Nieuws van de afdeling

20 February 2017

Seize the power!

Summary of the SP election manifesto for March 2017

Foto: SP

The Netherlands has more millionaires than ever before, yet more than a million people can't afford to pay the costs of the health care they need. The difference between the big earners at the top and the rest of the population has been deliberately widened by this government. Prime Minister Mark Rutte has taken good care of directors and executives, of the banks and multinationals. In the wake of the crisis this elite is richer than it was before it. Yet for most people, vital services such as affordable care and social security, have only declined. Read more

15 February 2017

European Parliament supports CETA, but last word is for national parliaments

Foto: SP

The European Parliament's vote in support of CETA, the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement with Canada, was not unexpected but was in the SP's view disappointing. CETA will come into force as early as the beginning of April, but has still to be ratified by the member states.

14 February 2017

SP Euro-MP De Jong demands complete openness on Commission Expert Groups

Foto: SP

The report from SP Euro-MP Dennis de Jong on the European Commission's advisory expert groups was today adopted with almost unanimous support (663-16, with 13 abstentions) by the European Parliament. “I'm very pleased with the enormous support for transparency shown by my fellow MEPs,” says De Jong. Referring to the Dutch Commissioner in charge of the portfolio on transparency, he notes that “Frans Timmermans will now have to take his responsibility and ensure that an end is put to the dominant position of major corporations in the Commission's hundreds of expert groups. We saw in the investigation into Dieselgate how harmful it can be when in expert groups like CARS21, the industry dominates and environmental and consumers' organisations hardly get a look in.”

4 February 2017

Understanding why there’s discontent doesn’t mean legitimising discrimination

Our elections are in sight. At the same time we can see in the United States where discrimination and exclusion on the grounds of nationality, religion, sexual preference or gender can lead: to a society in which people are set against each other, while the 1% make off with the booty. It’s high time we set a new course: radical together.

1 February 2017

SP urges enquiry into introduction of euro

The SP is supporting the citizens’ initiative (CI) – dubbed the ‘peuro’ – requesting a parliamentary enquiry into the way in which the euro was introduced. The CI will need to gather 40,000 signatures, which will in turn oblige the Dutch Parliament to add the matter to its agenda. The people behind the CI are of the opinion that there was insufficient critical debate around the time that the Maastricht Treaty, which made the euro’s introduction possible, was signed.

31 January 2017

Halt the Brussels revolving door

Foto: SP

On the basis of today’s report from anticorruption group Transparency International’s report ´Access All Areas - When EU politicians become lobbyists´, SP Euro-MP Dennis de Jong believes it’s time to see rapid measures taken to put a stop to the revolving jobs door in Brussels and intends to include this in his report on the European Parliament’s accounts. “A third of MEPs and fully half of the Commissioners turn out, at the end of their term of office, to go to work as lobbyists in the Brussels bubble”. This leads to a closed system, where big corporations, but not the general public, are welcome. The rules on cooling off periods and integrity during and after these periods must now, at last, be amended. I get a queasy feeling from fellow Members who claim to be defending the general interest and at the end of their term go straight into working as lobbyists.’

International