Social Affairs is disappointed with the tax authorities: ‘Ugly when we blame each other’ | NOW

The mutual accusations between the Tax and Customs Administration and the Ministry of Social Affairs about who can be blamed most in the childcare allowance affair do not paint a good picture. That is also the opinion of the top officials involved, who are heard by the interrogation committee.

“Sparring is also possible with colleagues in another department. We are not in another country,” said Loes Mulder, the highest official at the Ministry of Social Affairs since 2016.

“Since I became Secretary General of Social Affairs, I have never been approached by the top of the Tax and Customs Administration of: ‘Loes, something is going wrong here,'” Mulder said.

“It’s really ugly when we all start to blame each other.”

Tax authorities were disappointed by ‘obstinate attitude’

Mulder responded to statements made by her colleagues at the Ministry of Finance earlier this week. Peter Veld (until 2015 a top official at Finance) spoke during an interrogation on Wednesday about the “stubborn attitude“of Social Affairs.

According to Veld, the Ministry of Finance had approached Social Affairs twice in vain to warn that it was going wrong with the reclaiming of the childcare allowance.

Hans Blokpoel, a director at the tax authorities between 2010 and 2016, said that he “stomach ache“got off the situation in which parents ended up.

Mulder knows Blokpoel, they worked together at Immigration Affairs. So finding contact was not that complicated, Mulder thinks. “If Hans Blokpoel had said to me: ‘Loes, I have a stomach ache’, then I would have asked: ‘What’s the matter?”

‘It took too long, that’s very bad’

Maaike van Tuyll, the current director of childcare at Social Affairs who was heard earlier today, also said that nobody from Finance had discussed the childcare allowance with her. “I haven’t had anyone at my desk.”

According to Mulder, it is true that the Tax and Customs Administration has issued a warning to Social Affairs. “We have not picked up those signals properly. As a result, it all took longer and I think that is very bad.”

Both ministries are involved in the childcare allowance affair. The Tax and Customs Administration, which falls under Finance, implements the policy and detects possible fraud. Social Affairs is about the rules of childcare.

Plan for other benefits system failed at the last minute

The committee members were left with an unsatisfactory feeling after the conversations with Mulder and Van Tuyll.

This is because Social Affairs was working on a plan to transfer the childcare allowance directly to the childcare organizations, so that the allowances were no longer necessary. For example, parents were no longer the victim of the all-or-not policy, whereby all benefits received had to be refunded if a mistake had been made with the personal contribution.

Van Tuyll made a “passionate” plea for this to the then State Secretary Tamara van Ark (Social Affairs). Mulder also advised the minister to agree to the plan, although it would be “an exciting project”.

But Van Ark (now Minister for Medical Care) decided against it just before a decision was to be made. There was insufficient political support. Mulder: “We advise, the minister ultimately makes his own decision.”

Former State Secretary Snel wanted to keep allowances with the tax authorities

That may have to do with the plan that former State Secretary Menno Snel (Finance) came up with at the last minute. According to that plan, the childcare allowance would remain with the tax authorities.

According to Van Tuyll, Snel saw financial risks if the benefits were transferred directly to the childcare organizations. Moreover, the childcare allowance at the Allowances department was in good hands, according to the minister. He would have called the department “the best running part” of the tax authorities.

Mulder concluded that the financial risks in combination with “a reasonable alternative from the tax authorities” was the deciding factor not to proceed with the original plan.

Commission President Chris van Dam (CDA) calls it “strange” to throw the proposal overboard at the “supreme moment”. He will undoubtedly ask Snel about it himself when the former state secretary is heard next week.

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