Cabinet withdraws stricter Covid access pass bill

The Cabinet officially withdrew its controversial bill to introduce the 2G coronavirus access policy. Under the current circumstances, it is no longer necessary to limit access to only people vaccinated against or recently recovered from the coronavirus to locations that work with a coronavirus access pass. 

Minister Ernst Kuipers of Public Health announced this in a letter to parliament. The Minister's decision is no surprise. In February, parliament voted against the introduction of the 2G policy. A majority then supported a motion to that effect by the SGP and Pieter Omtizgt. In response, Kuipers said he would respect parliament's wish. He confirmed this intention a few days later and now actually withdrew the bill.

The previous Cabinet also put the bill on hold at the end of last year because it doubted whether there would be sufficient support for it. Kuipers initially wanted to have further research done into the effects of the 2G policy, but parliament wanted the proposal off the table immediately.