The Netherlands 12 provincial governments have urged the cabinet not to scrap legislation to organise accommodation for refugees throughout the country, even though their combined efforts had fallen short of the 96,000 beds needed by Friday’s deadline.

Seven of the twelve provinces have failed to identify enough places, but the 12 king’s commissioners have told migration minister Marjolein Faber that uncertainty surrounding the status of the legislation is an important cause of delay.

The legislation, which came into effect in February this year, is aimed at spreading asylum seekers more evenly across the country to relieve the overcrowded reception centre at Ter Apel. But the right-wing cabinet has made scrapping it a priority, despite local authority opposition.

Refugee settlement agency COA says some 96,000 places are needed, depending on the size of the local population. Zeeland, for example, has to come up with 2,109 beds while Zuid-Holland has to find 19,776.

Zuid-Holland has fallen some 3,000 short of the required total but king’s commissioner Wouter Kolff told broadcaster NOS he is “proud of what we did achieve.”

He also pointed out that it is not “completely fair” to take only the number of inhabitants of the province into account because of the pressure on homes and space in Zuid-Holland. “A quarter of the population lives here,” he said.

Noord-Brabant and Gelderland found 90% of the required places and Gelderland king’s commissioner Henri Lenferink said this is proof that the legislation works. “Before the legislation just 19 of the 51 local councils in Gelderland provided accommodation for asylum seekers, and that is now being increased to 33,” he said.

The 12 commissioners told Faber the legislation is already having an effect. “The plans show that more local councils will be offering accommodation in the next two years and we also see a movement from emergency to more permanent accommodation,” they said.

“Questions remain about how concrete some of the plans are,” Kolff said. “But if we can do this in the coming years, the accommodation crisis will be over.”