The Digital Government: a state that no longer steers itself

Summary

This investigation connects five threads that, each worrying on its own, together raise the question of whether the Dutch state can still steer itself, let alone the country. It follows the previous investigation into New Public Management as the quiet ground the childcare benefits scandal grew from and the billion-euro balance of the recovery operation.

The first thread is the digital state itself. The central government spends roughly six billion euros a year on large ICT projects. The 2024 Major ICT Activities Report concludes that 27 percent of those run over budget, a record since the report was introduced in 2020. Across 2022, 2023 and 2024 alone, the documented overrun reaches roughly €4.2 billion. Projects that explicitly failed or were abandoned include the STAP budget at UWV (abolished after two years due to fraud and system failure), the Bekostigen application landscape modernisation at DUO (five years wasted, intervened in five times by the Advisory Committee on ICT Assessment), the value-added tax modernisation at the Tax Authority (€190 million contracted to an American vendor with high failure risk), the Boundary-Pushing IT programme at Defense (investigated six times since 2016 and still not completed), and the Digital System for the Environment Act (five-year delay, reviewed five times).

The second thread is the cabinet expenses black box. There is no structural disclosure of expenses claimed by individual ministers, even though the Open Government Act requires active disclosure of institutionalised advice and spending in article 3.1. What does surface comes through incidental Woo decisions: the ruling on the Woo request about Dick Schoof’s expenses of 22 August 2024, the ruling on government aircraft costs of 5 March 2026, and scattered parliamentary questions. The 2024 budget for the government aircraft was roughly €303,000, while the purchase of a new government aircraft in 2017-2024 cost roughly €89 million. Who claimed what in 2022-2026 cannot be reconstructed without ten separate Woo requests across ten ministries.

The third thread is the non-response from Prime Minister Rob Jetten. On 17 February 2026 Kristie Rongen, who against her will became the face of the childcare benefits scandal, and the researcher Krijn ten Hove issued an open plea to the then informateur and future prime minister: do not reappoint Sandra Palmen as State Secretary for Benefits Recovery. Five days later she was sworn into the Jetten cabinet anyway. Jetten himself has made no concrete, dated promises to individual benefits parents in public sources between 2024 and 2026. The National Ombudsman states that information provision to affected parents is still not in order.

The fourth thread is the wavering of the Council of State. In 2024-2026 the Administrative Jurisdiction Division curtails the benefits recovery along three tracks. Substantively: the €500 flat rate per half-year is withdrawn from judicial review via the prohibition on review in article 120 of the Constitution (ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2864). Causally: the required link between wrongful decision and damage is reduced to one sub-aspect, the OGS qualification and the personal payment arrangement, instead of the broader institutional failure (ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166, 3 June 2026). Procedurally: the procedural interest in the light-test procedure for the Catshuis Scheme lapses as soon as the integral assessment is completed, removing one ground of appeal for the victim (ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166, 25 February 2026).

The fifth thread is social unrest. Trust in the House of Representatives dropped in 2025 to 24.6 percent and in politicians to 21.2 percent, the lowest level since the series began in 2012 (CBS, 12 May 2026). Nearly a quarter of the Dutch population lives in poverty or just above the poverty line without savings, and the working poor fall shorter on average than those on welfare. In the spring of 2026 civil servants struck twice nationwide, on 3 March for 24 hours with more than a thousand people on the Malieveld, on 14 April across six cities with 160,000 civil servants. An EenVandaag poll of 18 May 2026 finds that 71 percent of the Dutch support potential strikes against cuts to social security. On 24 June 2026 public transport ground to a halt nationwide until eight in the morning.

The question this investigation poses is not whether the individual threads add up to a crisis signal. They already do, separately. The question is whether the state, as an institutional arrangement that combines the monopoly on coercion with a duty of care, can still recognise those five threads as connected failure. The working hypothesis of this investigation answers no, for now. Not because no one means well, but because the institutional reading-time of the Dutch state is longer than the lifespan of an average cabinet.

Trust in political institutions, 2012-2025

The chart below tracks trust in five political institutions from 2012 to 2025, based on the CBS Social Cohesion and Well-being survey. It is the visual summary of the fifth thread of this investigation, and reads as a long-term blood-pressure reading of Dutch democracy.

The chart shows a clear split between the decentralised and supranational institutions (municipal council, EU) on one hand and the national political institutions (House of Representatives, politicians) on the other. Where the decentralised and European trust lines recover slightly or hold steady in 2024-2025, the national lines keep dropping. The corona effect visible in 2020 as a temporary lift across all lines becomes a kind of relapse afterwards: once the crisis eased, the national institutions dropped below their pre-crisis level, while the decentralised institutions returned to their old level. The distance between citizen and national politics in The Hague keeps widening.

Methodological note

This investigation combines five data sources that usually stay separate: the National ICT Dashboard and the Major ICT Activities Report for the digital state, Woo decisions and parliamentary questions for ministerial expenses, uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl for Council of State case law, CBS and SCP for social indicators, and polls by Ipsos I&O and the EenVandaag Opinion Panel for willingness to strike and trust.

Amounts in this investigation are marked in two ways. Published marks amounts taken directly from official sources. Estimate marks amounts derived from published totals and ratios. Not public marks data that the central government does not publish structurally and that can only be obtained through a Woo request (art. 4.1 Woo) at the relevant ministry.

Two substantive choices deserve mention. The first is that expense amounts of individual ministers are not ranked in a top-10, because such a ranking cannot be assembled without ten separate Woo requests and would therefore be factually inaccurate. The absence of that ranking is itself a finding. The second choice is that ICT projects are only labelled “failed” or “stopped” when there is a public decision by a minister, an advice by the Advisory Committee on ICT Assessment, or a Court of Audit finding underlying it.

Dashboard

The dashboard below brings together the five threads of this investigation in one visual overview. The tabs show the key figures per thread: ICT cost overruns per year, expenses decisions and known amounts, Council of State rulings, willingness to strike and strikes, and trust in government.

The long view: unrest and those affected

The chart below gives the long-term picture of CBS strike figures since 2012, with the participating workers and lost working days on top. The chart of political trust over the same period is included at the start of this investigation, right after the summary. Together they sketch the picture of a society in which the formal channels of political representation and the polder model have been under pressure since 2020.

Strikes, participants and lost working days, 2012-2025

The chart teaches three things. 2019 was an outlier year: across 26 strikes nearly 319,000 workers were involved and 391,000 working days were lost, mainly in education and healthcare. During corona (2020) strikes did not disappear but concentrated: only 9 strikes, but still more than 100,000 participants and 211,000 lost days. Since 2022 the strike movement has returned in waves, with the 2023 peak (52 strikes) coinciding with the largest healthcare strikes in history. In 2025 a new phenomenon appears, fewer strikes, but longer and larger actions, with that year’s education strike accounting for nearly half of all lost working days. The CBS dashboard does not yet contain data for 2026, but the spring of 2026 already saw two nationwide civil service strikes (3 March and 14 April) and a nationwide public transport strike (24 June) that will immediately rank among the top in the historical series.

Scandals and their victims

The third layer of “unrest” is not the strike but the scandal: the structural failure of a specific government task that directly affects large groups of citizens. The table below shows the major scandals of the past fifteen years, with the number of direct victims where possible. The table is not exhaustive; it is an indication of the order of magnitude.

The sum of directly affected citizens across the three biggest scandals (childcare benefits, Groningen, FSV) reaches over 200,000 people. That is more than 1 percent of the Dutch population, directly hit by institutional failure of the Dutch state in the past fifteen years. Excluding indirectly affected parties, family members, employees of affected businesses, municipalities that had to take in victims, the effect runs to a multiple according to the Donner Committee. The Donner Committee spoke in 2021 of “indescribable unjust justice” and “over 26,000 possibly incorrect affected parents”; that number has since been adjusted to over 35,500 recognised victims at the UHT in 2025.

What this table does not show, but can be estimated, is the sum of downstream damage: children of victims who grew up in diminished parenting situations, partners who gave up their jobs to care for the victim, municipalities that had to take on hundreds of additional welfare and debt-assistance files, GPs who saw the consequences of chronic stress and uncertainty in their consulting rooms. No victim registry exists for any of these groups. The table shows the tip of the iceberg.

1. The digital state as a failing system

The Dutch central government spends roughly six billion euros a year on large ICT projects. That is the equivalent of one and a half percent of the total national budget, or, put differently, about €340 per Dutch citizen per year, spent solely on ICT projects above five million. The National ICT Dashboard launched in 2014 to track those projects is not part of a statutory transparency obligation; it is an administrative agreement. The Major ICT Activities Report published annually for the House of Representatives since 2020 is not enshrined in law either. Both instruments depend on voluntary cooperation by the departments.

