Explosive advice to the ministry: Princess Laurentien must completely distance herself from her own foundation

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According to NautaDutilh, the princess still has an “important, if not decisive” influence with the foundation that helps allowance parents. This hampers the successful execution of the order to help thousands of victims assess their damage, says the office.

• Authors
  • Derk Stokmans
  • and Stefan Vermeulen
• Published onMarch 27, 2025 at 12:25pm
• Reading time 3 minutes

Princess Laurentien van Oranje must stand at a complete distance from the Foundation (Equal) Worthy Recovery (SGH), which assists victims in the Allowance Scandal.

That advisor to NautaDutilh lawyers to the Ministry of Finance in a report that was shared with the House of Representatives on Thursday, in the run-up to a debate about the recovery operation Surcharges.

After criticism of her performance Laurentien quit as chairman of SGH last year, but according to the report, she is still “intensively involved in the manipulation” and is still informally still at the helm through a statutory structure. According to NautaDutilh, this successful execution of SGH's mission to help thousands of victims to do enormous damage.

The legal analysis has already troubled relationship between Finance and the foundation is further strained. Laurentien's right-hand man and co-founder of SGH Gerd van Atten mentioned the report earlier this week in The Telegraph a “sneaky” personal attack and said it makes him feel “extremely unsafe”.

In the analysis carried out by NautaDutilh at the request of the ministry, the lawyers drew firm conclusions about how SGH is managed. It is alleged that there is a “serious lack of checks and balances ”. The powers of the founders conflict with corporate law, good governance guidelines and agreements that SGH has made with the ministry. Finances should probably talk to the foundation “in the short term”.

According to SGH, Nauta's conclusions have been resolved. In response to the advice made public, in part, the foundation on Thursday, a own lawyer advice, by the Lindenbaum office, stating that the foundation is indeed managed in accordance with legal requirements. “In principle, SGH can decide for itself how it sets up its organization, and SGH was set up and set up in accordance with requirements,” Lindenbaum writes.

In part, SGH also gave a brief from the ministry to the foundation, showing that Secretary of State Sandra Palmen (Allowances, NSC) had a conversation about the report with Chairman of the SGH Supervisory Board Gert-Jan Segers last Monday, who had received “the message about strengthening the board”. According to Palmen, it was a “pleasant and constructive conversation”, the briefing states.

Heavy strain

In their advice, NautaDutilh's lawyers write that the foundation's statutes give Princess Laurentien and her right-hand man Van Atten as “Founders”: they have “a weighty voice in their vision, course and choice”. In addition, they establish the administrative regulations, elect the chairman of the supervisory board and also have ties with other directors and supervisors.

This observation is remarkable because responsible Secretary of State Palmen during an interview with Buitenhof about Laurentien's role, on the contrary, said that the princess was “at a distance” and had “retreated a little further”.

According to the advisory report, in practice, the princess and Van Atten actually have an “important, if not decisive” influence on the foundation's decisions, even though they have no (legal) responsibility for them. According to NautaDutilh, it is completely “completely outside the framework of laws and regulations”. The only way to end it, writes Nauta, is “to completely remove the Founders as a premium”. That, the lawyers write, “should not replace informal control”.

NautaDutilh's analysis also poses fundamental questions about the ministerial responsibility for Laurentien, who is a member of the Royal House. Combined, Prime Minister Dick Schoof is responsible for this construction, which, according to the lawyers, is legally and politically risky. In the report, NautaDutilh interprets Laurentien's special position “giving her an established authority; components others do not have”.

Integrity in business operations

The legal advisors also write that SGH does not meet the requirements of “business integrity”. “There is no regulation to avoid risks of strengthening interests or other unlawful acts by the Founders [...] and there is no person who supervises hierarchically.”

According to the code of good governance that SGH must comply with under its contract with the state, “no agreements may be concluded with (legal) persons with an integrated involvement of the directors”. One of Laurentien's foundations provides for a fee training sessions for SGH employees. That foundation also charges office costs to SGH. Van Atten works as a legal advisor for SGH.

Mega job

Last year, the Ministry of Finance commissioned SGH to definitively determine financial compensation for twenty thousand benefit victims — a mega job worth almost 100 million euros. The foundation turned out originally unable to carry out this' scaling ', according to research by NRC in October.

The latest figures show little improvement. By now, according to its own calculated amounts, SGH should help hundreds of allowance parents. That was 21 last week, so there is a risk that victims will have to wait a long time for compensation, even at the foundation, which is expressly intended to accelerate the recovery operation.

Despite the, the ministry is negotiating with SGH about further extension of the assignment , up to possibly all 41,000 victims. This is done on the advice of a committee led by former MP Chris van Dam, who did make two comments: “The implementation requires that SGH scale up strongly and that their management is in order. We think they are capable of doing this.”