Dutch political parties to be made more accountable

Following in the wake of a damning report from the European Council on the Dutch government’s funding of political parties published earlier this year, the Dutch government is working on a new set of rules which should increase accountability and bring the Netherlands into line with the rest of Europe.

Lawyer Laurens Dragstra, who presented his doctoral thesis on this topic at Amsterdam University last week, says the current system of party funding is hopelessly inadequate and lacks transparency. His thesis, which backs up the European Council’s findings, puts the Dutch rules in an international perspective.

It practically impossible in the Netherlands to find out which individuals donate how much to a political party and on what conditions. This lack of transparency means there is a danger of undue political influence. Dragstra feels a change is long overdue: “These flaws in the Dutch system have been known about for years. That’s why it’s so disappointing that there have been no proposals to change the law”.

Restrict donations

Home affairs minister Guusje ter Horst (Labour party PvdA) is working on stricter rules for party funding and although the draft bill has not yet been made public, some of the proposed changes are already known. In future, private donations will be restricted to 25,000 euros a year and anonymous donors will not be allowed to give more than 700 euros. Parties will have to disclose not just the names of companies who donate funds but also those of private donors.

Last Friday, the cabinet also approved cuts in state funding for political parties. Government aid for parties has increased significantly over the last few years. This year, the government spent 15.8 million euros compared to 3.9 million euros in 1999. Funding will be brought down to 13.6 million euros over the next four years, a nine percent cut.

Smaller parties in particular are annoyed about the proposed restrictions for donations. They tend to receive relatively big amounts from private donors. Rita Verdonk, leader of the nationalist TON party, managed to rake in 700,000 euros in a matter of weeks.

Protecting established parties

And the 300,000 euros that was given by one businessman to the animal rights party more or less financed the party’s whole election campaign. Party leader Marianne Thieme understandably does not agree with the new proposals. “They are geared towards protecting the established parties,” she says.

But the older established parties are also unhappy. Christian Democrat party chairman Peter van Heeswijk was not pleased and Labour chairwoman Lilianne Ploumen called on her fellow party members to donate “a little more” to party funds.

Labour is already suffering from lower state contributions because parties are financed according to the number of parliamentary seats they hold. Labour lost nine in the last elections and dwindling membership also means less money.

Quality at risk

Willibrord van Beek, a member of parliament for the right-wing Liberal party, thinks the minister should make up her mind one way or the other. “You either allow unlimited private donations or you decide on proper state funding. If you restrict both you’re putting the quality of parliamentarian representation at risk.”

Socialist member of parliament Ronald van Raak, who will vote in favour of the changes, does not agree: “Being sponsored means being bought,” he says. “And it isn’t as if the money from the government is all that important to parties. Before 1972, no party was subsidised by the state and democracy didn’t suffer”.

Influencing politicians

Lawyer Laurens Dragstra is not overly worried about donors unduly influencing politicians. There is more than one way in which companies and affluent individuals can exert influence. The Netherlands is governed by coalition governments and therefore does not invite huge donations to parties.

He points out that in Britain, and to a certain extent, Germany, only one party comes into power. But in the Netherlands parties can hide behind the fact that they have to form alliances and make compromises, says Dragstra.

He cites German ex-chancellor Helmut Kohl as an example. He ruined his reputation by accepting millions of euros in donations and refusing to reveal the names of the donors. The party was fined 4.3 million euros. “It is very likely that these were gifts from private persons. In which case they would have been perfectly legal here,” says Dragstra.