1.1 The 2022-2024 balance

The figures from the Major ICT Activities Report for 2022, 2023 and 2024 together form the most systematic picture the central government has published of itself. In 2022 documented overruns on large projects ran to roughly €1.3 billion (AG Connect / Binnenlands Bestuur / Accountant.nl, 23 January 2023). In 2023 that was €1.26 billion across 164 projects, an average overrun of 21 percent on a total budgeted volume of roughly six billion. In 2024 the number of projects rose to 184 and the average overrun rose to 27 percent, which amounts to roughly €1.62 billion of overrun in that year alone (iBestuur, 6 October 2025). The subtotal for 2022-2024 thus reaches roughly €4.18 billion.

For the period 2010-2021 systematic annual totals are missing. The Netherlands Court of Audit has investigated ICT and digitalisation since 1991, but only began publishing a combined annual total in 2020. Based on individual files (Environment Act, Tax Authority SUWINet and Wage Tax Return, UWV W-systems, Groningen reinforcement DICTU, C2000) a conservative estimate of one to three billion euros can be made for 2010-2021. The cumulative estimate for 2010-2026 thus runs to five to seven billion euros in directly documented overruns, excluding projects under five million and excluding opportunistic costs such as ongoing maintenance of legacy systems.

1.2 Who is responsible?

Responsibility for a failed project sits at four levels in the Dutch administrative model. The minister is ultimately accountable for the policy area and signs off on the budget. The secretary-general is the administrative head of the department. The departmental chief information officer (CIO) is technically responsible for execution. Since 2024 a government-wide CIO (held by Art de Blaauw since the position was created) coordinates across government. The Advisory Committee on ICT Assessment (AcICT), established by the Advisory Committee on ICT Assessment Establishment Act (Stb. 2024-42, effective 1 July 2024) and its predecessor (BIT, until 2024), has reviewed projects above five million for their chance of success since 2015.

What matters here is that AcICT advises, it does not decide. An advice to halt a project can be ignored by the responsible minister. That happened in 2019 with Renewed Praeventis at RIVM: the then-BIT recommended stopping in January 2019, but only in 2025 was a follow-up project (Praeventis Continued) started. At DUO DAB AcICT has intervened five times since 2019 without being able to bring the project to a halt; only at the end of 2023 was it paused for reorientation, and it has since been renamed Bekostigen vernieuwt. At Defense GrIT AcICT has intervened six times since 31 May 2016, and the programme is still running.

The responsible minister differs per project and per year. For the STAP budget that was Karien van Gennip (Social Affairs) and Robbert Dijkgraaf (Education) during the period the scheme was designed and eventually abolished. For DUO DAB that was successively Dijkgraaf and Eppo Bruins. For Defense GrIT responsibility passed from Ank Bijleveld via Kajsa Ollongren to Ruben Brekelmans. For the VAT modernisation at the Tax Authority that is the State Secretary for Finance. The Director-General of the Tax Authority is Peter Smink, the CIO is Bart de Jongh.

1.3 The Tax Authority as a case study

The Tax Authority is a special case in this story. The childcare benefits scandal originated in this body. Annual ICT costs at the Tax Authority also rose to €849 million in 2022, an increase of 80 percent over ten years (NRC, cited by Taxence). The core of the Tax Authority runs on systems built in the 1980s and 1990s in COBOL and Cool:Gen. The race against the clock to replace those systems before the last programmer retires is a familiar phenomenon in international ICT literature, but in the Netherlands it has gained an extra dimension through the value-added tax modernisation.

In 2025 the American company Fast Enterprises won a €190 million tender for the renewal of VAT processing (Techzine). The choice of an American vendor for a core system of Dutch fiscal sovereignty is in itself a substantive question. That question became urgent when competitor Capgemini challenged the award in interim injunction proceedings. The District Court of The Hague dismissed that claim on 12 March 2025 (ECLI:NL:RBDHA:2025:3645), but AcICT had already warned in May 2024 about the failure risk of the modernisation. A failure would mean that the collection of VAT, the largest source of revenue for the Dutch state after income tax, would be impaired.

1.4 Defense and the procurement theme

On 20 May 2026 the Netherlands Court of Audit published a finding that broadens the scope of this investigation. The Ministry of Defense does not follow procurement rules adequately, with €4.4 billion in errors and uncertainties in 2025. While this is not exclusively ICT, the ICT share is significant. The ADR audit opinion for Defense was issued with qualification. The finding fits a pattern visible at GrIT as well: the ministry that in public perception is synonymous with order and discipline fails internally to comply with the basic rules of procurement and execution.

1.5 Central government in the cloud

In January 2025 the Netherlands Court of Audit published the report “Central Government in the Cloud”. The conclusion was that central government pursues an ill-considered cloud policy: poor contracts, lock-in with large American providers, and insufficient safeguarding of digital sovereignty. The report fits a broader international trend of reconsidering cloud dependence, but in the Netherlands it carries specific weight because the government data in question falls under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). A government that no longer manages its own data can no longer fully control its own tasks.

2. The cabinet expenses black box

Alongside the failure in digital execution there is a second, less visible problem: the absence of structural transparency about what ministers claim in expenses. The Open Government Act that took effect on 1 May 2022 requires active disclosure in article 3.1 for documents of “societal relevance”. Article 3.2 explicitly mentions “institutionalised advice”. There is, however, no active disclosure scheme for ministerial expenses, even though these are institutionalised in a certain sense: they are claimed periodically, based on a fixed framework, and paid from public funds.

2.1 What surfaces, surfaces through Woo

What openness there is comes from incidental Woo requests. The Woo decision on the request about Dick Schoof’s expenses was issued on 22 August 2024 and confirmed in a parliamentary letter by Van Weel (Justice and Security) on 12 September 2024 (Parliamentary Document 36410-VI-107). The inventory list and accompanying documents were partially made public on open.overheid.nl. The Woo decision on the request about government aircraft costs was issued on 5 March 2026, following a government flight to Suriname on 30 November 2025. The document list is also partially public.

Both decisions are partially public. That means categories of information were refused, mostly on the basis of exceptions in article 5.1 of the Woo (for example privacy of third parties, or state security in the case of the government aircraft). A complete picture of who claimed what, in which hotels they stayed, and which flights were taken with the government aircraft, requires analysis of the inventory lists attached to the decisions, and that analysis was not carried out in this investigation due to limited access to the PDF attachments.

2.2 What is structurally known

Only total budget items are published structurally. The 2024 budget for the government aircraft was roughly €303,000 (Parliamentary Document 2025D19977) and was almost fully spent. The purchase of a new government aircraft, a Boeing BBJ, cost roughly €89 million in 2017-2024 after sale of the old aircraft for €3.7 million (NOS; De Gelderlander). The 2024 annual report of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs lists roughly €36 million for travel costs among other things, but that is a departmental line, not an individualisable amount.

A ranking of the top-10 most expensive ministerial expense claims for 2022-2026 cannot be factually assembled without ten separate Woo requests across ten ministries. The absence of that ranking is itself a finding. In a democracy that calls itself an “open government”, the absence of a periodic overview of expenses claimed by those running the country is a structural transparency gap.

2.3 The procedural manual

Anyone wanting to complete the picture can proceed as follows. A Woo request can be filed per minister per year at the relevant ministry, addressed to the Woo officer (art. 4.1 Woo). The decision period is four weeks, extendable by four weeks (art. 5.1 Woo). For tardy decision-making a penalty payment of €70 per day is due, up to a maximum of €1,758 (art. 4:17 Awb). For an overview of total cabinet expenses per year, a Woo request can be addressed to the Ministry of General Affairs, invoking the active disclosure obligation of article 3.1 Woo. This investigation recommends filing such requests, but does not carry them out itself.

3. Rob Jetten and the plea

On 17 February 2026 Kristie Rongen, who against her will became the face of the childcare benefits scandal, and the researcher Krijn ten Hove issued an open plea to the then informateur who would become prime minister within a week: Rob Jetten. The plea, published the same day by Hart van Nederland and picked up by De Telegraaf in its “What you say” section, asked in essence: do not reappoint Sandra Palmen as State Secretary for Benefits Recovery in the new cabinet. “There are tens of thousands of files still to be settled financially. If things continue under this official, we will only be rid of the whole benefits scandal in 25 years.”

Five days later, on 23 February 2026, the Jetten cabinet was sworn in. Sandra Palmen, who had already been transferred as a non-partisan State Secretary for Benefits Recovery from the Schoof cabinet on 5 September 2025, was sworn in again. Rongen and ten Hove received no public response from Jetten. In a LinkedIn post of 30 October 2025 ten Hove called Palmen’s reappointment a “false start for benefits victims”. Jetten did not distance himself in public sources. At the parliamentary debate of 4 March 2026 about the files of parents in the childcare benefits scandal, Jetten was not present; only Palmen spoke on behalf of the cabinet.

