Parliamentary majority for higher defense spending as GL-PvdA throws support behind plan
GroenLinks-PvdA will support increasing the NATO standard for defense spending to 3.5 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), party leader Frans Timmermans confirmed. That means that the caretaker Cabinet has majority support in parliament to spend more money on defense.
NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte wants all NATO countries to spend at least 5 percent of their GDP on defense. That is 3.5 percent that must go directly to defense and 1.5 percent that can go toward other matters that benefit the armed forces, such as cybersecurity and strengthening roads and bridges so that heavy army vehicles can use them. The NATO standard is currently 2 percent.
Last week, the caretaker Cabinet said the Netherlands intends to comply with this new standard. Now there is also enough support in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of the Dutch parliament, to do so.
“GroenLinks-PvdA will support a higher defense budget if that is necessary for our security,” Timmermans told NOS. The party can also agree with that extra 1.5 percent. “It is so vaguely formulated that it is difficult to oppose it.”
The extra defense spending will cost the Netherlands an estimated 16 to 19 billion euros per year. The new Cabinet will have to decide how to fund that.
According to Timmermans, the voters can have a say in this. GroenLinks-PvdA will look for the money from existing financial buffers and from “a solidarity contribution” by wealthy Dutch people, he said. He mentioned increasing the bank tax and the wealth tax, and borrowing within the European Union at low interest through “eurobonds.”
