Politics and Elections in the Netherlands: Rutte III era

[DavidB.]

- Henk Otten still intends to take up his Senate seat.

- The VVD had another corruption scandal: magazine Quote called into question Senator Anne-Wil Duthler's integrity because she voted on issues that she had a business interest in. Duthler then made derogatory statements about Quote and started a libel suit, which she lost yesterday. Subsequently, Duthler was kicked out of the parliamentary group. She refuses to give up her seat.

- Rumors that CDA leader Sybrand Buma would leave and become mayor in Leeuwarden, the capital of the province of Frisia from which he hails, are getting stronger. Potential successors of his could be Finance Minister Wopke Hoekstra or Deputy PM and Public Health Minister Hugo de Jonge. A dark horse could be Defense Minister Ank Bijleveld. Presumably a primary would take place.

- 74% of FVD voters in the PS elections think it's right Otten had to resign from the party board, an EenVandaag poll found. More than 90% of voters maintain their trust in Baudet and more than 90% say this affair will not affect their FVD vote in the European election.

FVD supporters are more split on Otten's future: 40% think he should sit in the Senate for FVD, 40% think he should be kicked out of the Senate parliamentary group even if it means he takes his seat with him and FVD have one fewer seat.

With regard to the criticisms Otten coined in the NRC interview, only 16% think FVD is moving too much to the right. But 36% think Baudet is centering himself too much within the party, and 50% think Baudet's language is too philosophical.

48% expect more internal conflicts in the coming years and 27% say it would have been better if FVD had not grown as quickly.

Peil.nl is currently conducting a similar survey as well as the first proper European election poll. The results will be in on Sunday morning.

[DavidB.]

First non-Peil post-Provincial election poll, by I&O. Numbers compared to March 18, two days before the PS election:

VVD 27 (+4)
Forum voor Democratie 24 (+4)
GroenLinks 20 (+1)
D66 13 (+2)
CDA 12 (-3)
PVV 11 (-4)
PvdA 11 (nc)
SP 10 (-2)
50Plus 6 (+1)
ChristenUnie 5 (-2)
PvdD 5 (-2)
SGP 4 (+1)
DENK 2 (nc)

55% (-2) are dissatisfied with Rutte-III's performance, 42% (+3) are satisfied.

60% conducted pre-Otten interview.

Peil.nl already finished its poll (conducted after everything regarding Ottengate happened, full details including EP election poll to be published tomorrow) and released that FVD will have 26 (-2 compared to last week). PVV and PvdA gain a seat. All other parties remain stable, including the VVD at 22.

[DavidB.]

Apparently the EP poll isn't being publicized yet, God knows why.

Peil poll today compared to last week: FVD 26 (-2), VVD 22, GL 18, CDA 15, PvdA 14 (+1), D66 11, PVV 9 (+1), SP 9, PvdD 8, CU 7, DENK 4, 50Plus 4, SGP 2, "Others" 1

Even though the media brouhaha over Ottengate is still ongoing, actual FVD voters in the PS election don't give a damn: 81% think Otten shouldn't have given the NRC interview, only 15% agree with Otten's criticism about Baudet moving the party too much to the right, 89% think Otten should have kept his criticism internal, 78% think Baudet was right in his behavior towards Otten, only 19% think this scandal will hurt FVD electorally in the long run, and only 4% regret voting FVD. 66% think Otten should not take up his Senate seat.

Among all voters, 21% view Baudet's victory speech positively, 22% neutrally, 53% negatively. Only 7% of FVD voters are negative about the speech. Interestingly, PVV voters view the speech more positively than FVD voters (though not sure if this is significant): 57% of PVV voters, 54% of FVD voters view it positively. However, only 12% of VVD voters and 17% of CDA voters view it positively. Not a good strategy to attract more center-right voters - but then again this obviously isn't the aim of a speech directly after the polls close.

[DavidB.]

