The finance ministry has confirmed that it will still be breaking its own rules on sham self-employment next year and that it will pay any fines imposed on the staffing agencies it uses by its own tax inspectors.

Some 580 freelancers are working on solving the childcare benefit scandal as part of a “temporary team” even though they should be considered staff according to the rules on self-employment, the Volkskrant reported on Tuesday.

Using freelancers who are effectively ordinary workers – because they do the same job as staffers, don’t get to choose their hours, and are told what to do – has been banned since 2016. And the tax office, which has turned a blind eye so far, has said it will start cracking down on sham self-employment in 2025.

A finance ministry spokesman told the Volkskrant that the situation could not be avoided, because the team depends on its freelancers. Without them, he said, the sorting out the childcare benefit scandal would face even more delays.

Freelancer lobby group Zipconomy reported on Monday that the ministry had written to staffing agencies that it would pay any fines and back payments levied by the tax office.

VVD parliamentarian Thierry Aartsen told the website that the ministry’s determination to press ahead with the checks will cause major problems for some sectors. More than that, he said, pointing the finger at others while doing the same thing itself smacks of double standards.

Aartsen has asked the finance ministry to explain the rules in a string of parliamentary questions and is also calling soft launch in enforcing them.

ABN Amro estimates some 250,000 freelancers, or ZZP’ers, could be affected by the crackdown, which will initially focus on employers not the self-employed themselves.

The rules are a particular problem in healthcare, where the number of freelancers has risen by 60% and now accounts for some 10% of the total workforce. The situation is similar in the transport sector, ABN Amro said.

• What does the crackdown on sham self-employment mean for you?

In the construction sector, however, freelancers are more likely to be used for specific jobs and have their own tools, and so are less likely to fall under the rules.

According to national statistics agency CBS, some 1.25 million people in the Netherlands are entirely or partly self-employed.