On Thursday evening, the Dutch government confirmed an additional 2 billion-euro investment to combat the national housing crisis, increase teachers’ salaries, and compensate for rising energy bills.
After the cabinet announced the budget for 2022 on Tuesday, parliament took issue with a number of aspects, most notably the fact that the investments to encourage the development of (affordable) housing would do little to curb the growing housing crisis.
After much debate, Thursday afternoon saw several additions made to the governmental budget for next year. All in all, these new policies will see the total budget increase by almost 2 billion euros. In order to encourage housing associations to lower the cost of rents and new builds, the cabinet has earmarked 500 million euros for the partial abolition of the landlord levy.
In addition to this, 300 million euros will be invested in national defence, with another 200 million euros put aside to fund the police and community service officers (BOAs). 500 million euros will go towards lowering energy costs for families and small and medium-size enterprises. A further 500 million euros will be used to reduce the salary gap between teachers working in primary and secondary education.
On top of these significant changes to the national budget, the government agreed to increase the salaries of healthcare workers, and the House of Representatives (Tweede Kamer) supported a motion to abolish the student loan system, replacing it with a basic grant as soon as possible.
The motion was put forward by ChristenUnie and Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), and read: “The House has noted that since the introduction of the student loan system, the number of students with a student loan has risen sharply and the average student loan is also higher than before, [and] is of the opinion that it is undesirable for young people to pile up debts, [while] having to look for work and a home.”
The Dutch student union LSVb was pleased to see the House’s “death blow” to the loan system, but emphasised that no concrete actions have been taken. “We are not there yet,” LSVb chair, Ama Boahene, told NOS Radio 1 Journaal.
Thumb: Maarten Zeehandelaar via Shutterstock.