Ipsos for parliament (compared to last poll on Feb 27):
VVD 27 (+1)
Forum voor Democratie 25 (+8)
PVV 14 (-5)
CDA 14
GroenLinks 14 (-3)
D66 11 (-1)
SP 10
PvdA 10 (+1)
PvdD 8 (+1)
CU 6 (-1)
50Plus 5 (-2)
SGP 3
DENK 3

For European parliament (compared to current Dutch EP composition):
VVD 5 (+2)
Forum voor Democratie 5 (+5)
CDA 3 (-2)
GroenLinks 3 (+1)
D66 2 (-2)
PVV 2 (-2)
PvdA 2 (-1)
CU-SGP 2
SP 1 (-1)
PvdD 1
50Plus 0
DENK 0

[DavidB.]

Forgot to say that the FVD crisis has been solved: Paul Cliteur, a well-known professor of Philosophy of Law at Leiden University and #2 at the FVD list, will lead the parliamentary group in the Senate; Otten will be an ordinary Senator. He has apologized for his actions. A clear sign from Baudet: if even Henk Otten can't mess with his authority, no one can. Quite important for the party that the issue has been solved, which means coverage of it will stop and not interfere with the EP election campaign; it presumably also means Otten won't air the dirty laundry behind the affair.

Meanwhile the Peilingwijzer, the "filter" of all the opinion polls that takes into account all the house effects, will be a bit less useful: Maurice de Hond, the pollster behind Peil.nl, has gone on an angry rant because he thinks the Peilingwijzer isn't updated sufficiently often. As many media have pledged not to publicize information from single polls anymore but only use the Peilingwijzer (to avoid sensationalism), which means Peil's polls have received less attention in the first place, De Hond already was rather unhappy with the instrument - but it does seem as if his objections are really related to the frequency of publishing. I partly agree with his criticisms, but the fact that Ipsos, Kantar and I&O, the three other pollsters, only poll monthly or even bi-monthly doesn't make it much easier for Dr. Tom Louwerse, the political scientist behind the Peilingwijzer (who doesn't get paid for any of this). In anger, De Hond now demands Louwerse to pay him 2500 euros for every poll he uses, which is insane as the only data Louwerse uses are the seat numbers publicly released by De Hond every week. Louwerse almost definitely has the law on his side, but says he has no time and energy for a legal battle, so he will omit the Peil polls from now on.

I&O was the most accurate pollster for the (prognosis of the) Senate election: 14 seats apart from the final result. Peil.nl was the second best (16 seats), Peilingwijzer was 20 seats apart, Ipsos and Kantar 22 seats. Peil did end up looking the best because I&O was further off with VVD and FVD, whereas Peil had those about right but botched some of the smaller parties by a couple of seats.

Peilingwijzer (without Peil):

VVD 24-28 seats
Forum voor Democratie 21-27 seats
GroenLinks 16-18 seats
PVV 11-15 seats
CDA 12-14 seats
PvdA 9-13 seats
D66 10-12 seats
SP 8-12 seats
CU 6-8 seats
PvdD 5-7 seats
50Plus 5-7 seats
DENK 2-4 seats
SGP 2-4 seats

[DavidB.]

In Zuid-Holland, FVD, VVD and CDA have arrived at a draft version of a coalition agreement and will now negotiate with other parties to fill in the details and receive a majority in the Provincial States. FVD have agreed to continuing the "energy transition" towards renewables, but there will be no more wind turbines on land.

[DavidB.]

The Amsterdam city government intends to ban all diesel and petrol cars by 2030 in the area on the inside of the A10 ring road. Controversial, but this weekend's Peil poll suggests a majority of people in Amsterdam support it: 56% support it, 34% oppose it. People from outside Amsterdam are more negative: 57% oppose it, only 27% support it.

Peil.nl today: FVD 27 (+1), VVD 23 (+1), GroenLinks 17 (-1), CDA 14 (-1), PvdA 14, D66 11, PVV 9, SP 9, PvdD 8, CU 7, DENK 4, 50Plus 4, SGP 2, "Others" 1.

