Agata Walczak & Diederik Perk

Last week Wilders’ PVV announced the launching of a web-based hotline to gather complaints against migrants from Middle- and Eastern-Europe, the so-called ‘MOE-landers’. The website reminds everyone that “the PVV was against opening the labour market for Poles and other MOE-landers from the start” for fear of overcrowding, and it welcomes complaints about this community concerning their pollution, noise or drinking behaviour, and general nuisance value. Within a day as many as 14,000 disturbances were reported.

The initiative was immediately met with bewilderment, dismissiveness and mockery. A Polish-Dutch rapper going by the name of Mr. Polska immediately launched his own hotline for positive experiences with migrants from post-communist countries, and a similar initiative ironically singled-out Limburgers, Wilders himself being one of the most prominent individuals from that  southern province.

True to form, Prime-Minister Rutte declined to comment on “matters of party-political concern” (conveniently overlooking the PVV’s support for his governing coalition), but Groen-Links parliamentarian Tofik Dibi tweeted that Wilders had a new scapegoat now that previous ones such as Muslims and Greeks had been worn out.

While Dutch society continued to satirically display the short-sightedness of Wilders’ initiative, the Polish embassy scolded the insulting implications and counter-productiveness of such activities. Even Brussels felt compelled to call on the Dutch not to participate.

However, despite all the public debate, it remains altogether unclear who crossed what lines to bring about this tension. In 2011 alone, the Dutch Complaints Bureau for Discrimination received 230 objections concerning discrimination against MOE-landers, suggesting that the PVV initiative constitutes part of a smear campaign feeding off a discriminatory atmosphere already present in society. Nevertheless, after consulting the Public Prosecutor’s Office, the Complaints Bureau concluded that it should not be regarded as illegal.

Geert Wilders is of course aware of Article 137 of the Penal Code on discrimination after recently being acquitted of charges of discrimination and hate speech himself. In that much-publicised trial, the court failed to define the borders between free speech and the right to insult groups in society.

The current controversy exposes a Dutch climate of acceptance for offensive moves singling out minority groups which would not have been tolerated 15-20 years ago. The PVV website collecting complaints about a certain group does not stand up to scrutiny in terms of discrimination. But if the hotline is not discriminatory, then is it a useful instrument to address a real social problem? Yes and no. Yes, it gives a forum for people to vent daily frustrations, but at the same time no, because it ignores their underlying structural causes. The PVV initiative blurs the issues instead of offering a solution in an effort to halt its recent downfall in the polls. The party’s aversion to the EU has been combined with its traditional agenda on migrant issues to create a useful headline-grabbing, social media-based campaign. Wilders and the PVV once again hit the trending topic and go viral.

Meanwhile the real issues get snowed under. There is something to be said for collecting data on the effect migrants willing to work for lower wages have on an economy that is under ongoing pressure, looking in particular at the lower-educated stratum of Dutch people. Cultural background, heavy drinking and poor driving skills should, however, be excluded - there are enough mechanisms already in place to address minor offences.

The fears that have moved the Dutch away from their celebrated tolerance towards minorities are not completely unfounded. The fear of the unknown that comes with the influx of migrants has not disappeared over the past decades after first Turkish and then Moroccan labourers settled in Dutch cities. This time, though, amid the Euro-crisis, the potential consequences are more daunting than ever.

There is a clear discrepancy between two current political objectives. The short-term need is well-known: a sufficient workforce to maintain the pension funds of an ageing society. But recent years have also seen an increase in the retirement age across Europe to mitigate the negative consequences that ageing societies have on economic growth. And if you don’t secure employment for the 60+ers, young migrant workers will be seen as a threat to those facing the prospect of working until 67 (or beyond), not to mention the risk of further inflating the already sizeable social security system. Yet the links are hardly ever made in party-political discourse.

MOE-landers, mostly underpaid and often unregistered, are thus a necessary economic component, but the structural tension between pension age and inflow of migrants is unlikely to be resolved by the government, and daily social tensions are the inevitable result. Meaningful integration is obstructed from the start by short-term employment contracts usually not exceeding 9 months. While the state-funded inburgeringscursus (Civic Integration Course) does not even include such short stays, subsidies will in any case be completely terminated by 2013.

On top of these obstacles to integration, sometimes a conscious effort is made by employers and uncertified uitzendbureaus (work agencies), often in cooperation with insurance companies, to keep the workers isolated and unaware of their rights. Some migrants employed in industries like construction, food production, agriculture or manufacturing are facing conditions that border on modern slavery. Confiscated passports, withheld wages and poor housing are regular (illegal) occurrences that contribute to the alienation of vulnerable groups.   

