1284 LETTER FROM THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FINANCE

Meeting year 2023—2024
31 066
Tax authorities
No.
1284 LETTER FROM THE SECRETARY OF STATE FOR FINANCE
To the President of the House of Representatives of the States General The Hague, September 14, 2023 The Standing Committee for Finance made several requests to the State Secretary for Finance — Surcharges and Customs before the summer recess. This letter provides six requests with a response. Your House is periodically informed about the recovery operation in its entirety via the Recovery Surcharges Progress Reports (VGR). The next Progress Report for the period May to August 2023 will be sent to both Houses at the end of September/beginning of October.
The State Secretary for Finance, A. de Vries
kst-31066-1284
ISSN 0921 - 7371
The Hague 2023 House of Representatives, meeting year 2023—2024, 31 066, No. 1284 1
Response to various requests from the Permanent Chamber Committee on Finance from the procedural meetings on June 21, 2023 and July 6, 2023
The standing committee for Finance received a letter from A.C.S. Law Firm in Rotterdam dated 8 June 2023 concerning the approach to recovery surgery surcharges. At the procedural meeting on June 21, 2023, the committee decided to receive a response to this letter. In the letter, Ms. Köse-Albayrak from ACS lawyers identified two points that she states need urgent attention. First of all, she refers — in short — to the provision of files in the proceedings before the Advisory Committee (BAC) and Commission for Actual Injury (CWS) and the related organization of the process, scheduling hearings or explanatory interviews. The signals include the completeness of the files, the contacts between the Implementation Organization for Recovery, Allowances and committees without involving the lawyer, and the unavailability of online portals. Finally, the letter states — in short — that compensation for non-material damage and discrimination experienced should be dealt with differently.

1. Providing files and setting up processes
The letter contains essential and serious signals; in many cases, improvement measures have been or are being taken to do so. It is important to be and remain in talks about such signals; these discussions also take place with the Dutch Bar Association and the benefits lawyers working group. Currently, these discussions mainly concern the provision of files; the signals as included in this letter will also be discussed. With regard to the improvement measures, the following can be noted. As included in the letter dated 23 June 2023 (Parliamentary Paper 31 066, No. 1254), the cabinet wants to make the provision of files less complex in order to better and earlier provide parents and lawyers with their information needs. In consultation with the Dutch Bar Association's working group on payment lawyers, over the past few months, we have looked at the composition of the recovery file in relation to the objection, CWS, and personal file. For example, the personal file also includes a lot of information that is not relevant to providing recovery: it contains all information available in the systems, with regard to all years of benefits and also with regard to other surcharges. The composition was also discussed with the BAC and the CWS, with attention to the importance of an unambiguous table of contents and order of composition. Based on a new inventory of the necessary and desired documents in a file, the current recovery file will be further expanded to arrive at a uniform file that contains the information relevant to parents, representatives and committees. The uniformed file is expected to better meet the information needs of parents and their representatives. The compilation of a uniform file is in a final phase, about the House of Representatives, meeting year 2023—2024, 31 066, No. 1284 2 completion of the state of affairs will be reported in the following progress report. Otherwise, measures are also taken with regard to the appeal process that will ensure that parents and their representatives will have access to their file earlier in the appeal process and not just shortly before the objection hearing. For example, files are also being made available as part of mediation and the measure to use the BAC in a more targeted manner leads to a new organization of the objection process. With this new institution, the Implementation Organization for Recovery of Surcharges (UHT) will itself provide the file to the parent after receiving an objection. The parent then does not have to wait for the BAC hearing to receive the file. This will be reported in more detail in the next Progress Report. With regard to applications for compensation for additional actual damage, it has been possible since the beginning of this year to make files available before the explanatory interview. In most cases, the file is made available at least one week before the hearing; in many cases, this is also possible earlier in the process. With regard to actual damage, the letter dated 23 June 2023 announced that parents and their representatives will be better involved in the process. In the process as it is currently set up, the CWS advises and UHT takes a decision based on this (subject to the obligation to verify). There is no role for parents and their empowered persons in this. By offering the opportunity to express an opinion, parents' story is better involved and there is also the opportunity to respond to the proposed compensation for additional actual damage before a decision is made. The letter also states that the lawyer would be kept out of the picture during the course of the file and various emails would be exchanged between the UHT and the Committees without the lawyer being informed. These highlights, among other things, the importance of a fair trial. This importance is underlined, but at the same time, there may be reasons why parents and representatives are not always directly involved. For example, files can be made available unvarnished to the committees but not to parents and their representatives. Otherwise, there may also be reasons why communication — initially — only takes place with a committee. Fair trial guarantees are, for example, laid down in the procedure of the BAC, which ensures that the interested party and his representative receive a copy of the results of further investigation, with the opportunity to respond and request a new (additional) hearing. In light of the above, an online portal, as proposed in the letter, offers no solution, except that making such a portal widely accessible is not easy to achieve, even in light of its required security.