Kantar also had a poll. Compared to GE:

FVD 28 (+26)
VVD 27 (-6)
GroenLinks 19 (+5)
PvdA 12 (+3)
PVV 11 (-9)
CDA 11 (-8)
D66 10 (-9)
SP 8 (-6)
CU 8 (+3)
PvdD 6 (+1)
50Plus 6 (+2)
SGP 2 (-1)
DENK 2 (-1)

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

PvdA 12 (+3)

What a comeback.

[Zinneke]

PvdA 12 (+3)

What a comeback.

Probs due to Timmermans.

[DavidB.]

Nah, this is +3 compared to the GE, not compared to the last poll. They've been in the 9-13 zone in most non-Peil polls for the last year or so. But Timmermans will probably cause the PvdA to avoid another loss in the EP election. Peil's poll today showed that 21% consider voting for the PvdA, on par with FVD. Obviously a lot of these people will ultimately end up voting GL or D66 anyway, but it shows their ceiling is rather high with Timmermans (by Dutch standards...). Wouldn't even be surprised if they gain a seat and get to 4, which would go at the expense of D66/GL.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Nah, this is +3 compared to the GE

Didn't they get 6% last election? Even though I was actually thinking about that one, I remember times when almost everybody was saying that they are already dead and now and even in new Peil they got 14 seats (ca 10%?).

[DavidB.]

Nah, this is +3 compared to the GE

Didn't they get 6% last election? Even though I was actually thinking about that one, I remember times when almost everybody was saying that they are already dead and now and even in new Peil they got 14 seats (ca 10%?).

Yes, 6% is 9 seats so 12 seats would be 3 seats up from the 9 that they currently have.

In the Peil poll they do have 14 seats which is significantly up from 9 (but of course still poor). Ipsos has them at 10, I&O at 11, Kantar at 12. So a small recovery, but still pretty poor given that the GE is more than two years ago already. Second-order elections with lower turnout are better for them, because older people tend to turn out and at this point the PvdA is massively overrepresented among them. This is also why their loss in the PS election wasn't as bad as it could have been (though they still lost even more compared to PS2015).

[DavidB.]

Sybrand Buma is out as CDA leader: he will be the new mayor of Leeuwarden, the capital of Frisia. The CDA now need to find a new parliamentary group leader and a political leader. For the latter job, ministers Wopke Hoekstra (Finance) and Hugo de Jonge (Public Health) are considered to be frontrunners.

[DavidB.]

See the EU election thread for my comments on that election result.

In today's Peil poll, the VVD have taken the lead again: VVD 25, FVD 24 (-3), PvdA 16 (+1), GL 16 (+1), CDA 15, D66 10 (-1), PVV 8, SP 8, PvdD 8, ChristenUnie 7, 50Plus 5 (+1), DENK 4, SGP 2, "Others" (unspecified) 2 (+1)

On the EU, 51% want less integration or Nexit, 47% want more European integration. 16% support Nexit (76% of PVV EP19 voters but only 46% of FVD EP19 voters), 35% want to stay in but oppose EU integration as much as possible, 30% want gradual EU integration and 17% want full EU integration.

[Lord Halifax]

Sybrand Buma is out as CDA leader: he will be the new mayor of Leeuwarden, the capital of Frisia. The CDA now need to find a new parliamentary group leader and a political leader. For the latter job, ministers Wopke Hoekstra (Finance) and Hugo de Jonge (Public Health) are considered to be frontrunners.

Will that lead to any policy changes?

[DavidB.]

Sybrand Buma is out as CDA leader: he will be the new mayor of Leeuwarden, the capital of Frisia. The CDA now need to find a new parliamentary group leader and a political leader. For the latter job, ministers Wopke Hoekstra (Finance) and Hugo de Jonge (Public Health) are considered to be frontrunners.

Will that lead to any policy changes?

Too early to say. Buma is more on the right of the CDA whereas Hoekstra is clearly more on the left. That's not where any CDA leader needs to be when competing with the VVD, though, so perhaps he could reinvent himself just like Rutte did within the VVD. It's completely unclear where De Jonge stands. All in all I'd definitely not expect a shift to the right. A shift to the left is possible, but would be electorally dangerous. The CDA's eternal issue is that its membership has a very vocal left-wing segment whereas the base is actually to the right of the party.

