The discussion about more intensive cooperation between the PvdA and GroenLinks has been going on for some time, both within the party tops and among the rank and file. When it became clear that both parties would not be in the current cabinet, prominent figures from both parties pleaded in a opinion piece in de Volkskrant even before ‘joining forces’ in the Senate. Criticism followed. For example, former PvdA leader Ad Melkert wrote that there is a major cultural difference between the parties. According to him, the PvdA always tries to take “small steps forward” to “keep things together”. GroenLinks would have a more activist slant.
Further cooperation has already partially taken place. The parties will actually form one party in the Senate, after 76 percent of PvdA members and 80 percent of GroenLinksers voted for a joint senate party in June. GroenLinks party leader Jesse Klaver, who also wants cooperation in the next parliamentary elections, informed critics that if the joint group in the Senate does not appear to work, the cooperation can be reversed.