BBB leader wants to send Ukrainian refugees back to safe areas in their home country

The BBB believes the government should give serious consideration to returning Ukrainian refugees to safe parts of the country. “We cannot accommodate everyone here,” said BBB MP Mona Keijzer in a parliamentary debate on asylum and migration. Her political party is one of four negotiating to form a new Cabinet, along with the PVV, NSC and VVD. Separately, State Secretary Eric van der Burg, the VVD politician in charge of the current caretaker Cabinet's asylum policy, thinks he’ll need at least 600 million euros extra this year to accommodate all asylum seekers, he said in the debate.

Ukraine has been at war with Russia for almost two years. Keijzer also wanted to know the government’s position on the possible repatriation of Ukrainian conscripts to Ukraine if the country were to request it. According to the MP, 650,000 Ukrainian conscripts have fled their home country and are now living in various European countries, including the Netherlands.

D66 parliamentarian Anne-Marijke Podt immediately rejected Keijzer’s idea to send back Ukrainian refugees. Podt believes it is not up to politicians to determine which parts of a country are safe during a war

GroenLinks-PvdA MP Julian Bushof called the BBB’s idea “new and worrying.” He called it incomprehensible that the BBB is thinking about sending refugees back to a country at war.

Keijzer also said that Ukrainians should start paying rent. She called it “completely inexplicable” that refugees do not have to pay rent and healthcare costs, but low-income households do.

More money for asylum shelters

This year, at least 600 million euros extra is needed to accommodate asylum seekers, regardless of their nationality, State Secretary Van der Burg said in the debate. He added that he might have to visit parliament again in the spring with another request for additional funding.

The PVV, among others, thinks the extra budget request is far too much. However, PVV MP Gidi Markuszower insisted that it would only become clear whether the PVV agreed with the extra money when the matter was voted on.

NSC, BBB, and VVD, the parties negotiating with the PVV about forming a new Cabinet, also have difficulty with the amount. NSC called it incomprehensible that the budget for the reception of asylum seekers is too low every year. “Why is that?” NSC MP Caspar Veldkamp wanted to know from the State Secretary.

Van der Burg listed the three leading causes. First, emergency shelters for asylum seekers are much more expensive than regular shelters. A regular shelter costs approximately 30,000 euros per year compared to around 6,000 euros for a place in an emergency shelter. Since the start of the reception crisis in 2021, many asylum seekers have been living in emergency shelters.

In addition, sheltering child asylum seekers is expensive. Unaccompanied minors are housed in small-scale facilities and need good guidance, Van der Burg explained. The influx of unaccompanied children was also significantly higher last year at 5,804 than the 4,207 in 2022.

On top of that, the influx of asylum seekers has been higher than estimated for years. “If you get 50,000 people, while you assume structurally 35,000 people, then a problem arises,” said the State Secretary.

PVV, NSC, VVD, BBB, and JA21 want to limit the influx. The current numbers are “unsustainable,” said Veldkamp and Keijzer (BBB), among others. NSC reiterated that the aim should be a migration balance and a target figure.

NSC wants a maximum of 50,000 migrants a year, including international students, knowledge migrants, and asylum seekers. BBB wants to admit a maximum of 15,000 asylum seekers per year in the Netherlands. The PVV wants an asylum stop but realizes that this is not feasible at the moment. The VVD does not want to mention numbers but believes that the influx of asylum seekers should be significantly reduced.

The Tweede Kamer, the lower house of the Dutch parliament, will vote on the extra budget in two weeks.