Ministry takes measures to prevent a recurrence of the Laurentien issue
NOS News•Today, 11:55 •Updated today, 15:26
Ministry takes measures to prevent a recurrence of the Laurentien issue
- Marleen de Rooy
- Political reporter
The Ministry of Finance has made new agreements about contacts between officials and external parties, such as the Princess Laurentien (Equal) Worthy Recovery Foundation, which works for victims of the Benefits Affair. From now on, there must be equal relations in negotiations and discussions.
In practice, this means that employees of the Ministry of Finance are no longer all allowed to negotiate with foundation employees. This is reserved for senior officials.
“In addition, contacts with third parties will now state that the agreements with the national government about integrity and manners also apply to a third party,” says an internal memo.
The Ministry of Finance has received several reports of unwanted behavior by Princess Laurentien, according to an internal review that the ministry did and which was inspected by the NOS.
More reports than expected, no official complaints
These are reports; no official complaints of unwanted behavior have been submitted. The reports come from the time when Princess Laurentien was chairman of the foundation. The review was done after reports about the princess's unwanted behavior in the AD.
Discussions that the NOS had with those involved show that these are more reports than previously thought. There would be about twenty of them.
Based on the review, the ministry comes to the conclusion “that employees found themselves in a working climate with too high a workload, which, in addition, did not pay sufficient attention to the position of employees in relation to the foundation”.
The top official of Finance, Secretary General Van den Dungen, writes in an internal memo that “last summer's publicity has understandably caused a lot among employees of our ministry. It is important that signals and reports are not only heard but also followed up.”
“Great respect and appreciation”
Responsible Secretary of State Achahbar includes it in the internal memo for her employees, who have been struggling. “Especially with all the publicity and nasty statements on social media that officials cannot defend themselves against. Every day, I see how hard everyone is working to recover from the benefits affair. That deserves great respect and appreciation.”
The foundation is satisfied with the reflection. “No complaints have been made, so there is no reason to continue talking about transgressive behavior from that period. It's great that we can now look ahead together,” a spokesperson said.
Former politician Gert-Jan Segers, chairman of the foundation's board of trustees, says in a statement that he fully supports the princess. “It's quite a lot when you get so much about yourself publicly based on anonymous allegations. Especially now that it appears that there have never been any factual grounds for it either.”
Laurentien explained end of August quit her work as chairman of the (Equal) worthy Recovery Foundation, after there was a stir about the foundation's method of helping parents. Finance officials found the amounts awarded unexplainably high.
Once again, upsets
The foundation and the ministry have been lying down these past few weeks upset again about the future of the recovery route. This mainly concerns the burden of proof that victims have for compensation. The foundation is based on trust; the ministry wants to see receipts and evidence.
Since the cabinet decided to continue with the foundation as an official Recovery Route under stricter conditions, twenty files have been sent to the ministry. All of them were returned with red stripes by the ministry.
The foundation does not see fit to continue working with the ministry in this way and wants to review the terms and conditions. Both the foundation and the ministry say they are hopeful that they will eventually figure it out.
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