Against this backdrop, the Polish have no voice to defend themselves against stigmatization. Neither is there a voice in Dutch civil society that would stand up for them in a concerted way. Admittedly, every provocative statement made by Wilders and his party is instantaneously met with uproar from the public. However, in the present case few really represent or sympathize with the difficulties faced by MOE-landers and the underlying reasons for their presence.

So what is the best response? The Netherlands should have learned already that letting issues of migration and integration linger only results in widespread societal discontent. Stigmatization of MOE-landers, and more specifically Polish workers, only exposes them to further discrimination, alienation and exploitation.  It is not only a task for the government to address this, but also for the media and civil society to address the underlying conditions and appreciate the contribution migrants workers make to economic progress. Instead of fearing the construction workers, it’s time to construct the future together.

[Thanks to Tangent Reality]

Knowing where political parties obtain their money is a fairly essential aspect of democracy. Transparency for financial transactions prevents parties from becoming trojan horses for hidden interests able to pay for political influence.

On Wednesday and Thursday this week the parliament discussed a proposal for a new law that would require parties to declare any donation of above 1000 Euro in their annual report, and any donation above 4500 Euro must be listed with the name of the donator. Failure to do so would mean a fine of 25,000 Euro. The consequences for Wilders’ PVV would be considerable if this went through, because the party has from day one wanted to avoid any insight into its financial affairs.

To receive state funding like the other political parties, the Freedom party would need party members, and it only has two: Wilders himself, and the Friends of the PVV foundation. In this way Wilders sticks by his aim to avoid any connection with the Dutch state. He also avoids any annual financial reports. And he maintains complete control over everything. But to do so, he needs to haul his money from somewhere else. And as everyone knows, much of it comes from abroad – right-wingers in the US, and probably Israel. There have been plenty of reports on this, some of which were compiled here on the Bureau in June 2010.

“The proposal for a law on the financial support for political parties has a long history, too long in the opinion of my party.” So spoke Tofik Dibi of GreenLeft in the debate yesterday, and his view coincided with the PvdA, who also want to ban all donations that come from abroad (nice twist too - the Communist party was villified for getting money from Moscow, so whats the difference with a party getting money from the crazy US Right?). But the show was stolen by the Freedom Party’s Hero Brinkman, who held forth against this ‘anti-PVV law’ and against a wave of critique from all the other parties for around an hour. Brinkman, who is known as the ‘democrat’ within the PVV for various efforts to develop a more open party structure, used a string of interesting arguments in response:

1) The proposed law originated as a move by former Interior Minister Guusje ter Horst to demand transparency from Pim Fortuyn’s LPF back in 2002. Once the LPF declined in numbers and was less of a threat, the law was shelved. Now that the PVV has become one of the top three parties, the law has been revived. In other words – whenever a threatening political movement rises in power to challenge the established order, this law gets pulled out.

2) The law would require all PVV donators to be made public, and this could bring them in danger – Not for nothing does Wilders wander around with heavy protection every day. The law would therefore actually be undemocratic because it would scare away Dutch individuals who would otherwise support the PVV.

3) According to Brinkman, only nine democracies provide state money for political parties, so the Netherlands already belongs to a minority of states. (needless to say, he didn’t name the other eight, and one wonders if he knows what he is talking about here).

4) The fact that the Freedom party might obtain its money from the US is nobody else’s business.

5) Final point – the new law is so full of holes that it will be possible to find the gaps in it anyway. For instance, money coming in to local branches of a political party will not have to be declared, offering a large and obvious loophole.

Obviously, for any normal politician it would have take around ten minutes to outline these points. For Brinkman, however, this was a useful stage for a tirade against all things leftist and CDA-ish, stringing out his defence of the wonderful contribution that the PVV makes to Dutch democracy so much that the questioners had to repeat their enquiries more than once in order to get an answer out of him. Dibi’s protests that the law reflects the anti-corruption stance of Dutch foreign policy – which the PVV supports – went nowhere against Brinkman’s determination to avoid real debate on the issue. For anyone who wants a taste, the debate can be found here.

Looks like a solid majority in parliament want to pass the law. Is it anti-PVV? It is an important move to standardise Dutch politics by getting everyone to play by the same rules - and there is only one loser, as the Dutch press have made clear. Private financial arrangements are the life and soul of the whole Wilders operation. He has to be able to declare a distance between himself and ‘the state’ (i.e. established politics), otherwise his whole carefully constructed image collapses.

Brinkman’s Pyrotechnics included the announcement that the PVV would find ways around the law if necessary, a sign of the way ahead. But the law could just add extra weight to the apparent decline in Wilders’ fortunes shown by recent opinion polls. When it comes to the effects of economic crisis, will the voter after all choose the Socialists over the PVV? Maybe….