parliamentary debate

Minister Sander Dakker for Legal Protection acknowledged in a parliamentary debate on Wednesday that he bears political responsibility for mistakes made in the treatment of Michael P., the man who raped and murdered 25-year-old Anne Faber from Utrecht in 2017. At the same time he asked parliament to trust him to also solve the problems. He survived the debate, NU.nl reports.

"I feel the responsibility in my every fiber", Dekker said. "One of my most important tasks is to protect society from people like Michael P." 

Minister Cora van Nieuwenhuizen of Infrastructure did not know which types of Stint cargo bikes were on the public road until she temporarily banned the vehicles following a fatal accident in Oss. "If you find that there is no supervision, then I can only confirm that", she said in a parliamentary debate on Thursday evening, NU.nl reports.

A visitor to the Tweede Kamer jumped off the public gallery during a parliamentary debate on organized crime on Thursday. Eyewitnesses claim it was an attempted suicide, though this has not yet been confirmed, NU.nl reports.

The parliamentary debate was halted and the meeting chamber evacuated. The man was taken to hospital, injured but alive, a spokesperson for the Hague police said to NU.nl.

The spokesperson confirmed that the man jumped off the gallery himself. Attempted suicide is one of the scenarios the police are investigating.

A marathon debate akin to the American style filibuster is starting in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of Dutch parliament, on Tuesday. Parliamentarians asked for over 36 hours of talk time to debate the abolition of the so-called Hillen law - a law that gives tax credit to mortgages that have been repaid or almost repaid. The idea behind this marathon debate is to stall the abolition of this law, RTL Nieuws reports.

The PVV requested 1,200 minutes of speaking time, 50Plus wants 900 minutes. Other parties requested no more than 30 minutes.

The VVD, CDA, D66 and ChristenUnie presented its plans for the Netherlands for the coming years on Tuesday, 209 days after the parliamentary election In March. The Rutte III government is expected to take office in two weeks. Opposition parties have Wednesday to read through the agreement, and on Thursday they wil debate in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of parliament, the Volkskrant reports.

Dutch food safety authority NVWA is facing fierce criticism in the Tweede Kamer on Thursday. The parliamentarians have nothing good to say about the NVWA's actions in dealing with millions of Dutch eggs being contaminated by toxic insecticide fipronil. In summary, the MPs accused the NVWA of not communicating well, not responding adequately to an anonymous tip about the contamination and having an inadequate setup to deal with such a crisis, NU.nl reports.

The Tweede Kamer is cutting its summer holiday short in order to debate the fipronil contamination of eggs from Dutch poultry farms with Public Health Minister Edith Schippers and State Secretary Martijn van Dam of Economic Affairs, NU.nl reports.

VVD leader and current Prime Minister Mark Rutte is "extremely disappointed" and "bewildered" that the government formation talks between the VVD, CDA, D66 and GroenLinks collapsed again. A parliamentary debate on the matter is likely to be held before the end of Tuesday, the Telegraaf reports.

The Dutch Public Prosecutor wants to prosecute jihadists before their return to the Netherlands, while they are still in Syria and Iraq, national coordinating prosecutor Ferry van Veghel said in Nieuwsuur. "Given the high risk of people who come back from this area, we do not want to wait until they come back before opening criminal investigations. We want it all to start now and continue in their absence", he said.

Minister Ard van der Steur of Security and Justice survived another debate without a vote of no confidence against him. In Wednesday's debate Van der Steur was under fire for a letter he helped former Justice Minister Ivo Opstelten write in the so-called Teeven deal while he was still a parliamentarian.

The parliamentary debate about the scandal surrounding the so-called Teeven deal with Prime Minister Mark Rutte on Wednesday may well put the Prime Minister on the defensive