Dutch minister pushes ahead with controversial plan to free up asylum centers

Caretaker asylum minister Mona Keijzer wants to lower the criteria for when family members can be housed with refugees. The measure is intended to free up space in asylum centers and ease pressure on the overcrowded registration facility in Ter Apel, the Ministry of Asylum and Migration said.

According to a spokesperson for the Ministry of Asylum and Migration, the measure could create around 2,000 spots in asylum centers. That number roughly equals the group of family reunification migrants who already hold residence permits but whose relatives’ homes are deemed too small to accommodate them.

The ministry spokesperson could not yet specify which rules will be relaxed. “If there is housing available, it would now take something very serious to prevent a family member from joining,” he explained. “The approach is shifting from ‘no, unless’ to ‘yes, provided that.’”

According to Keijzer, “we have reached the limits of what is possible, which is why we are beginning this without delay,” she stated in a press release. During the night between Monday and Tuesday, 2,075 people stayed at the Ter Apel asylum seeker registration center, the largest figure recorded since November 1 of last year.

Under current law, municipalities must arrange housing for asylum seekers who have been granted a residence permit. However, Keijzer intends to ban municipalities from giving these recognized refugees preferential access to social rental housing.

On Monday, the Council of State noted that Keijzer’s proposal to end priority access to social housing for residence permit holders clashes with municipalities’ duty to provide them with housing. Although the country’s highest legislative advisor urged her not to move forward with the plan, the minister rejected that guidance immediately.

The Association of Netherlands Municipalities (VNG), which called for an emergency meeting with the cabinet on Tuesday morning about the asylum situation, criticized Keijzer’s plan as “merely a band-aid and an example of reactive management.”

According to the VNG, housing must be handled thoughtfully, responsibly, and in close coordination with municipalities. They argue that the true solution lies in enforcing the distribution law and giving priority to housing for residence permit holders.

VluchtelingenWerk expressed alarm over Keijzer’s proposed changes. They feel the minister wants relatives to move in with recognized refugees even if the home isn’t suitable. “This could leave refugees and their entire families crammed into a tiny room, or even homeless.”

According to VluchtelingenWerk, people granted residence in the Netherlands often receive accommodations designed for a single occupant, such as a shared room in a house or a student room “with no space for an extra mattress on the floor.” Housing corporations sometimes forbid cohabitation because the spaces aren’t suitable for families.

“Already, family members are contacting us, unsure of where they will sleep the next night.” While emergency solutions like hotels can occasionally be arranged in coordination with the Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA), VluchtelingenWerk warns that this will almost certainly fail under Keijzer’s new plan. The organization also fears shortages of basic necessities such as food, water, and clothing, as no funding has been allocated.