Palmen had announced before the debate that she would stop paying penalty payments to benefits parents, a decision that shocked the House. Palmen herself called it “very painful” (Trouw). The National Ombudsman Reinier van Zutphen stated in the same period that information provision to affected parents is still not in order (Taxlive).

3.1 What Jetten promised in 2024-2026

In the public sources examined for 2024-2026 no concrete, dated promises from Rob Jetten to individual benefits parents were found. The coalition agreement “Getting to work. Building a better Netherlands” of 30 January 2026, drafted under informateur Rianne Letschert, mentions the recovery operation of the childcare benefits scandal in general terms, but contains no specific commitments from Jetten personally to parents.

In a rare public comment Renske Leijten, former SP MP and one of the two whistleblowers of the childcare benefits scandal alongside Pieter Omtzigt, defended the choice for Palmen: “It is not the case that you simply put another figure there and that policy will then change. Sandra Palmen can handle this position perfectly well in my view, I only ask that she be given support.” It is a remark that reads two ways: as support for Palmen personally, and as criticism of a cabinet that puts a state secretary on an impossible post without adequate resources.

3.2 The prevalence of non-response

The non-response from Jetten to the plea by Rongen and ten Hove fits a broader pattern. In the file practice of individual victims, non-response from ministers and executive agencies is the rule rather than the exception. The penalty payment scheme of article 4:17 Awb does not exist for nothing. The Childcare Benefits Recovery Act itself provides for a penalty payment for tardy decision-making in article 4:17 of the General Administrative Law Act, a provision applied so frequently that the total penalty payments the Tax Authority owed to benefits parents in 2025 ran to €363 million (Spring Memorandum 2025), with €59 million in penalty payments actually paid by May 2026 alone (Trouw, 24 May 2026).

The non-response of a prime minister to an open plea from two faces of the drama that shaped his office is in that light not a policy choice but a symptom. It points to an administrative system in which the distance between the Catshuis and the victims’ minibuses has grown so large that a signature under a coalition agreement carries more weight than a signature under a plea.

4. The wavering Council of State

The Administrative Jurisdiction Division of the Council of State (ABRvS) is the highest administrative court in the Netherlands. In the period 2024-2026 the Division curtails the benefits recovery along three tracks. Three rulings are the key witnesses.

4.1 Substantive: the €500 flat rate withdrawn from review

On 2 July 2025 the Administrative Jurisdiction Division issued ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2864. The ruling concerns the flat-rate compensation of €500 per half-year fixed in article 2.3, fourth paragraph, of the Childcare Benefits Recovery Act as compensation for the presumed stress, inconvenience and uncertainty over the period between the first wrongful assessment and the first compensation assessment. In paragraphs 9.4 to 9.7 the Division establishes that the legislator made a reasoned choice for this amount, following the advice “Looking back in amazement” of the AUT of 14 November 2019, and that an amendment for a higher amount was not adopted on 5 October 2022. The conclusion:

“Because the legislator has made a reasoned choice to grant a flat-rate amount of €500.00 per half-year within the framework of the integral assessment, the administrative court has no room to test the level of this amount against the principle of proportionality.”

The Division adds that findings of discrimination by the Netherlands Institute for Human Rights and fines from the Data Protection Authority do not mean that the flat-rate Wht provision must be treated differently. The prohibition on review in article 120 of the Constitution is the shield here.

4.2 Causal: the link reduced to one sub-aspect

On 3 June 2026 the Administrative Jurisdiction Division issued ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166 (case 202504054/1/A2). The ruling concerns the Catshuis Scheme of €30,000 flat rate and the question of which damage qualifies for additional compensation. In paragraph 4.3 the Division formulates:

“The actual damage, as referred to in article 2.6, third paragraph, of the Wht, only qualifies for compensation insofar as it is causally linked to the wrongful refusal of the personal payment arrangement on grounds of the OGS qualification.”

In paragraph 4.4 article 2.6, fourth paragraph, Wht is applied: no additional payment if the Catshuis Scheme has already been paid out. Actual damage up to a maximum of the remaining difference, roughly €24,400, qualifies. The causal link is thereby reduced to one sub-aspect of the institutional failure: the OGS qualification and the personal payment arrangement. The broader institutional failure, the years of wrongful accusation, the freezing at the municipality, social isolation, the loss of business and family, falls outside the causal framework.

4.3 Procedural: the procedural interest that lapses

On 25 February 2026, the same day on which an earlier ruling in case 202500512/1/A2 was issued, the Division held that the procedural interest in the procedure on the light test of the Catshuis Scheme lapses as soon as the integral assessment is completed. In paragraph 7.1:

“In order to still achieve that a parent is recognised as a victim and thereby can claim at least the €30,000.00, the parent must submit his or her grounds in the procedure on the integral assessment. That means that the procedural interest of [the appellant] in this procedure on the outcome of the light test has lapsed.”

The double test that the law made possible, first the light test, then the integral assessment, is thereby merged. The victim loses a ground of appeal.

4.4 The synthesis

The three tracks together form a substantive legal turn. Substantively the flat-rate amount is withdrawn from judicial review via the prohibition on review. Causally the required link is reduced to one sub-aspect of the failure. Procedurally an independent ground of appeal lapses. A victim who in 2021 expected on the basis of the legislative history and the Explanatory Memorandum that the administrative court would test the level of immaterial damages against the principle of proportionality, that the causal link would bring in the broader institutional failure, and that the light test had independent procedural value, sees that expectation frustrated on three points in 2026.

4.5 The Council of State as legislative adviser

Alongside administrative jurisdiction the Council of State has a second task: advising on legislative proposals (art. 73 Constitution). The Council’s advice on the Childcare Benefits Recovery Act was discussed in the Senate on 1 November 2022 as “rather negative”. The Council’s 2023 annual report shows that a negative dictum was given in 10.3 percent of legislative advice; the Wht fell into that category. On 16 April 2026 the House of Representatives passed a motion requesting the government to ask the Advisory Division to test the new damage routes (MijnHerstel and SGH) for legal protection and equal treatment. It is a rare parliamentary intervention in the Council’s advisory task.

4.6 The Council of State and the shift from Triple R to Triple E

The previous investigation in this series, New Public Management: the quiet ground the childcare benefits scandal grew from, captured the central shift that ABDTOPConsult identified in its essay for the parliamentary inquiry committee: NPM displaced the classic lawfulness orientation of government with an economic paradigm. The old public administration steered on the three Rs:

The three tracks of curtailment that the Administrative Jurisdiction Division made visible in 2024-2026 read strikingly well in that Triple E register. They show that not only the executive government, but also the highest administrative judge now operates in the economic paradigm, and no longer in the lawfulness paradigm that the 1848 Constitution and the 1950 ECHR impose on it.

Three findings follow. The first is that the Council of State chooses the manageability of the recovery apparatus, not the rights of the victim. The flat rate is budget logic, not legal logic. The causal reduction is administrative efficiency, not equality before the law. The procedural merger is throughput time reduction, not legal protection. The second finding is that the prohibition on review in article 120 of the Constitution, once designed to guarantee the separation of powers, now works as a shield for a legislator that fixes a flat rate in Economy-thinking. Article 120 of the Constitution protects the legislator against the judge, but does not protect the citizen against the legislator. The third finding is that in a legal system that shows itself resilient against discrimination and carelessness by executives, the highest administrative judge should have taken the room to test the relationship between flat rate and actual damage against the principle of proportionality in article 3:4 Awb and article 14 ECHR. The Division does not take that room. It chooses the economic paradigm.

The three rulings are in themselves defensible in a strictly legalistic reading of the Childcare Benefits Recovery Act. But in connection with the findings of the NPM investigation, they show that the shift that was formally abolished in 2023 (Interior Ministry put NPM out with the bulk waste) continues in full scope in the case law of 2024-2026. The institutional automatism that made NPM possible in execution is confirmed by the Council of State in the judiciary. Where the legislator fails in lawfulness, the judge gives no correction, out of respect for the legislator, and out of efficiency considerations.

5. The letter to Marijnissen: the forgotten group abroad

The interim report of the Special Judicial Coordinator (SJD) sent to victims in 2026 raises the question of who speaks on behalf of the victims who fall outside a Dutch postcode. The letter below is the response of one of those victims to the interim report. The letter is reproduced here in full, as primary source material. The author is a victim of the childcare benefits scandal and belongs to the group of roughly a thousand families who, as a result of the scandal, have become stuck abroad.

Subject: SJD interim report, the forgotten group: affected families abroad

Dear Ms Marijnissen,

I read your interim report with great interest. It gives me hope that someone is finally travelling the country with so much energy and commitment to map the social and legal problems people face. Your words about the benefits scandal touched me personally.

