BBB to vote down extra minimum wage increase; Measure will likely fail in the Senate

The extra minimum wage increase that the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of the Dutch Parliament, wanted to implement this year is not expected to happen after all. Right-wing political party BBB will vote against the bill next week, said the leader of the BBB faction in the Senate, Ilona Lagos, after a report by NOS. This means that a majority of senators will likely shoot the bill down.

The proposal to raise the minimum wage and the associated benefits by an additional 1.2 percent above an inflationary increase in July was accepted by a majority in the Tweede Kamer last month, mainly due to the support from the PVV. But the parties who voted against it, BBB among them, have a majority together in Eerste Kamer, the Senate.

BBB had mentioned earlier that raising the minimum wage further was a concern for entrepreneurs due to high costs. The party expected the policy initiative will put jobs at risk. The party also pointed out the high costs for the treasury as a result of increasing benefits at the same rate.

What remains to be seen is if this issue will cause a new rift between the four political parties who have struggled to form a coalition government since the November election. The PVV and NSC voted in favor of the extra bump in minimum wage, while the VVD and now the BBB have been opposed.

The measure passed the Tweede Kamer in March by a vote of 107 to 43, after winning the support of the far-right PVV. The largest party in the lower house brought 37 votes to the table, and NSC brought another 20 to join the left-wing parties.

It was a mostly right-wing coalition that voted against the additional wage increase, with the BBB, VVD, CDA, FvD, SGP and Ja21 all opposed. But the BBB is the largest party in the upper house with 16 seats.

That means that a vote strictly down party lines would lead to a 39-36 vote against the proposal in the Eerste Kamer. The VVD has 10 senators, the CDA has six more, Ja21 has three, and the other two parties have two each.

Tom van der Lee came up with the proposal as a Member of Parliament for GroenLinks-PvdA. He said the BBB's plan to vote against the minimum wage increase is “a terribly wrong decision.” He said he thinks it is “really a shame” that the party is “suddenly saddling the lowest-paid people with a significant loss of purchasing power.”

The minimum wage has jumped considerably in recent years, also on top of the regular semi-annual adjustment for inflation. Despite this, many people with low-paid jobs are still finding it difficult to make ends meet. They are often hundreds of euros short every month, concluded a committee last year that investigated whether support for this group was being adequately addressed. One of their recommendations was a further increase in the minimum wage.