[DavidB.]

The actual Senate election just took place in the Provincial States, which always leads to a ton of electoral games. This sort of stuff:




The Senate will look like this:
FVD 12
VVD 12
CDA 9
D66 7
PvdA 6
PVV 5
SP 4
ChristenUnie 4
PvdD 3
50Plus 2
SGP 2
Independent Senate Group 1

32/75 for the coalition.

FVD, GL and PvdA one down compared to the prognosis; SGP, D66 and the Independent Senate Group one up. This means the government can use both the PvdA route and the GL route to a majority, which is a relief to the right-wing parties VVD and CDA, as the 'coalition deal with GL' frame would be potentially damaging.

FVD probably voted for the SGP in ZH on purpose: #15 on the Senate list, Robbert Baljeu, has been kicked out of the NH provincial group following Ottengate, resulting in one fewer seat for FVD. Because of the fact that two people who were technically elected to the Senate are going to Brussels as MEPs, Baljeu would be in the Senate and 'steal' his FVD seat anyway. So it is assumed that FVD rather see the SGP with one more seat than to have Baljeu in the Senate as a reminder of FVD's internal conflicts for four years. Some provincial FVD groups gave their preference votes to candidates below Baljeu (like Hugo Berkhout who now lives in Cyprus and MP Theo Hiddema who would have to resign from the Lower House to take his seat), presumably so that one of them is eligible to take the 12th FVD seat before Baljeu when, for some reason, in the worst case scenario, an incumbent Senator has to go. All of this wouldn't have been possible if FVD had won more seats in the European parliament either, so this is all galaxy brain tier manoeuvring.

[DavidB.]

Ron Meyer will be out as chairman of the SP "by the end of the year". That's a pretty big deal. A logical conclusion after two absolutely disastrous elections, but not as logical in a party led like the SP. Meyer was responsible for pushing the SP in a more "workerite" direction: more negative on immigration, more focused on bread and butter issues, more opposed to the EU. It led to an exodus of professional far-left activists (to BIJ1 and GL) but failed to attract the numbers of voters the SP attracted in the 00s. Marijnissen will stay on, though, and I doubt the more 'internationalist' side in the SP (informally led by MP Sadet Karabulut) has enough clout to steer the party in a different direction. I guess Meyer will make sure a copy of him succeeds him.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

does anybody expect the PvdA to get a boost from its EU result, or is everybody just putting it down to Timmermania?

[DavidB.]

does anybody expect the PvdA to get a boost from its EU result, or is everybody just putting it down to Timmermania?

I don't expect a huge boost in the short run, but it definitely shows that the PvdA has found the way up again. The narrative is changing accordingly and I think this will be very important for them in the longer run. Which will hurt GL and D66 electorally. Klaver can put his Prime Ministerial ambitions aside and is not the uncontested leader of the left anymore, D66 will probably end up in the single digits.

[DavidB.]

Coalition formation update in the provinces:

Drenthe: PvdA-VVD-CDA-CU (formed)
Flevoland: VVD-CDA-PvdA-CU-D66
Frisia: CDA-VVD-PvdA-FNP
Groningen: GL-VVD-PvdA-CDA-D66-CU (formed)
Gelderland: VVD-CDA-PvdA-GL-CU-SGP (formed)
Overijssel: CDA-VVD-PvdA-CU-SGP
Noord-Holland: GL-VVD-D66-PvdA
Noord-Brabant: VVD-CDA-GL-D66-PvdA
Zeeland: CDA-VVD-SGP-PvdA
Utrecht: GL-D66-CDA-PvdA-CU
Zuid-Holland: FVD-VVD-CDA-CU-SGP still ongoing
Limburg: CDA-PVV-FVD-VVD with support from 50Plus and PvdD still ongoing
(not entirely sure about the stage of the formation of some of these)

In the last ten years or so, the average number of parties has gone up from 2 to 5 or so this time, reflecting fragmentation.

