With this week’s gay marriage vote, the anti-Islam PVV has yet again sided against the government. So why is the minority cabinet still committed to it alliance with Geert Wilders and his chums? asks Robin Pascoe.

On Tuesday, the 24 MPs who are part of the populist PVV voted against the government and in favour of ending the opt-out for civil servants who don’t want to carry out same sex marriages.
The move by the government’s alliance partner surprised pundits, who expected the party to toe the government line – to vote against the motion and keep the coalition peace.
Loyalty
The PVV’s betrayal was made more painful by the fact the dissident MPs from Liberal VVD decided to put their principles vote against on hold and support the motion – out of loyalty to their government.
No such loyalty on Geert Wilders’ part even though his party is de facto in the coalition. Wilders has a formal alliance with the minority VVD CDA government. He has agreed to support it in terms of economic policy in return for tougher immigration rules.
So, same sex marriages aside – how reliable is Wilders on the economy? On the big issues – how to help the economy and support the eurozone – not very.
More cuts
Wilders has made it repeatedly clear he will not support a second package of cutbacks, on top of the €18bn-worth already agreed. New Twitter messages on Thursday restated his position yet again.
Wilders is also a staunch opponent of measures to bail out Greece, and Italy – referring to the Mediterranean countries sneeringly as ‘garlic lands’.
He has even gone so far as to commission research into the cost of abandoning the euro, declaring it to be a failed experiment (thus we all know the results he is hoping for). So no help for the government from its faithful partner on that aspect of economic policy either.
Benefits?
So who is benefiting from the alliance? Certainly not the CDA, whose popularity has plummeted in the polls and is now at an all-time low. Nor does the VVD emerge with much credit after being made to look foolish over gay marriage and the euro.
Wilders has got the best of both worlds. He is the cabinet bully when it suits him – such as the Mauro deportation scandal – making sure everyone falls into line. But equally, he is happy to go his own way when it suits him – same sex marriage, the face-saving police training mission to Afghanistan, and, of course, the macro economy.
With friends like this, the government not really need any enemies.
Robin Pascoe is the editor of DutchNews.nl