The minutes of discussions within the cabinet about the benefits affair will be made public tonight. The outgoing cabinet is taking this very unusual step in response to the fuss about a reconstruction RTL News last Wednesday came along.
According to RTL, the Rutte III cabinet has deliberately withheld information that the House of Representatives had asked for. Ministers would also have complained about difficult MPs, such as CDA member Omtzigt. RTL relied on “sources that have access to the minutes of the Council of Ministers”.
The news from RTL stirred up a lot. The benefits affair is already a very delicate topic in The Hague: the cabinet has fallen on it, and comments from Rutte about Omtzigt led to an adopted motion of censure in the House of Representatives against the VVD leader at the beginning of this month.
In the formation, ‘trust’ and ‘a new management style’ are precisely the concepts that many of the discussions revolve around.
‘Riskant precedent’
The Chamber demanded clarification, and some also demanded publication of the minutes. The Cabinet decided Friday that they are indeed published. These are the minutes that previously went to the parliamentary interrogation committee. That committee investigated the benefits affair last year. Their report ‘Unprecedented Injustice’ eventually led to the resignation of the cabinet.
Rutte spoke of an exceptional decision on Friday, which will also be a one-off. In the TV show Buitenhof Vice President De Graaf of the Council of State called yesterday’s disclosure “a risky precedent”, although he also thinks it is an inevitable decision. According to De Graaf, this should remain an exception.
Rutte said on Friday that the cabinet was unanimous in its decision to release the minutes. The Prime Minister reiterated that nothing improper has happened in the way the House was informed: “We will also show that in the letter that goes out on Monday.”
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