The handling of the Gijs van Dijk issue continues to be somewhat unsatisfactory. Not because the former MP would not have exhibited all kinds of dubious behavior in his private life, leaving his partners ignorant about his doubles. He himself admitted and regretted it. It’s not all that nice and the more you reread the story, the more unpleasant it becomes.
What does bother me is that these behaviors have been made public. And that the way in which that happened meant the end of the political career of an elected representative. What is different than when a teacher, civil servant or TV maker runs into the lamp. The fact that Van Dijk became a Member of Parliament was, after all, the result of a democratic process.
The seriousness of those reports is not in dispute here. Three women felt badly treated by him and raised this with the PvdA leadership. ‘They have been hurt and distressed’, as it is stated in the summary of the study by the Bezemer and Schubad bureau.
What matters is: did the PvdA board – because that was the leader in this affair – acted carefully? And how good was the work of Bezemer and Schubad (B&S), the agency that was asked to investigate Van Dijk’s behaviour? So not the question of guilt, but the process.
I base this on the ‘summary of the findings’ of B&S, on the PvdA press releases and on a non-public memorandum that Christiaan Alberdingk Thijm, Van Dijk’s lawyer, sent to B&S on 9 June. Van Dijk and his lawyer did not receive a copy of the final report, they were allowed to view it under supervision on 2 June, when the PvdA had already had it at home for a week.
According to the lawyer, the final report differs from the summary on one crucial point. The final report is said to be less certain in determining whether there has been any transgressive behaviour. Because the final report is not made public for privacy reasons, it cannot be determined whether this is correct.
Another crucial adjustment would concern the investigation itself: B&S was instructed to investigate whether there was any question of transgressive behaviour. That gradually changed to: has Van Dijk exceeded the PvdA’s code of honor and the group’s code of conduct. The complaints about Van Dijk were expanded in the course of the investigation to slander, lying about illness, alcohol use, truancy so that group members had more work, leaking the Budget Memorandum, messing around with travel costs. This was later removed from the investigation.
B&S could not objectively establish transgressive behavior, but it was found plausible that the reporting persons ‘feel being treated transgressively’, which introduces a subjective element. A crucial reason for crossing the border from the public to the private domain with such an investigation is because private behavior can make someone blackmailable. Whether that was the case is not answered in the study.
A final point that raises questions is when the report was delivered, a day after the deadline for Van Dijk to have claimed a seat in parliament.
The nice thing about the Gündogan – Volt case, which is very similar to the Van Dijk case, is that it involved a legal process, which revealed some of the facts. That will not happen in the Van Dijk case. Here everything relies on the insights of one person, in this case mr. drs. Gertjan van der Brugge, ombudsman of thirteen municipalities in Zeeland, but also as a freelancer working for B&S, who provides an analysis intended only for the eyes of the client that – regardless of its quality – is barely controllable, but has far-reaching consequences.
This is how it works in integrity investigation. An appeal is not possible in this case, so that at most a claim for compensation remains with the court. For future affairs, it is useful to carefully review that process again. Perhaps the evaluation study, which the PvdA wants to have instituted, could be a first step.
In the memorandum, the lawyer ordered B&S to post on the website that ‘our investigation into Gijs van Dijk does not show that he is guilty of transgressive behavior towards persons’. The lawyer wanted an answer no later than 15 June. B&S has requested a postponement.