Yet I miss in your report a group that, in my view, must not be forgotten: the more than 1,000 families who, as a result of the childcare benefits scandal, have become stuck abroad. We are one of them.

Our family has deep roots in the Netherlands. The name Van der Velden appears in documents dating back to the 14th century, though the spelling was only officially fixed in 1811, when Napoleon introduced the Civil Registry. Before that, the spelling changed with each generation in the archives. It is a name with history, with attachment to this country. And yet we, and more than a thousand families with us, stand sidelined.

You write that obtaining justice depends on postcode and wallet. For us that is even more true: we no longer have a Dutch postcode. We fall outside the scope of your assignment, outside the municipal counters, outside the Legal Aid Desk. And yet we are victims of the same system that you want to improve.

My question to you is therefore: why does your interim report, and presumably also the assignment itself, not speak about the families stuck abroad as a result of the childcare benefits scandal? Will we be included in the final report? And if not, who then speaks on our behalf?

I sincerely hope you are willing to pay attention to this, because we too deserve to be heard.

Kind regards,

John van der Velden

5.1 What the letter signals

The letter signals a series of problems that remain underexposed in the formal recovery operation. The first is the problem of legal accessibility. The Legal Aid Desk is, contrary to what is often assumed, accessible to affected parents, including those living abroad. But legal coverage ends there. Filing an objection against a decision by the Tax Authority or the Benefits Recovery Executive Agency is no longer possible for a victim abroad through any administrative law route, but only through the civil route. And on that civil route the staff lawyers of the Director-General for Benefits Recovery at the Ministry of Finance consistently push for rejection.

This became visible in a personal online conversation that the author of this letter had with the then Director-General for Benefits Recovery, Dennis Levy de Graaf, working in close collaboration with Thomas van Zon, and his staff lawyer coordinator Ida Petter. In that conversation no real consultation proved possible. The staff lawyer coordinator repeatedly cut off the interlocutor. An earlier agreement with the State was swept off the table, in defiance of its own legal force. The message was not subtle: rights are being violated further, not restored. Victim remains victim; we do not work on rehabilitation.

The civil route that remains is impassable for most victims. A lawyer asks for a retainer of €8,000 to €10,000. The expected damages award comes, in the practical wisdom of insiders, rarely above 12.5 to 25 percent of actual damage. Higher will not be reached. That is not because the law dictates it. It is because the civil damage routes themselves are under heavy direction from the Ministry of Finance, which has had to pay hundreds of millions in penalty payments in recent years for wrongful action (€363 million budgeted in the 2025 Spring Memorandum; €59 million actually paid by May 2026). Those penalty payments weigh heavily on the budget, and MinFin therefore directs civil settlements tightly. Anyone who does not dance to the ministry’s tune, who takes an independent legal position, makes a higher demand, brings in an independent expert, or refuses to accept a lower award, runs into a wall of administrative-legal and civil obstruction. The mutual coordination among the lawyers involved means that the outcome of a procedure is known in advance, and that outcome is not in the victim’s favour. The State has, in the victim’s observation, taken away and will continue to take away with its Triple E thinking: Economy over Lawfulness, Efficiency over Equality before the law, Effectiveness over Legal certainty. The economic paradigm that was formally put out with the bulk waste in 2023 is in full operation in the civil practice of recovery.

The second is the problem of institutional visibility. The group of fled benefits-victim families is not mentioned in the assignment of the Special Judicial Coordinator. The Childcare Benefits Scandal Victims Foundation and the advocacy organisations focus primarily on victims residing in the Netherlands. Radar Adviesgroep and the Foundation for Equitable Recovery apply different scopes for foreign cases, but in public communication about the recovery those scopes are not always clear.

The third is the problem of political representation. Members of the House of Representatives receive mail from residents; that is a practical constraint. A letter from abroad reaches the House, but does not carry the weight of a letter from one’s own constituency. The plea by Rongen and ten Hove to Jetten received public attention because they live in the Netherlands and are faces of the scandal. The same plea from abroad would probably not receive that attention.

5.2 How many families are there?

The estimate of “more than a thousand families” mentioned in the letter is a conservative estimate based on research by Radar Adviesgroep and the Childcare Benefits Scandal Victims Foundation. Radar has been active in approximately thirty-two countries for victims abroad since July 2022; the exact number of families that became stuck abroad as a result of the scandal has not been published. It is one of the figures that can be requested through a Woo request at the Ministry of Finance or at the Benefits Recovery Executive Agency.

5.3 The right to be heard

The right to be heard is laid down in article 3:2 of the General Administrative Law Act as a duty of care, and in article 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights as the right to a fair trial. For a victim who is abroad and cannot fall back on a Dutch postcode, that right is a paper reality. The letter to Marijnissen reminds the Special Judicial Coordinator and, more generally, the Dutch state of the duty to include that group in the recovery as well. That is not a favour, but a right.

5.4 The butcher inspects his own meat: the conflict of interest in the recovery apparatus

De waarneming van de auteur van deze brief reikt verder dan de eigen casus. Zij wijst op een structureel conflict of interest in de inrichting van het herstel dat tot op heden onvoldoende is benoemd. De observatie luidt: de slager keurt zijn eigen vlees, en versobert alle compensatie die een ruimhartig herstel zou moeten zijn volgens de wet.

The ivory tower of MinFin

The Ministry of Finance, which in the childcare benefits scandal was the executor that committed the injustice, is at the same time the designer of the recovery, the funder of the recovery, the assessor of the damage, and the auditor of the assessment. Those four roles are housed within one and the same organisation. The Directorate-General for Benefits Recovery (until recently Dennis Levy de Graaf, with Thomas van Zon) sits within the Ministry of Finance. The staff lawyers who set the damages awards, design the modules of the recovery routes, and carry out the GWBO assessments are civil servants of that same ministry. The Netherlands Court of Audit, which supervises, depends on the information supplied by that same ministry. The Advisory Committee on ICT Assessment tests IT projects, not the content of the recovery modules. The Administrative Jurisdiction Division of the Council of State tests against the law, but cannot make the law (art. 120 Constitution), and the law was written by that same ministry.

Ida Petter and the silence of a departing civil servant

What underlines the author’s observation is the position of staff lawyer coordinator Ida Petter. Public LinkedIn congratulations from former colleagues show how much pride is taken looking back at the collaboration with her on the policy and the modules of the Foundation for Equitable Recovery (SGH), and on the way the Ministry of Finance put the entire SGH apparatus together. The congratulations are at the same time an inadvertent folio: they confirm that SGH, presented in public communication as an independent recovery organisation, is in fact an instrument designed, built and steered by the Ministry of Finance. The supposed independence of SGH is organisational, not substantive. The policy comes from the ivory tower of MinFin; SGH executes.

That Ida Petter has by now left for a new position in Delft, with the online congratulations serving as farewells, fits a pattern that has also become visible among other integrity whistleblowers: those who develop conscience problems about the content of their work within an executive agency eventually leave themselves. The organisation itself remains. The policy remains. The modules remain. And the victim remains a victim.

The circle of design, execution and review

De driehoek MinFin, SGH, Rechter kan als volgt worden getekend:

In seven of the nine roles within the recovery apparatus the Ministry of Finance is itself involved. The independent bodies (ABRvS, Court of Audit, Ombudsman) operate under constraints: the judge cannot test the law, the Court of Audit depends on information supply, the Ombudsman has no binding power. The result is a recovery system in which the causer of the injustice is able to design, execute, assess and defend its own responsibility. That is what the author of the letter means by the butcher inspects his own meat.

The austerity of the generous recovery

The Childcare Benefits Recovery Act (Wht) spoke in its Explanatory Memorandum of a “generous recovery”. The House spoke in 2021-2022 of “smooth” procedures and “generous” compensation. In execution that principle of generosity has been diluted step by step:

• De Catshuisregeling van 30.000 euro forfait is, na de ABRvS-uitspraak van 3 juni 2026 (ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166), aanvullend ingeperkt tot schade die in causaal verband staat met de OGS-kwalificatie. Werkelijke schade boven het resterende verschil komt niet meer in aanmerking.
• De forfaitaire immateriële schadevergoeding van 500 euro per halfjaar is via het toetsingsverbod van artikel 120 Gw aan rechterlijke toetsing onttrokken (ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2864).
• De aanvullende immateriële schadevergoeding wordt bij erkende gedupeerden ingehouden via een verkeerde wettelijke grondslag (zoals gedocumenteerd in het Follow-the-Money-onderzoek): de Afdeling stelde in r.o. 9.5 van ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2864 dat het forfait in de integrale beoordeling en de aanvullende compensatie “andere immateriële schade” betreffen, maar in de uitvoering worden ze opgeteld verrekend.
• De civiele route die overblijft voor schade boven het wettelijk minimum kost een gedupeerde 8.000 tot 10.000 euro voorschot, en levert · zo luidt de praktijkkennis onder ingewijden · zelden meer dan 12,5 tot 25 procent van de daadwerkelijke schade op.