In some provinces, other parties pushed out FVD from the negotiations: often negotiations took place constructively until the national leadership of PvdA and CU intervened and found a reason (often Thierry Baudet) to terminate talks (Overijssel, Zeeland, Flevoland). In others, FVD wasn't invited in the first place (Utrecht, Noord-Holland) or left itself (Noord-Brabant, Friesland). In two provinces FVD is still at the table: Zuid-Holland and Limburg.

In Limburg, where the Provincial States are called Parliament and the King's Commissioner 'Governor', an attempt at forming an extraparliamentary government without coalition or opposition was made. However, GL, SP, D66 and PvdA left because they felt that the right-wing 'parliamentary' majority would also produce policies that would be too right-wing for them to accept. 50Plus and PvdD did like the innovative approach and because of FVD and PVV's focus on environmental issues and animal welfare, they remain at the negotiating table. Would certainly be interesting if the first regional government with real PvdD influence were one consisting of CDA-PVV-FVD-VVD. To be continued.

[DavidB.]

Parliament today passed a motion to ban 'conversion therapy' for gay people by a margin of 101-49. PVV, CDA, CU, SGP and FVD opposed the initiative.

[windjammer]

Parliament today passed a motion to ban 'conversion therapy' for gay people by a margin of 101-49. PVV, CDA, CU, SGP and FVD opposed the initiative.

Why did they oppose it?

[DavidB.]

Parliament today passed a motion to ban 'conversion therapy' for gay people by a margin of 101-49. PVV, CDA, CU, SGP and FVD opposed the initiative.

Why did they oppose it?

SGP has an ideological problem with it, CU's base wouldn't appreciate it. CDA are "supposed" not to vote for these things, I guess, and PVV and FVD opposed it for a combination of legal reasons (badly defined stuff, difficult to actually do something with it) and opposition to the "wokeness" reflex to ban everything not viewed as sufficiently progressive.

[DavidB.]

This evening, the GroenLinks parliamentary group decided to sack MP Zihni Özdil. A historian teaching at Erasmus University Rotterdam, Özdil was a new candidate in 2017 and had the reputation of somewhat of a 'maverick', having criticized GL's neoliberal turn before.

A few weeks ago, Özdil, who held the education portfolio, made a comment that the new student loan system was a mistake. Under this system, students do not receive grants from the government anymore (technically a loan but it turned into a grant upon finishing one's studies) but will have to take loans from the beginning - unlike in most of Western Europe. The money would be invested in the education system. It was supported by VVD, PvdA, D66 and GL under the Rutte II government and GL leader Klaver was partly responsible for writing it. A few years afterwards, the consequences are clear: young people now have a lot of student debts and have trouble buying a house, people feel more of a barrier to go to university, and students are less inclined to engage in other activities next to their studies (as they are afraid of studying longer and taking more loans), even though this is of critical importance these days and highly valued by employers. So now that the results are in, Özdil said it is necessary that GL rethink the policy. Student organizations had always criticized the policy and put a lot of pressure on Klaver, who gave in and said it is indeed time to think about improving the system. Apparently, however, Özdil had not discussed his interview with Klaver, which led to a "breach of trust". Özdil, I guess, was always too much of a free thinker and an academic to deal with the party discipline. It is revealing that sources now say the GL organization, with all the nice and informal optics, is rather hierarchically oriented towards Klaver.

Another aspect in the background is that Özdil is all about 'progressive patriotism', finding a new way of civic nationalism that includes immigrants without engaging in identity politics. He doesn't shy away from criticizing bad integration, and he emphasizes the importance of an open debate. For this reason, he was the constant victim of relentless attacks by a small, but incredibly vocal, activist and nasty group of 'woke' people who demanded he be sacked - for instance for posing in a picture while hugging the conservative philosopher Sid Lukkassen, who is associated with FVD. This incident apparently caused Klaver to seek to impose a 'Twitter ban' on Özdil. He is now giving up his seat, but I suspect we will hear much more from him. My prognosis: he'll lead the new Free Left movement in the next election.