Officials in childcare benefits scandal investigated for lying to Parliament committee
2 years ago

Officials in childcare benefits scandal investigated for lying to Parliament committee

NL Times  

The independent government investigation service, Rijksrecherche, is investigating whether or not top officials at the Ministry of Finance and the Dutch tax service, Belastingdienst, committed perjury in front of the parliamentary committee tasked with examining the childcare benefits scandal, according to Nieuwsuur. The decision to launch the investigation was already made back in June 2021, around the same time that the news outlets Trouw and RTL Nieuws reported allegations that Belastingdienst director Jaap Uijlenbroek did not tell the full truth in front of the committee, and neither did Minister of Finance official Manon Leijten. Central to the investigation is a highly critical memo written in 2017 that said the Belastingdienst’s method of discontinuing childcare benefits of people wrongly accused of being fraudsters was reprehensible and unlawful. A parliamentary committee tasked with investigating the Belastingdienst’s abuses found that parents faced unprecedented injustice, and the third Cabinet of Prime Minister Mark Rutte collapsed.

Parliament Memo Childcare Benefits Belastingdienst Leijten Uijlenbroek Investigation Service  parliament  memo  benefits  parents  scandal  lying  committee  belastingdienst  childcare  investigation  service  investigated  officials  perjury  uijlenbroek  report

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Tax office whistleblower named new Cabinet member for welfare policy
2 weeks, 5 days ago

Tax office whistleblower named new Cabinet member for welfare policy

NL Times  

NSC parliamentarian Sandra Palmen will be the new State Secretary for Allowances and Customs, sources close to the government confirmed to NOS and WNL. In the benefits scandal, the Tax Authority wrongly labeled thousands of parents fraudsters and ordered them to repay the full amount of the childcare allowances they had received, leaving many in financial ruin. Earlier this year, …

Shame that gov't didn't prevent benefits scandal, Rutte says in parliamentary inquiry
1 year, 2 months ago

Shame that gov't didn't prevent benefits scandal, Rutte says in parliamentary inquiry

NL Times  

Outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte is ashamed that he and his Cabinet were unable to prevent tens of thousands of people from being plunged into financial ruin by the Tax Authority’s hunt for alleged fraudsters. Rutte acknowledged that Moreira Moreno’s story is one “among many.” His interrogation once again revealed how the top of the Cabinet overlooked the Tax Authority’s …

Wide-ranging inquiry into discredited anti-fraud strategy begins
1 year, 3 months ago

Wide-ranging inquiry into discredited anti-fraud strategy begins

Dutch News  

Hearings started this week in a wide-ranging inquiry into the Dutch government’s anti-fraud policies in the last 30 years, including accusations that officials deliberately targeted families and benefit claimants from ethnic minorities. The inquiry beginning this week will look at wider anti-fraud measures stretching back three decades to identify how the childcare benefits scandal emerged. The furore around the Bulgarian …

Far more children taken from homes of victims in tax office benefits scandal
2 years ago

Far more children taken from homes of victims in tax office benefits scandal

NL Times  

Roughly 25 percent more children were removed from the homes of parents who fell victim to the Dutch tax office’s benefits scandal than previously estimated. A total of 2,090 children were taken from their parents and placed in care during the period from 2015 through June 2022, according to a new calculation by Statistics Netherlands. The benefits affair mainly affected …

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