The sum of these dilutions is that the “generous recovery” of 2021 has by 2026 become a tight, financed and pre-budgeted recovery, in which the minister who commits the injustice is also the minister who determines how much compensation the country can bear. That is not ill will on the part of individual civil servants. It is the logic of a system organised in the economic paradigm (Triple E): Economy over Lawfulness dictates that the budget remains manageable; Efficiency over Equality before the law dictates that flat rates are preferred over individual damage assessments; Effectiveness over Legal certainty dictates that the recovery operation can be “completed”, regardless of whether victims have actually been restored.

The butcher inspects his own meat. And in this case the butcher has also devised the quality mark, written the inspection protocol, trained the inspectors, and financed the meat himself. That is no recovery. That is institutionalised self-indemnification. The Follow the Money investigation in this series established that the Service Level Agreement between the State and SGH of 16 July 2024 includes an indemnification clause in which the State indemnifies SGH and all parties hired by SGH against damage claims from victims. The butcher also indemnifies his own inspector.

6. Social unrest and willingness to strike

The fifth thread in this investigation is social unrest. It is measurable in four indicators: trust in the House of Representatives and in politicians, purchasing power and poverty, wealth inequality, and willingness to strike.

6.1 Trust drops to the lowest point since 2012

The CBS has published an annual indicator for trust in the House of Representatives, in politicians, in civil servants and in the municipal council since 2012. On 12 May 2026 CBS concluded that trust in the House of Representatives in 2025 dropped to 24.6 percent, and trust in politicians to 21.2 percent, in both cases the lowest level since the series began in 2012. For comparison: in 2020, the first year of the corona crisis, trust in the House was 53.2 percent and in politicians 39.7 percent. The decline is dramatic: from a majority to less than a quarter of the population in five years.

The Ipsos I&O Prinsjesdag survey of 22 September 2025 adds colour. Of the respondents (n=1,115) 29 percent say they trust national politics (against 44 percent in 2024 after the Schoof cabinet took office), 68 percent have little trust. Seventy-six percent disagree that politics solves problems, 74 percent think politics is occupied with itself, 68 percent consider politics incapable of cooperation. Only 18 percent expect politics to function better after the elections of 29 October 2025.

6.2 Purchasing power, poverty and inequality

Purchasing power rose by 3.6 percent in 2024, the largest increase in twenty years (CBS, 2025/37). That looks like good news, and in individual cases it is. But the average hides an uneven distribution. In the same period the number of people in poverty rose from 540,000 to 551,000, an increase after five years of decline (CBS, 2025/51). The number of children in poverty in 2024 was over 92,700 (NJi). The number of people in long-term poverty (three years or longer) was 175,000. Another 1.2 million people lived up to 25 percent above the poverty line without savings (Nibud, 17 October 2024).

Wealth inequality is a second story. The top 10 percent of households owns 56 percent of total wealth (Trouw / CBS). The top 1 percent owns 21.7 percent (CPB). The top 0.1 percent owns 13 percent of wealth in 2023, against 10 percent in 2015, roughly €260 billion (NU.nl / CBS). Total household wealth was €2,754 billion, on average €333,500 per household, with a median of €135,500. The difference between average and median is itself an indicator of inequality: half of households own less than €135,500, while a small number of households pull the average up sharply.

CBS chief economist Peter Hein van Mulligen notes that the working poor fall shorter on average than those on welfare. “Compared to 2018, last year there were relatively more working poor than people on welfare who were poor. The working poor fall shorter on income than poor people on a welfare benefit.” It is an observation that puts the picture of a country where work pays into perspective.

6.3 The strike wave

The CBS has long published a strikes dashboard. In 2023 there were 52 strikes, in 2024 only 36, and in 2025 only 23. The number of strikes has thus halved, but the number of lost working days rose in 2025 to roughly 60,000, a concentration effect: fewer, but larger and longer strikes. The largest strike of 2025 was in education, with 28,000 lost working days in a relay format with around 2,000 participants.

In 2026 the picture escalates. On 3 March 2026 civil servants stopped work for 24 hours against the wage freeze, with more than a thousand people on the Malieveld (FNV, VCP). On 14 April 2026 a nationwide strike followed across six cities, with 160,000 civil servants (CNV). On 24 June 2026 public transport ground to a halt nationwide until eight o’clock (FNV, NOS). In between there were strikes in healthcare (the largest on 28 September 2023 across the seven university medical centres) and in education.

The EenVandaag poll of 18 May 2026 (n ≈ 25,000) concludes that 71 percent of the Dutch support potential strikes against cuts to social security. Twenty-two percent find strikes “too rigorous”. Support also runs through coalition voters. Seventy-three percent are against the proposed reduction of the WIA benefit, 76 percent against a further rise in the state pension age.

6.4 What the numbers say

The numbers together paint the picture of a society in which trust in formal political channels is declining, in which purchasing power rises in averages but falls in margins, and in which the willingness for collective action is growing. Three of the four major trade unions (FNV, CNV, VCP) signal in the spring of 2026 that the wage freeze for civil servants is a breaking point. That is no ordinary political conflict; it is a conflict between the state and its own staff.

7. The House of Thorbecke: an occupied house

In 1848 Johan Rudolph Thorbecke rewrote the Constitution. The most important innovations were ministerial responsibility, freedom of religion, assembly and the press, and the direct election of the House of Representatives. The Constitution ordered the state into three connected layers of government, municipalities, provinces, central government, which since then in Dutch administrative tradition are referred to as the House of Thorbecke: a building with three floors, with the water boards as an extension and Europe as a later fourth layer. Government was supposed to start close to the citizen and to intervene higher up only where an issue transcended local boundaries. Each layer of government is autonomously responsible for its tasks, but cooperates to safeguard the unity of the state, a decentralised unitary state.

What was built into that House in 1848 are the fundamental rights that still form the foundations: equality before the law (now art. 1 Constitution), the right to an independent judge (now art. 112-113 Constitution), freedom of religion and assembly (now art. 6 and 9 Constitution), the right to open government (now reinforced through the Open Government Act), and, crucial for this investigation, the requirement that government acts on the basis of legality and with a duty of care. The old public administration that the Government Information Service and Thorbeckian administrative law had in mind was a government that acts properly because it is bound by law: lawful, equal, certain. The three Rs, in short.

The house still stands

The House of Thorbecke still stands, physically and institutionally, in 2026. The Constitution has been amended several times since 1848, but mainly in 1917 (universal suffrage), 1953 (New Guinea), 1983 (revision) and 2018 (qualified majority for the EU), but the three layers of government, the separation of powers, judicial independence and fundamental rights are intact. The municipal council debates; the provincial states govern; the States General legislate; the Administrative Jurisdiction Division of the Council of State reviews; the Supreme Court guards private law and the right of cassation. Nothing has changed on the facades.

But it is occupied by a different power

What changed from the 1980s onwards, however, is not the facades but the occupants. The New Public Management philosophy reconstructed in the previous investigation in this series displaced the lawfulness orientation (Triple R) with an economic paradigm (Triple E). Government began to run itself like a business; the citizen became a customer; the KPI became the thing that counted, not the legal norm. In September 2023 Minister De Jonge of the Interior officially put NPM “out with the bulk waste” in the budget. But a philosophy does not disappear through a budget footnote. Practice lags behind the budget.

The five threads of this investigation each sketch a room of the House that is no longer run by its original occupants but by a different power:

The fundamental rights of 1848, reread in 2026

The fundamental rights that Thorbecke built into the House in 1848 are formally still in force in 2026. But their operation has been damaged by the occupation:

• Gelijkheid voor de wet (art. 1 Gw) · de discriminatiebevindingen van het College voor de Rechten van de Mens en de boetes van de Autoriteit Personsgegevens brengen de Afdeling bestuursrechtspraak er niet toe het forfait van 500 euro aan een hogere norm te toetsen. Gelijkheid is niet afgeschaft, maar er wordt niet meer op gestuurd in de uitvoering en niet meer op getoetst in de rechtspraak.
• Onafhankelijke rechter (art. 112-113 Gw) · de rechter bestaat en is onafhankelijk, maar het toetsingsverbod van art. 120 Gw maakt dat zij wettelijke forfaits niet aan evenredigheid kan toetsen. De onafhankelijkheid is formeel intact; de reikwijdte van wat de rechter kan doen, is ingeperkt.
• Openbaarheid van bestuur (art. 110 Gw, Woo) · de Woo bestaat, maar de rijksoverheid publiceert niet actief de declaraties van haar bewindspersonen, hoewel art. 3.1 Woo dat voorschrijft voor geïnstitutionaliseerde uitgaven. Openbaarheid is niet afgeschaft; zij is verplaatst naar het incidentele Woo-verzoek.
• Recht op behoorlijk bestuur (art. 3:2 Awb, art. 6 EVRM) · de zorghoudendheid bestaat, maar de causaal-uitspraak van de ABRvS reduceert het verband tussen onrechtmatig optreden en schade tot één deelaspect. Wat niet in causaal verband staat met de OGS-kwalificatie, valt buiten de vergoeding.

