Freedom Party's summer inquisition

Searchlight - September 2009

Geeert Wilders' right-wing populist Party of Freedom (PVV) has been grabbing the headlines and dominating the political debate, sometimes even without saying anything.

In the last week of July, a former Immigration Bureau employee and PVV MP Sietse Fritsma, sent almost all Dutch government ministries a total of 79 questions on the costs of non-Western immigrants to the state and the benefits to the latter from the same group.

This pressure followed a debate a month earlier with the minister of integration, Eberhard van der Laan, in which Fritsma claimed that non-Western immigrants would cost a figure of 100 billion Euro (ũ85 billion) due to the extra demands they place on social welfare benefits.

Now, the PVV is pestering the tax service to ascertain how much less tax the immigrants pay because they are often unemployed or, when they work, earn less. Similarly, the education ministry is being asked to detail how much is spent specifically on immigrant pupils because according to the PVV, the most absentees from school are to be found among this group. Also, believes the PVV, the costs of the extra pressure on health care also have to be recalculated because immigrants visit the doctor more often and have more problems due to children being born from marriages between family members.

Nor is this all, the PVV's inquisition extends to the justice department - which has to provide information on the costs of court cases and legal aid - while the housing ministry has to come up with the costs of social housing for immigrants.

In all, the PVV wants figures on the costs and benefits of the Netherlands immigrants over the last 5 years and a projection of what they will cost and contribute to the economy over the next five years. By branding ethnically non-Dutch people a burden to society in this way, the PVV is adding another racist medal to its already impressively shameful collection.

Jeroen Bosch for Alert! and Antifa-Net