Draft Cabinet deal caught on camera: Strict asylum plan, tax cuts for middle incomes

The PVV, VVD, NSC, and BBB want a super strict asylum package. From 2025, they also want to push billions of euros into tax cuts, mainly for people with mid-level incomes and employed people struggling to make ends meet, according to the first page of their draft Cabinet agreement.

PVV parliamentarian Gidi Markuszower today leaked the page. He held the document with the text showing as he entered the first meeting in the “final week” before negotiation leaders Richard van Zwol and Elbert Dijkgraaf conclude whether a right-wing Cabinet with the PVV, VVD, NSC, and BBB will work.

These were known topics of discussion between the right-wing parties. The leak seems like a calculated move to quiet those who think that there is no deal between the parties.

The document states that “all people in the Netherlands” need “stability and hope” because “too many people have a lack of social security,” there is “no control over the far too high influx of asylum seekers and migrants,” farmers and fishermen “see no future in their the own businesses,” and the “government and politics have too often proven to be unreliable for their own citizens.”

Markuszower's arm mostly obscures the “concrete steps” in the agreement. However, “Tax adjustment from 2025 of PM billion, justice for workers with middle incomes and for people in need,” can be made out. As well as: “With the strictest admission regime for asylum and the most brutal package for grip… ever.” It also looks like they want to push “PM billion” into housing, infrastructure, accessibility, and something else that is obscured.

“PM” in these sentences could indicate a need to either remember to include this or the possibility that no concrete agreements over money have been made.

All four party leaders were tight-lipped on Monday morning as they entered the final week of talks with Van Zwol and Dijkgraaf. PVV leader Geert Wilders spoke about the “week of truth” and said he would do his best to reach an agreement on a new Cabinet. He said it has “not been easy” and that he hopes agreements can now be made under time pressure. “The will is there.”

VVD leader Dilan Yeşilgöz ignored the press completely, walking straight into the negotiation room. NSC leader Pieter Omtzigt said he would do his “very best” to make this Cabinet work.

BBB, the smallest negotiating party, believes that the four parties will reach an agreement this week. “Everyone is still eager to get there. Let’s go for it,” BBB leader Caroline van der Plas said.

Van Zwol and Dijkgraaf plan to submit their report on the past weeks of negotiations on May 15, next week Wednesday.

Wilders won’t say who he wants as Prime Minister

PVV leader Wilders won’t say who he will nominate to be Prime Minister, sources close to the Cabinet formation negotiations told Nieuwsuur. This is causing some nervousness within the VVD, who don’t want the PVV leader to announce his candidate at the last minute as he has done with the formation leaders.

The leaders of the four parties agreed in March that none of them would be Prime Minister or a member of the Cabinet if their talks succeed. They will remain in parliament. As the leader of the largest party in the formation talks, Wilders gets to nominate a candidate for Prime Minister. But he is refusing to answer questions about who this will be, according to Nieuwsuur’s sources. It is even unclear whether the PVV leader has anyone in mind. One person involved in the formation talks called it “Geert Wilders’ best-kept secret.”