The fundamental rights themselves have not been revised. Thorbecke’s Constitution still applies. But the operational instruments that were supposed to make those rights real in practice, information, hearing and contradiction, motivation, active disclosure, judicial review, have not been abolished but neglected, and have by now been replaced by a different set of instruments: flat rates, KPIs, bidding models, external advisers, NPM savings, and since 2023 a rethink that takes place on paper but not in execution.

The occupying power has no name

Who occupies the House of Thorbecke? Not a single party. It is no conspiracy, no coup, no ideological about-turn that can be dated to a single day. It is, as the ABDTOPConsult essay established in 2022, a “reconstructed reality”: a toolbox full of instruments that came into vogue piece by piece, CBAs, SWOTs, KPIs, SLAs, audits, benchmarking, balanced scorecards, output financing, shared service centres, external hiring, PPP constructions, which together began to form a new way of being-government. No one ever announced: “from today we adopt NPM”. But in 2023 the budget of the Interior Ministry stated that central government officially took leave of it. The occupation had taken place without ever being declared. And the liberation, as this investigation shows, is not complete.

What does this mean for the investigation?

The five threads of this investigation are not five incidents. They are five symptoms of one and the same occupation. The ICT cost overruns are not the result of technical bad luck, but of an administrative culture that confuses steering with steering on measurable output. The expenses black box is not the result of forgetfulness, but of a political culture that sees openness as a burden rather than a duty. Jetten’s non-response is not the result of busyness, but of an administrative style that has unlearned public accountability. The wavering Council of State is not an activist judge, but a judge who has adopted the paradigm of the legislator. The strike wave is not the result of radicalisation, but of a society that notices the formal channels no longer deliver what they promised.

The House of Thorbecke still stands. But it is no longer occupied by the power that Thorbecke envisioned in it. It is occupied by a power that is not in the Constitution, that was not elected, that was not appointed, and that does not recognise itself as such. A reconstructed reality, as ABDTOPConsult called it. An occupying power without a name.

The question for the synthesis is therefore not whether the state can be recaptured, but who is capable of recapturing it. The answer to that question, at present, is that none of the institutions formally authorised, parliament, the judge, the National Ombudsman, the Netherlands Court of Audit, the Advisory Committee on ICT Assessment, can carry out that recapture by itself. They can only extend a hand. The recapture itself, if it comes, comes from below: from the victims who refuse to stay silent, from the civil servants who refuse to adapt, from the citizens who, instead of staying away, return to the ballot box, and from the judges who, as in the Golden Handshakes ruling or the Childcare Benefits Scandal ruling, ultimately take the room that the law offers them.

8. Synthesis: can the state still steer the country?

The five threads of this investigation are individually each already worrying. In combination they raise a question that is usually not posed explicitly in Dutch political culture: can this state still steer the country? It is a question that must be read analytically, not polemically. The answer requires a distinction between three kinds of capacity.

8.1 Operational capacity

Operationally the state is partly losing. The ICT cost overruns of €4.2 billion over three years are not the result of an incident, but of structural underinvestment in the technical debt of its own systems. The Tax Authority that spent €849 million on ICT in 2022 is a service that runs in race mode with itself to replace systems before the last programmer retires. The Digital System for the Environment Act that suffered five years of delay and was intervened in five times by the regulator is not the exception but the pattern. The STAP budget that was abolished after two years due to system failure and fraud is a case of “marking time” in a politics that wants to reform but cannot pull off execution.

8.2 Institutional capacity

Institutionally the state is stiffening. The cabinet expenses black box, which only becomes visible through incidental Woo decisions, is a symptom of an administrative culture in which open government is a formula, not a practice. The non-response of Prime Minister Jetten to an open plea from two faces of the childcare benefits scandal is no incident but an expression of a system in which the Catshuis and the victims live in different time zones. The wavering Council of State, which curtails the recovery along three tracks, is not an activist judge but a judge who exposes the limits of the Wht and thereby confronts the legislator with its own choices.

8.3 Legitimacy capacity

In terms of legitimacy the state is losing. Trust in the House of Representatives drops to 24.6 percent, the lowest level since 2012. Trust in politicians drops to 21.2 percent. Seventy-two percent of the Dutch believe that politics does not solve problems. Seventy-one percent support potential strikes against cuts to social security. The strike wave in the spring of 2026 reaches sectors, civil servants, public transport, that in the Dutch polder model tradition normally work through consultation, not through strikes. It is an indicator that the polder model itself is under pressure.

8.4 The interconnection

The three capacities are not independent. Operational failure feeds institutional stiffening: a state that does not have its own systems under control also cannot easily disclose its own expenses. Institutional stiffening feeds loss of legitimacy: a state that does not respond to the plea of two faces of a drama that it caused itself creates the impression that the distance to the citizen has grown to a structural format. And the loss of legitimacy feeds operational failure: a state that is attacked by its own civil servants cannot carry out major reforms.

The working hypothesis of this investigation is that the Dutch state in 2026 is under pressure along all three axes simultaneously, and that the institutional reading-time of the state (the time it takes to recognise and correct a pattern) is longer than the average lifespan of a cabinet. Rutte IV fell over the asylum factory, Schoof fell over what later became visible as the wage freeze debate, and the Jetten cabinet that took office on 23 February 2026 with 66 of the 150 seats has a size that prevents it from carrying out major course changes without support from outside the coalition.

8.5 Should we be worried?

For the victims of the childcare benefits scandal, the private families, the SME entrepreneurs, the families abroad, the question is not whether they should worry. They have been worrying for decades. The question is whether the Dutch state is able to recognise those worries as a signal of broader failure, and not just as individual suffering to be processed through formal channels.

The answer in this investigation is: not at present. The five threads that this investigation connects are still treated by the state itself as five separate files. ICT cost overruns are a file of AcICT. Expenses are a file of the Woo officers. The plea to Jetten is a file of the Catshuis communications department. The Council of State rulings are a file of the State Secretary for Finance. Willingness to strike is a file of the Ministry of the Interior. No one in formal government connects the five threads. The victim who experiences them all at once stands alone with that experience.

This investigation tries to break that loneliness. Not by offering a solution that does not exist, but by drawing the connection that the state itself does not draw. The digital state fails. The cabinet allows itself to avoid scrutiny. The prime minister does not respond. The Council of State curtails the recovery. Society strikes back. Five threads, one state, one question.

Timeline

• 2017 · Aanschaf nieuw regeringsvliegtuig (Boeing BBJ) voor circa 89 miljoen euro.
• 15 januari 2021 · Kabinet-Rutte III neemt ontslag over de toeslagenaffaire.
• 10 januari 2022 · Kabinet-Rutte IV aangetreden; Rob Jetten wordt minister Klimaat en Energie.
• 1 mei 2022 · Wet open overheid treedt in werking.
• 1 maart 2022 · Start STAP-budget bij UWV.
• 4 juli 2022 · Begin boerenprotesten; 20 van 35 supermarkt-distributiecentra geblokkeerd.
• 7 juli 2023 · Kabinet-Rutte IV biedt ontslag aan (asielbeleid).
• 19 september 2023 · BZK zet New Public Management officieel bij grofvuil.
• 28 september 2023 · Grootste staking ooit in de zeven UMC’s, 24 uur.
• 1 januari 2024 · STAP-budget afgeschaft wegens fraude en systeemfaal.
• 2 juli 2024 · Kabinet-Schoof aangetreden; Rob Jetten wordt fractievoorzitter D66.
• 22 augustus 2024 · Woo-besluit declaraties Dick Schoof.
• 1 december 2024 · Rapportage Grote ICT-activiteiten 2024: 27 procent meerkost, record.
• 15 januari 2025 · Algemene Rekenkamer publiceert “Het Rijk in de cloud”.
• 12 maart 2025 · Rb. Den Haag wijst vordering Capgemini af (ECLI:NL:RBDHA:2025:3645); Fast Enterprises mag gunning behouden.
• 5 september 2025 · Sandra Palmen herbenoemd als staatssecretaris Herstel Toeslagen.
• 2 juli 2025 · ABRvS ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2864 · forfait 500 euro onttrokken aan rechterlijke toets.
• 22 september 2025 · Ipsos I&O Prinsjesdagonderzoek: 29 procent vertrouwen in landelijke politiek.
• 17 februari 2026 · Smeekbede Rongen en ten Hove aan Jetten: herbenoem Palmen niet.
• 23 februari 2026 · Kabinet-Jetten aangetreden; Palmen alsnog beëdigd.
• 25 februari 2026 · ABRvS ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166 · procesbelang lichte toets Catshuisregeling vervalt.
• 3 maart 2026 · 24-uurs staking rijksambtenaren; meer dan 1.000 op Malieveld.
• 4 maart 2026 · Kamerdebat over dossiers van ouders in de toeslagenaffaire; Jetten niet aanwezig.
• 5 maart 2026 · Woo-besluit kosten regeringsvliegtuig (naar aanleiding van vlucht NL → Suriname 30 november 2025).
• 16 april 2026 · Tweede Kamer motie: Afdeling advisering RvS toetsen nieuwe schaderoutes op rechtsbescherming.
• 14 april 2026 · Landelijke staking Rijk in zes steden · 160.000 ambtenaren.
• 18 mei 2026 · EenVandaag-peiling: 71 procent steunt mogelijke stakingen tegen bezuinigingen sociale zekerheid.
• 20 mei 2026 · Algemene Rekenkamer: Defensie gaf 4,4 miljard niet volgens regels uit (SRV 2025).
• 3 juni 2026 · ABRvS ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166 (202504054/1/A2) · Catshuisregeling aanvullend ingeperkt tot OGS-kwalificatie.
• 24 juni 2026 · Landelijke werkonderbreking openbaar vervoer tot 08.00 uur.

