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The Dutch Tax Scandal

KRISTIE RONGEN

“Why do you think you can stay?” Prime Minister and VVD party leader Mark Rutte was confronted with that question during RTL's live election debate. Kristie Rongen, one of the victims of the benefits affair, faced the prime minister. “You have abandoned me, and all for your own gain,” she told him.
Rongen is one of the thousands of parents who have run into financial trouble as a result of the tax authorities's derailed fraud hunt. She had to repay huge amounts of childcare allowance.
“Wow”, Rutte said at the introduction of Rongen. “Very special that we are here like this.” The prime minister explained that Rongen is one of the parents he spoke to earlier at the Catshuis. Rongen wanted to know why former minister Lodewijk Asscher quit as PvdA party leader, but Rutte stayed on. The VVD leader indicated that he had “thought” about his political fate. “This is such a shame.” But “on balance”, a lot of good things have also happened under his responsibility, says Rutte.
“What you have experienced is terrible,” he did tell Rongen. He emphasized what the cabinet has done in response to the benefits report to prevent citizens from getting into such trouble as a result of the government's actions in the future.
Date
21 December 2022
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