Wilders: EU exit will let us breathe

Getting out of the European Union, will give the Netherlands "oxygen, while the EU chokes us", PVV-leader Geert Wilders said. On Thursday, Wilders presented a report in The Hague, carried out under instruction from the PVV by Capital Economics, in which it states that a departure from the EU will prove profitable to economic growth by billions of euros.

This step will, according to Wilders, offer a way out of the crisis. There will be job creation, Dutch money can be invested in the Netherlands, and taxes can go down, he said. The report proves, Wilders believes, that the departure of the Netherlands from the EU will be "much more advantageous than to muddle on in the EU." In this way, every Dutch household will, in the next two decades, receive an extra €10.000, by the calculations of the investigators. Wilders believes that a choice has to be made: "pine away further", or choose optimism, sovereignty and extra growth. The Netherlands should no longer let themselves be taken advantage of by the EU, but become boss over their own money again. "We should no longer economize our country to ruin to satisfy the norm in Brussels", Wilders said. He also wants to stop benefits for Romanians and Bulgarians. Upon exit from the EU, the Netherlands will have to become a member of the European Free Trade Association, a cooperative between Liechtenstein, Norway, Iceland and Switzerland. The PVV does want the Netherlands to close treaties with the EU, to keep access to the European market. This exit from the EU, which the PVV of Wilders argues for, would be "very unwise." Minister of Finance Jeroen Dijsselbloem said this in reaction. To the ANP, Dijsselbloem said "the PVV already had this point of view, and now has a report to go with it. I will read it, but I know one thing for sure: the Netherlands is an economic giant in Europe. We earn the bulk of our money in trade with EU countries, so the Netherlands stakes a lot of importance on an internal market with easy trade. One currency fits with this. This is strong at the moment, and the eurozone is doing a lot better than a few years ago. There isn't a single reason to throw ourselves into new adventures. I would be strongly against this."