Many concerns about Dutch government's budget plans

Municipalities, businesses, children’s rights organizations, education, and mental health institutions have many concerns about the plans the Dutch government announced on Budget Day. Like the Netherlands’ planning agencies, many feel that the Schoof I Cabinet is not paying enough attention to the future.

Rotterdam mayor Ahmed Aboutaleb fears that the government’s planned cut of 110 million euros on public transport in the three large cities would cause fare hikes of up to 11 percent. “If parliament does not take action, that could easily mean tens of millions in cuts on public transport. And if you do nothing about that, that could also mean a significant increase in the fare,” said Aboutaleb, who is retiring next month.

Aboutaleb was “not surprised” by the government’s intention. “We have known for a few weeks that the government wanted to do something about the way it distributes subsidies across the regions and cities. Ten percent of the total subsidies would be cut. We never knew that the subsidies we receive for public transport would be included in this. We still assume that there has been a mistake, and that is why we are lobbying parliament to correct that error.”

The Association of Dutch Municipalities (VNG) had hoped that the government would have a plan for supporting municipalities. VNG chairman Sharon Dijksma, also the mayor of Utrecht, called it disappointing that this was not addressed in the budget statement. “In the speech from the throne, the government formulates a number of ambitions that require good cooperation between government and municipalities. Think of livelihoods and housing. We are, of course, prepared to discuss this in a constructive manner, but municipalities do need sufficient resources to implement the government’s ambitions.”

The PO-Raad, the council for primary education, is worried about budget cuts. These will amount to 255 million euros for primary education in the coming period. “In his speech from the throne, the King stated that education benefits from peace and continuity, not from many new experiments,” PO-Raad chairman Freddy Weima said. “But with this budget, the Schoof Cabinet is sending education into a storm.”

UNICEF Nederland finds it worrying that children and young people were not even mentioned in King Willem-Alexander’s Budget Day speech. “There are major challenges for the future of the 3.3 million children and young people in the Netherlands,” said director Suzanne Laszlo. “Think, for example, of youth care, child poverty, and children in asylum reception. These are major issues that affect children and should be given priority.”

The National Child Aid Fund urged the government on Tuesday to also invest in children. Working parents have increasingly ended up in poverty in recent years, the organization said. “By only focusing on working poor people, we miss other children and young people who grow up in families with poverty stress,” the organization said. “Prime Minister Schoof, don’t forget to also invest these talents for the future. All children and young people deserve a promising perspective.”

Mental healthcare organization GGZ Nederland worries about the lack of attention to mental healthcare, especially for young people with mental health problems. “Mental health was not mentioned in the speech from the throne, and the government program does not contain any concrete policy intentions,” GGZ Nederland said. “Young people were not even mentioned in the King’s speech. Last year, one in five young people had to deal with mental health problems. Investing in the mental health of young people is crucial to prevent their problems from escalating, which unnecessarily deteriorates their well-being and makes them need more intense care later in life.”

NOC*NSF is pleased that the government won’t cut back on sports in 2025, but the sports umbrella organization fears negative consequences from other plans. “It is very clear that the government has a soft spot for sports and recognizes the social impact of sports,” NOC*NSF said. “It is good that there are no cuts in the sports budget for the coming year. But unfortunately, that does not alleviate our concerns.”

“Because other plans of this government have major consequences for sports. These are plans from the main lines agreement for VAT, which will increase from 9 to 21 percent, and the gambling tax that will increase. In addition, there will also be an adjustment to municipal sports subsidies.” According to NOC*NSF, the effects of these measures will be “a bloodletting for sports of tens of millions of euros per year.”

The Dutch Data Protection Authority (Dutch DPA) won’t be able to properly address new challenges with the 49 million euro budget the government allocated to it. The privacy watchdog pointed to a calculation by the parliamentary committee of inquiry on Fraud Policy and Services, which recommended a budget of 100 million euros. “100 million is the minimum needed to prevent new benefits scandals and to tackle challenges with digitalization and algorithms. But the budget has remained stuck at 49 million. This is not enough to meet even the most basic requirements of good supervision.”

Companies in the port of Rotterdam asked the government not to let its plans for labor migration go too far. “In addition to tapping into new talent and other measures to solve the labor shortage, experts and technicians from outside the Netherlands will continue to be needed,” said Deltalinqs, the business organization for the port of Rotterdam and industry. The government’s plans must not lead to “the situation where we can no longer offer [labor migrants] work in the port, while there are hardly any technicians or specialists left in the Netherlands,” Deltalinqs said. “Otherwise, we will really be shooting ourselves in the foot for both our logistics and industrial companies and for successfully completing the energy transition.”

FME, the business organization for the technological industry, praised the government's efforts to combat regulatory pressure, improve labor productivity, and reverse several tax increases on the business community. However, the organization is critical of significant cuts in education, innovation, and research. "We wholeheartedly endorse the government's ambition to be among the top 5 most competitive economies in the world," says FME chairman Theo Henrar. "However, there is too much space between what the government says it wants and the actual policy. We do not see how we can get back into the top 5 in the next Cabinet period in this way. And that is worrying because by hardly investing in innovation, the government is taking a mortgage on the future."