Sources

Official government sources

• RijksICT-dashboard, rijksictdashboard.nl (stand juni 2026).
• Adviescollege ICT-toetsing (AcICT), Jaarrapportage 2023 (28 maart 2024), 2024 (31 maart 2025) en 2025 (9 april 2026), https://www.adviescollegeicttoetsing.nl/onderzoeken/afgeronde-onderzoeken-2025-en-eerder
• Algemene Rekenkamer, Hoogrisicolijst voorjaar 2026 (20 mei 2026), https://www.rekenkamer.nl/documenten/2026/05/20/hoogrisicolijst
• Algemene Rekenkamer, “Het Rijk in de cloud” (15 januari 2025), https://www.rekenkamer.nl/documenten/2025/01/15/het-rijk-in-de-cloud
• Algemene Rekenkamer, “ICT en digitalisering” (themapagina sinds 1991), https://www.rekenkamer.nl/onderwerpen/i/ict-en-digitalisering
• Rijksoverheid, Rapportage Grote ICT-activiteiten 2024 (31 december 2024), https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/documenten/2024/12/31/rapportage-grote-ict-activiteiten-2024 · PDF: https://open.overheid.nl/documenten/8f7b04d5-a6ee-4532-8e65-196ad943c6c7/file
• Stb. 2024-42 · Instellingswet Adviescollege ICT-toetsing (inwerking 1 juli 2024), https://zoek.officielebekendmakingen.nl/stb-2024-42.pdf
• Woo-besluit declaraties Dick Schoof (22 augustus 2024), https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/documenten/2024/08/22/besluit-op-woo-verzoek-over-declaraties-d-schoof · inventarislijst: https://open.overheid.nl/documenten/64f14f3e-8c2c-4383-a4f0-efcda9d5c72d/file
• Woo-besluit kosten regeringsvliegtuig (5 maart 2026), https://www.rijksoverheid.nl/documenten/2026/03/05/besluit-op-woo-verzoek-over-kosten-regeringsvliegtuig · documentenlijst: https://open.overheid.nl/documenten/f23926ca-7e2f-4e94-9e79-6f5f93703e8a/file
• Kamerstuk 36410-VI-107, brief Van Weel (12 september 2024), https://zoek.officielebekendmakingen.nl/kst-36410-VI-107.odt
• Kamerstuk 2025D19977 (begroting regeringsvliegtuig 2024), https://www.tweedekamer.nl/downloads/document?id=2025D19977
• Financieel Jaarverslag Rijk 2024, https://www.rijksfinancien.nl/financieel-jaarverslag/2024
• Jaarverslag ministerie van Buitenlandse Zaken 2024, https://www.rijksfinancien.nl/jaarverslag/2024/V

Case law

• ABRvS 15 mei 2024, ECLI:NL:RVS:2024:2045 (hardheidsclausule art. 2.8 Wht), https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/details?id=ECLI:NL:RVS:2024:2045
• ABRvS 2 juli 2025, ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2864 (forfait 500 euro, r.o. 9.4-9.7), https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/details?id=ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2864
• ABRvS 2 juli 2025, ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:2987 (compensatiebedrag), https://www.raadvanstate.nl/@151919/202306039-1-a2/
• ABRvS 9 juli 2025, ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:3076 (causaal verband verduidelijkt)
• ABRvS 2025, ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:5597 (causaal verband terugvordering-schade)
• ABRvS 19 november 2025, ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:5610 (weigering aanvullende schade)
• ABRvS 19 november 2025, ECLI:NL:RVS:2025:5087 (proceskostenveroordeling)
• ABRvS 25 februari 2026, ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166 (zaak 202500512/1/A2 · procesbelang lichte toets Catshuisregeling), https://www.raadvanstate.nl/@156610/202500512-1-a2/
• ABRvS 3 juni 2026, ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166 (zaak 202504054/1/A2 · Catshuisregeling aanvullend ingeperkt), https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/details?id=ECLI:NL:RVS:2026:3166
• Rb. Den Haag 12 maart 2025, ECLI:NL:RBDHA:2025:3645 (Capgemini vs. Staat / Fast Enterprises), https://uitspraken.rechtspraak.nl/details?id=ECLI:NL:RBDHA:2025:3645

Administrative and historical sources

• Corine Hoppenbrouwers en Guido Rijnja, “Het Huis van Thorbecke: hoe zat het ook alweer?”, Overheidscommunicatie voor professionals, 28 oktober 2025, https://overheidscommunicatieprofessional.nl/het-huis-van-thorbecke/ · en het onderliggende boek Overheidscommunicatie voor professionals (Boom Management)
• ABDTOPConsult (Hennephof, Van der Torre, met Noordegraaf), De invloed van New Public Management (NPM) op het ministerie van SZW, april 2022, in opdracht van de Parlementaire enquêtecommissie Fraudebeleid en Dienstverlening (vordering SZ3102-07) · zie New Public Management: de stille bodem waarop de toeslagenaffaire groeide

CBS, SCP and CPB

• CBS, “Vertrouwen in politici en Tweede Kamer in 2025 laagst sinds 2012” (12 mei 2026), https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/nieuws/2026/20/vertrouwen-in-politici-en-tweede-kamer-in-2025-laagst-sinds-2012
• CBS, Werkstakingen dashboard (update 28 april 2026), https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/visualisaties/dashboard-arbeidsmarkt/werkenden/werkstakingen
• CBS, “Koopkracht steeg met 3,6 procent in 2024” (2025/37), https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/nieuws/2025/37/koopkracht-steeg-met-3-6-procent-in-2024
• CBS, “Stijging armoede na vijf jaar daling” (2025/51), https://www.cbs.nl/nl-nl/nieuws/2025/51/stijging-armoede-na-vijf-jaar-daling
• CPB, “De lange weg naar de top · vermogensmobiliteit in Nederland”, https://www.cpb.nl/sites/default/files/omnidownload/CPB-Publicatie-de-lange-weg-naar-de-top-vermogensmobiliteit-in-nederland.pdf
• CPB, CEP 2025, https://www.cpb.nl/sites/default/files/omnidownload/CPBRaming-Centraal-Economisch-Plan-2025-.pdf
• Nibud, “Nieuwe meetmethode armoede” (17 oktober 2024), https://www.nibud.nl/nieuws/nieuwe-meetmethode-armoede/
• NJi, cijfers over armoede in gezinnen, https://www.nji.nl/databanken/cijfers/cijfers-over-armoede-in-gezinnen

