PvdA members want people to stop boarding planes for short flights to London or Paris. They demand that the train is taken for all distances up to more than 500 kilometers. Despite opposition from the PvdA party leadership, a motion with that message was passed at the party’s congress.
At the PvdA congress in Nieuwegein – where a vote will be taken on Saturday about further cooperation with GL – 83 percent of the PvdA supporters voted in favor of a motion against flights of up to 500 kilometers. That is against the sore leg of the PvdA party leadership, which thinks it is still too early for such a measure.
“We are in favor of discouraging short flights, but this has to be combined with the construction of fast train connections,” said PvdA party chairman Esther-Mirjam Sent. “For the time being, there are no fast train connections, so we are against this motion.”
Dusty
Despite this, a large majority of members pushed through the motion. “Sorry Esther-Mirjam, I find your argument a bit dusty,” said petitioner Chris Peeters to his party chairman. “The train is an excellent alternative to the plane up to more than 500 kilometers,” he says. “No lengthy baggage handling, you arrive in the heart of the city and the environmental impact is much smaller.” According to another PvdA member, flying is a ‘luxury product’.
According to the passed motion, the PvdA must now start a campaign among its members in which they promise not to make flights of less than 500 kilometers. This means that flights to, for example, London and Paris are out of the question. These short flights still make up a large part of the air traffic at Schiphol.