VVD struggling with shaky Cabinet as voter confidence plummets
The VVD is struggling with the wobbling Cabinet and some members are pushing the party to back off on populist positions and return to its liberal core values. VVD voters are also quickly losing confidence in this government with less than a quarter still believing in it, RTL Nieuws reported after the VVD conference in Den Bosch this weekend and surveying the VVD voters in its opinion panel.
A massive 77 percent of VVD voters don’t have confidence in this Cabinet and 51 percent think things will not get better under its governance. When the Schoof I Cabinet first took office, 45 percent of VVD voters still believed in it.
“I think that the VVD is one of the few people’s parties in the Netherlands that can play a unifying role at the heart of politics. That is not happening now,” former VVD MP and alderman Pim Strien told RTL Nieuws. He presented a motion at the congress calling on the party to return to its liberal values.
Van Strien believes the VVD is going too far with populism in this Cabinet. He mentioned border controls, Asylum Minister Marjolein Faber’s plans to place signs at asylum centers warning asylum seekers that the government was working on deporting them, and various populist and often discriminatory statements by various PVV Ministers.
The party top is also dissatisfied with cooperation in the coalition. High-ranking VVD members feel that the PVV is not fulfilling its role as the largest government party - keeping the coalition together. According to RTL, there is also a lot of complaining about the NSC making discussions difficult and going back on agreements.
The VVD faction in parliament also seems to be divided. Some VVD MPs are happy with the right-wing cooperation, while others are much more critical and mainly waiting for it to be over.
For the time being, the VVD leadership will continue in this Cabinet. They’re hoping it achieves some concrete results, such as a stricter asylum policy. If the Schoof I Cabinet fails, it would reflect poorly on all the coalition parties. It would be the third consecutive Cabinet collapse for the VVD.