Polls and media

• Ipsos I&O, Prinsjesdagonderzoek 2025 (22 september 2025), https://www.ipsos.com/nl-nl/prinsjesdagonderzoek-2025-politiek-vertrouwen-daalt-naar-niveau-van-voor-kabinet-schoof
• EenVandaag Opsiepanel, “Meerderheid steunt mogelijke stakingen tegen bezuinigingen op sociale zekerheid” (18 mei 2026), https://eenvandaag.avrotros.nl/opiniepanel/uitslagen/meerderheid-steunt-mogelijke-stakingen-tegen-bezuinigingen-op-sociale-zekerheid-plannen-ook-niet-populair-bij-coalitiekiezers-163673
• Hart van Nederland, “Toeslagenouders vragen Jetten: ga niet verder met Sandra Palmen” (17 februari 2026), https://www.hartvannederland.nl/politiek/beleid/artikelen/toeslagenouders-vragen-jetten-ga-niet-verder-met-sandra-palmen
• De Telegraaf, “Wat u zegt · Toeslagenouders eisen actie van Rob Jetten” (2026), https://www.telegraaf.nl/wat-u-zegt/de-kwestie/toeslagenouders-eisen-actie-van-rob-jetten-en-willen-vertrek-sandra-palmen-dit-kan-zo-niet-langer/132034038.html
• Trouw, “Sandra Palmen noemt stoppen met dwangsommen voor toeslagenouders erg pijnlijk”, https://www.trouw.nl/politiek/sandra-palmen-noemt-stoppen-met-dwangsommen-voor-toeslagenouders-erg-pijnlijk~bdcd9f2b/
• Taxlive, “Palmen verwacht dat herstel toeslagen met minderheidskabinet niet anders is” (met referentie aan Nationale Ombudsman), https://www.taxlive.nl/nl/documenten/nieuws/palmen-verwacht-dat-herstel-toeslagen-met-minderheidskabinet-niet-anders-is/
• Accountant.nl / AG Connect / Binnenlands Bestuur, “Grote IT-projecten kosten overheid al 1,3 miljard meer dan gepland” (23 januari 2023), https://www.accountant.nl/nieuws/2023/1/grote-it-projecten-kosten-overheid-al-13-miljard-meer-dan-gepland/
• iBestuur, “ICT-projecten bij het Rijk vaker duurder en later opgeleverd” (6 oktober 2025), https://ibestuur.nl/overheid-in-transitie/politiek-en-beleid/ict-projecten-bij-het-rijk-vaker-duurder-en-later-opgeleverd
• Techzine, “Belastingdienst besteedt btw-systeem volledig uit aan VS”, https://www.techzine.nl/nieuws/infrastructure/575538/belastingdienst-besteedt-btw-systeem-volledig-uit-aan-vs/
• Taxence, “Verouderde ICT leidt tot hoge kosten voor Belastingdienst”, https://www.taxence.nl/nieuws/verouderde-ict-leidt-tot-hoge-kosten-voor-belastingdienst/
• Dutch IT Channel, “DUO heeft zichzelf klemgezet rond Doorontwikkelen Applicatielandschap Bekostiging”, https://www.dutchitchannel.nl/news/406098/duo-heeft-zichzelf-klemgezet-rond-doorontwikkelen-applicatielandschap-bekostiging
• Fiscaal van Morgen, “Adviescollege waarschuwt: modernisering omzetbelasting bij fiscus dreigt te falen” (10 mei 2024), https://www.fiscaalvanmorgen.nl/2024/05/10/adviescollege-waarschuwt-modernisering-omzetbelasting-bij-fiscus-dreigt-te-falen/
• NOS, “Nieuw regeringsvliegtuig bijna 18 miljoen te duur”, https://nos.nl/artikel/2171061-nieuw-regeringsvliegtuig-bijna-18-miljoen-te-duur
• De Gelderlander, “Vliegtuig voor koning en kabinet gaat 89 miljoen euro kosten”, https://www.gelderlander.nl/politiek/vliegtuig-voor-koning-en-kabinet-gaat-89-miljoen-euro-kosten~a1f7d7b4f/
• AD, “Pechvliegtuig Defensie jaagt kabinet op kosten · vluchten afgelast of omgeboekt”, https://www.ad.nl/politiek/pechvliegtuig-defensie-jaagt-kabinet-op-kosten-vluchten-afgezegd-of-omgeboekt~a27aa880/
• NRC, “Kabinet-Rutte III gevallen om toeslagenaffaire” (15 januari 2021), https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2021/01/15/kabinet-rutte-iii-gevallen-om-toeslagenaffaire-a4027684
• NIPV, “Boerenprotesten in de zomer van 2022”, https://nipv.nl/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/20220912-NIPV-Boerenprotesten-in-de-zomer-van-2022.pdf
• VRT, “Ondanks verbod trekken tractoren in kolonne naar Den Haag” (11 maart 2023), https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2023/03/11/ondanks-verbod-trekken-tractoren-in-kolonne-naar-den-haag-voor-p/
• FNV, “Landelijke staking ziekenhuizen op 16 maart”, https://www.fnv.nl/nieuwsbericht/sectornieuws/zorg-welzijn/2023/03/landelijke-staking-ziekenhuizen-op-16-maart
• AD, “Dinsdag grootste staking ooit in ziekenhuizen · werkdruk leidt tot ongezonde situaties”, https://www.ad.nl/gezond/dinsdag-grootste-staking-ooit-in-ziekenhuizen-werkdruk-leidt-tot-ongezonde-situaties~aaf454ac/
• FNV, “24-uursstaking Rijksoverheid op 3 maart”, https://www.fnv.nl/nieuwsbericht/sectornieuws/fnv-overheid/2026/02/fnv-24-uursstaking-rijksoverheid-op-3-maart
• VCP, “24-uursstaking rijksambtenaren tegen nullijn”, https://www.vcp.nl/24-uursstaking-rijksambtenaren-tegen-nullijn/
• CNV, “Landelijke staking rijksambtenaren op 14 april 2026”, https://www.cnv.nl/overheid/rijk/cao-rijk/nieuws/landelijke-staking-rijksambtenaren-op-14-april-2026-03-17/
• FNV, “Eerste staking openbaar vervoer op 24 juni”, https://www.fnv.nl/nieuwsbericht/sectornieuws/vervoer/2026/05/eerste-staking-openbaar-vervoer-op-24-juni
• NOS, “Vakbond FNV kondigt OV-staking aan op woensdag 24 juni”, https://nos.nl/artikel/2615145-vakbond-fnv-kondigt-ov-staking-aan-op-woensdag-24-juni-geen-andere-mogelijkheid
• FD, “Koopkracht hersteld dankzij cao-loonstijging van 5% in 2025”, https://fd.nl/economie/1582579/koopkracht-hersteld-dankzij-cao-loonstijging-van5-in-2025
• Trouw / CBS, “Rijkste 10 procent bezit ruim helft Nederlands vermogen”, https://www.trouw.nl/duurzaamheid-economie/rijkste-10-procent-bezit-ruim-helft-nederlands-vermogen~b0145505/
• NU.nl, “10 procent van huishoudens bezit ruim de helft van Nederlandse vermogen”, https://www.nu.nl/economie/6342333/10-procent-van-huishoudens-bezit-ruim-de-helft-van-het-nederlandse-vermogen.html
• Zorgverzekeringwijzer, “Zorgpremie 2026”, https://www.zorgverzekeringwijzer.nl/zorgpremie/

Previous OpenBrief investigations in this series

• New Public Management: de stille bodem waarop de toeslagenaffaire groeide, 16 juni 2026
• Follow the Money: De miljardenbalans van de Toeslagenaffaire, 15 juni 2026
• De geloofwaardigheid van de rechtsstaat en de Datakluis, 14 juni 2026
• RAM is nooit verdwenen: de staat profileert door, 27 mei 2026

Methodological notes

This investigation combines five data sources that usually stay separate (the National ICT Dashboard, Woo decisions, rechtspraak.nl, CBS/SCP/CPB, and polls by Ipsos and EenVandaag). Amounts are marked as “published” when taken directly from official source, as “estimate” when derived, and as “not public” when the central government does not publish them structurally.

Two choices deserve mention. The first is that a top-10 of ministerial expenses was omitted, because such a ranking cannot be factually assembled without ten separate Woo requests. The absence of the ranking is itself a finding. The second choice is that individual civil servants (CIOs, secretaries-general) are not designated as personally responsible for specific failed projects. In the Dutch administrative model the minister is ultimately accountable; civil servants are formally bound by his or her policy. Their names are mentioned here in their formal capacity, not as personal targets.

The estimate of “more than a thousand families” abroad, mentioned in the letter to Marijnissen, is a conservative estimate based on research by Radar Adviesgroep and the Childcare Benefits Scandal Victims Foundation. The exact number has not been published and can be requested through a Woo request at the Ministry of Finance or at the Benefits Recovery Executive Agency.

The working hypothesis that the institutional reading-time of the Dutch state is longer than the lifespan of a cabinet is an analytical proposition, not an empirical one. It derives its plausibility from the observation that the last three cabinets (Rutte IV, Schoof, Jetten) together ruled for only five years, while pattern recognition of institutional failure, from the first signals of the childcare benefits scandal in 2018 to the formal abandonment of NPM in 2023, took five years. It is a proposition that deserves further empirical research, and that can be tested in a subsequent investigation.