30th January 2025 | News
- The Council for the Judiciary has urged the government to delay the introduction of its planned new asylum laws until the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum enters into force in 2026.
- The Inspectorate of Justice and Security has called on Minister of Asylum and Migration Marjolein Faber to address the ongoing unsafe conditions at the Ter Apel reception centre.
- The Dutch Council for Refugees has announced that it may have to stop providing legal support to people seeking asylum in the Netherlands following a major reduction in the funding that it receives from the government.
The Council for the Judiciary has urged the government to delay the introduction of its planned new asylum laws until the EU Pact on Migration and Asylum enters into force in 2026. On 27 January, the council expressed “great concerns” about the legislative proposals that were adopted by the cabinet in December 2024. “These new European rules will force a revision of the national asylum system and are also expected to have major consequences for the judiciary and other organisations in the migration chain, both in terms of workload and implementation,” it said.
The Inspectorate of Justice and Security has called on Minister of Asylum and Migration Marjolein Faber to address the ongoing unsafe conditions at the Ter Apel reception centre. On 15 January, the oversight body reported that safety and quality of life in Ter Apel and its external waiting locations “remain poor”. It also made a number of recommendations for making the centre “truly safe”, including “ensuring a good throughput and outflow of asylum seekers”. A spokesperson for the inspectorate added that it was not able to enforce the implementation of its recommendations. “We can bang the drum and make recommendations, but in this area, we cannot enforce,” they said. According to ECRE member organisation the Dutch Council for Refugees (DCR), the situation at Ter Apel is “nothing new”. The organisation attributed overcrowding in the centre to “the lack of flow – not due to the number of people”. It also referred to the “Distribution Act” (Spreidingswet) as a possible solution which would enable the government to designate suitable reception locations across the country. However, in November 2024, Faber stated that a legislative proposal to withdraw the act would be “submitted for advice and implementation tests in the first quarter of 2025”.
The DCR has announced that it may have to stop providing legal support to people seeking asylum in the Netherlands following a major reduction in the funding that it receives from the government. Since 2010, the organisation has worked with people who arrive in the Netherlands to explain the functioning of the asylum procedure, their rights and obligations, and the information and documents that they need to provide to the Immigration and Naturalisation Service (IND). However, on 2 January, DCR was informed that the government was reducing its support for the organisation’s Legal Protection programme from € 34 million to € 13 million with immediate effect. “Immediately more than halving the budget while the work remains the same as what the ministry expects of us – that puts us in an impossible position,” said the chair of DCR’s board, Frank Candel. “Faber wants the strictest asylum policy ever. This is the most counterproductive asylum policy ever,” he said. DCR is challenging the government’s decision in court.
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