Dutch tax plan vote without VVD pushes Jetten's minority cabinet into crisis

The deal and the tax plan vote

D66 and CDA reached an agreement with the opposition parties PRO and Volt on an amendment to the Belastingplan, the tax plan, without coalition partner VVD. NOS reports that the plan was adopted on the evening of Thursday, 12 November, by the smallest possible margin, with support from left-wing parties and without the VVD. PRO leader Jesse Klaver spoke of a millionaire tax. The VVD warned that the plan would endanger economic growth and the investment climate. NRC's economics editor writes that the practical consequences are much smaller than both sides suggest.

The VVD and the minority cabinet

NOS describes the VVD as feeling betrayed and pushed into a corner by the cooperation between the coalition's left-wing partners and the opposition, and it warns of chaos and a possibly unworkable situation. The cabinet of Premier Jetten is a minority government that is nine months old and came in promising a new era of political stability, according to Volkskrant. NOS reports that Jetten is trying to restart his minority cabinet, and its podcast argues that he has partly caused the crisis himself while trying to manage it.

Talks and calls for restraint

On Friday, 13 November, Premier Jetten and the vice-premiers of the coalition partners VVD and CDA were in talks about the cabinet crisis. CNV chairman Hans van den Heuvel urged the coalition parties not to let the cabinet fall, telling BNR that a fall would leave important problems unresolved.

“Surely another cabinet is not going to fall?”

Van den Heuvel also described a deeper problem in Dutch politics, in which politicians overstate differences and put forward their own positions as harshly as possible. He blamed both left-wing and right-wing parties for this and said voters in recent years have not been very willing to value compromise. He warned that this creates a self-reinforcing effect in which parties keep clashing.

“That is fun for the debate, but it does not lead to a solution.”

Open questions

The outcome of the talks on Friday, 13 November, was not yet known when these reports were published. The coverage centres on whether the cabinet can keep its footing after the tax plan passed without the VVD, and on the reaction of the party that feels betrayed.