2. Compensation — immaterial and due to discrimination
Finally, the letter refers to compensation for damage due to non-material damage and discrimination experienced. This refers to (additional) advice from the Administrative Advisory Council of the House of Representatives, meeting year 2023—2024, 31 066, No. 1284 3
Childcare Allowance (BAK) of March 2, 2023. It is also argued that the Recovery Operation Surcharges Act inexplicably states that the affected parents are entitled to intangible compensation of €500 per six months over the period in which they had problems and that amount should be significantly higher. This refers to the amounts used for wrongful detention. It is also indicated that there is a legal gap with regard to compensation for damage due to discrimination experienced. In the recovery operation, a flat-rate compensation takes place as part of the comprehensive assessment and more customization can be offered in the context of compensating additional actual damage. For several reasons, I see no reason to change the flat-rate assessment. The origin of this amount lies in the Donner committee's advice on the benefits affair. This amount was subsequently included in the Recovery Surgery Surcharges Act (as part of the comprehensive assessment). Should the amount be insufficient in individual cases, there is room for customization. Partly for this reason, there is room to file additional actual damage with the CWS. The CWS uses independently drawn up frameworks. The Restorative Surgery Surcharges Act requires that civil compensation law be the starting point, not criminal law. As announced in the letter to parliament dated 23 June 2023, work is currently underway on new, additional routes for dealing with actual damage. The principles of civil compensation law also remain central to these routes. What is new is that parents get the opportunity to choose a claim route that best suits their needs. In short, there is the option to follow a rapid route based on a fixed claims framework with a reduced burden of proof (including immaterial claims); in addition to a route when more customization is required and/or more complex claims require a more complex calculation, including intangible claims. Assessing whether there is discrimination is complicated. The procedures at the College of Human Rights illustrate that it is not easy to determine that the discrimination experienced has resulted in certain damages. And whether this damage is related to the recovery or termination of the childcare allowance. Nevertheless, (experienced) discrimination is part of the Actual Injury Commission's assessment framework. In the short term, the House will be further informed about the new comprehensive claims approach and how the various routes and damage frameworks complement each other. At the same procedural meeting on June 21, 2023, the committee decided to receive a response to the letter from J.M.S. in L. dated June 5, 2023 concerning the recovery of childcare allowance. The letter writer shared thoughts by letter about the process of concluding a settlement agreement as part of the recovery operation. There was official contact with the letter writer, discussing the suggestions for improvement, including developing an admission test for the route of a settlement agreement (VSO) and an assessment of parents' willingness to settle, from the letter. In addition, the letter writer was informed about the cabinet's intentions to find an alternative damage route.
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A third request from the procedural meeting on June 21 concerns a request from the committee for response to the letter from the Foundation for Recovery of Unprecedented Injustice dated 7 June 2023 concerning the 14th progress report on recovery surgery surcharges (Parliamentary Paper 31 066, No. 1235). On behalf of the Foundation for Recovery of Unprecedented Injustice, various questions were asked and recommendations were made about the course of the recovery operation and its effects on victims. The questions and recommendations concern several topics, such as dealing with actual damage, the situation of parents abroad and the lack of housing upon return, children's debts, and how settlement agreements and mediation work. Damage suffered by entrepreneurs, the Fraud Signaling Facility (FSV) and its influence on entrepreneurs are also mentioned in the letter. During the debate on the latest Progress Report on June 29. (Parliamentary Paper 31 066, No. 1273) a number of questions were answered in response to new choices and developments in recovery surgery. Some of the topics address issues that are still under development. At the same time, several issues mentioned by the Foundation have already been addressed, such as the alternative treatment of additional damage, more focus on settlement agreements, expanding the number of mediation processes, dealing with debts and supporting parents abroad. The committee also received a letter from Stichting Herstel Onbekend Inrecht dated 26 June 2023 about housing problems for victims of the benefits affair. At the procedural meeting on 6 July 2023, the committee decided to receive a response to this letter. This request concerns a specific case in a family and is not shared in terms of content for privacy reasons. The broader content of the letter concerning housing for affected young people is in line with the Foundation's previous questions. The subject is of course familiar to us. However, the issue of housing is often complex and difficult to resolve. The committee also received a copy of the letter addressed to the Secretary of State from the Commission for Actual Damage (CWS) in Utrecht dated 20 June 2023 about the second CWS evaluation report. At the procedural meeting on 6 July 2023, the committee decided to receive a copy of the response to this letter. There are regular consultations with the CWS, where these issues are also addressed. In addition, on September 7, your House was informed by letter1 about recent developments concerning the CWS. The House is periodically informed about progress at the CWS via the regular Progress Report on recovery operation surcharges. Finally, at the same procedural meeting, the committee decided to receive a response to a letter from the Appeals Advisory Committee on Recovery Surgery Allowances (BAC) dated June 20, 2023 regarding BAC's response to the 14th progress report on recovery surgery surcharges. A copy of the response to the letter from the Appeals Advisory Committee will be sent with the upcoming Recovery Operation Surcharges Progress Report.
1Parliamentary Paper 31 066, No. 1282.
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