Government failings have crushed people’s lives and the same thing could happen again unless officials fundamentally change the way they look at people’s constitutional rights, according to the formal report on the childcare benefit scandal. 

• Tens of thousands of parents were accused of fraud
• Dual nationality was considered a risk factor
• Government acted illegally and MPs and press created a hype
• The human touch should be brought back into dealings with the public

“The powers that be were blind to the consequences of policies and decision-making,” the commission, chaired by Socialist party MP Michiel van Nispen said in the 500-page report. “They were blind to people, blind to justice and blind to people’s rights. A government that does not see people loses trust.”

Tens of thousands of Dutch parents were incorrectly accused of fraud and unjustly ordered to pay back thousands of euros in childcare benefit by the Dutch tax office. Between 2004 and 2019, parents had their childcare benefits stopped and were ordered to repay every penny ever received, sometimes due to the smallest mistakes.

Over 1,600 children whose parents were caught up in the scandal were removed from their homes by social workers. Marriages broke up and people lost their homes. The tax office also admitted that 11,000 people were subjected to extra scrutiny because they had dual nationality.

Many were labeled fraudsters, and their details shared across government departments, with devastating consequences for their financial, personal and children’s well-being. The scandal led to the collapse of the government in 2021 but has still not been properly resolved, and thousands of people are still waiting for compensation. 

Failed

“The cabinet and parliament failed, government services acted illegally and the legal system fell short,” the report said. “People’s constitutional rights were infringed and the rule of law was ignored in a hardened political and social climate. And because of this, people’s lives were ruined.”

Nationality was registered as a “risk factor” in multiple government services, in contravention of equal opportunity rules, the report said. “The government presented itself as the opponent of the ordinary citizen,” Van Nispen said at the presentation in front of an audience of campaigners and families. “And the shocking thing is, this is no longer considered shocking.” 

The patterns which led to the scandal are still there and the next scandal can happen at any moment, the commission said. The recommendations are not new, but nothing so far has been done. “That makes the lack of action even more serious,” the commission said. Some of the mistakes, it said, date back 20 years. 

MPs also failed because they voted in favour of bad laws and did not try to rectify problems. Journalists and MPs brought out the worst in each other by encouraging tougher policy. Giant headlines in the newspapers spoke of fraud and there was a “disproportionate response” to problems with the social security system, particularly when people with ethnic minority roots are concerned. 

The report also looked at the so-called “Bulgarian fraud” of 2013, in which it was claimed Bulgarian criminal gangs arranged for people to travel to the Netherlands and register as residents so they could claim healthcare and housing benefits. 

Media hype

The press, the report said, parroted each other and created a hype, when the reality was far more nuanced. The furore around the Bulgarian fraud was seen as one of the reasons the tax office and other institutions started to take a more aggressive stance towards perceived benefit fraud by non-Dutch citizens.

The commission said the budget of the privacy watchdog AP should be boosted to €100 million to help it perform its job. The conditions for legal aid should be widened and the human touch should be brought back to points of contact between government officials and the ordinary citizen. 

MPs should also be given more support to do their job in making laws and controlling the way they are applied. 

The report also slammed the Council of State, the highest administrative court in the Netherlands, which it said continued to approve the “all or nothing approach”, even when the disastrous consequences had become known. The court apologised to parents in 2021.