Interview

• Text:
• Steven Musch
• Photography:
• Eva Roefs
• Date:
• April 2, 2024

Former SP MP Renske Leijten has been away from politics for almost a year now. She wrote a book about Eva Gonzálex Pérez, the lawyer who started the Allowance scandal. “Without Eve, this would never have come out. She is important to our national history. '

“Negotiating the Constitution? Fine. Let's talk about it, but not only if the PVV wins... Damn hell!!!“Former SP MP Renske Leijten talks about the formation negotiations at the beginning of this year. She has been talking enthusiastically in her living room in Haarlem for over an hour, when she slaps her fists on the table and raises her voice. “All that mourning after the elections... Come on, we've uncovered the biggest discrimination scandal ever. It was, of course, the PvdA, VVD and D66 that organized everything to target their citizens, to profile them. So yes, let's talk about the Constitution, but also if Rutte is the biggest. ' “We are sad because of the election results,” says Leijten, “but I remember that the 2021 result hit me much harder. Because the coalition that suppressed the Benefits scandal was re-elected. '

Pitbull, file eater and red voice cannon

Renske Leijten (45) may have been away from politics for almost a year, but she is still closely following what is happening in The Hague and her fire is far from extinguished. In the House, she was known as a “pit bull”, “file eater”, but also as the “red voice cannon”. Partly because of her role in the Allowance Affair, she was popular, both inside and outside the SP. But after seventeen years of parliamentary membership, she said goodbye in July last year. She called The Hague's politics “toxic”, and she still thinks so. 'I started to get cynical and I don't think you should be a representative of the people. You have to want to change the world. “Four years earlier, she struggled with burnout symptoms, but because of her role in the Benefits Affair — together with Pieter Omtzigt (CDA, independent, now NSC) and Farid Azarkan (DENK) — she kept going.

CV

Name: Renske LeijtenLives: in Haarlem. Is married and has two children.Born: March 17, 1979, LeidenStudied: Political science at the UvA and Dutch language and culture at the University of Groningen.Worked: from 2006 to 2023 as a member of parliament for the SP. Prior to that, she was a member of the party board and chairman of the SP youth organization ROOD.Life motto: Those who do well, meet well. “My children would translate that into karma, but most of all, I mean: if you start from trust, you get it back.”

When she left in July, she announced that she would write a book about Eva Gonzálex Pérez, the lawyer who started the Allowance scandal, which led to the resignation of the Rutte III cabinet. This spring, the book will be published: We couldn't make it more fun.

Dadim Childcare Agency

“Without Eva, the Allowance scandal would never have come out,” says Leijten. “She is important to our national history. In her quest for justice, she knocked on all possible doors she encountered, out of deep faith in the rule of law. But in vain. She had been working for five years when I myself became involved in the Benefits Affair. “Eva Gonzálex Pérez is the lawyer for more than forty affected parents. Her husband is the owner of the Eindhoven childcare agency Dadim, which the tax authorities launched an investigation into in 2013 due to possible fraud. Although these signals proved unfounded, the childcare allowance was stopped and recovered from the hundreds of parents of this agency. Pérez objected to the closure on behalf of her clients, but those objections were rejected for reasons that are unclear. So she started litigating. Although she was ruled in favour in court and later by the Council of State, communication with the tax authorities came to naught time and time again. Later, it turned out that there was slowing down, withholding information and institutional racism.

Everything is procedural and legal

According to Leijten, the core of the problem is that the government only looks at the legal process when it comes to these kinds of moral matters. “That's still the case,” she explains. 'I read a judge's ruling yesterday about a benefit parent I know well. She received a decision on her compensation in 2021. She filed an objection, but it has not been dealt with now, three years later. So she says: I want to have a decision, a notice of default. But it is rejected. So the tax authorities have time to reject that notice of default, but no time to deal with its objection... She goes to court and says: I want that notice of default anyway. What does the judge say? You sent your notice of default four days early, so it will be rejected. In short, everything is procedural and legal, while the crux of the matter is that her objection is not being addressed. I find it incomprehensible. '

'Morally, the government should say: we're wrong'

“By the way, that lady hasn't been waiting for three years. No, she was arrested by the tax authorities in 2014, and now she is still litigating. People are really being destroyed. And it doesn't matter to the government, it has the time and resources. Ma'am doesn't have that. ' “Morally, the government should say: we're wrong. But instead, the policy is to get out of the legal process altogether. ' This applies to the tax authorities, says Leijten, but just as much to the Urgenda case (the state must do more to combat CO₂ emissions) or the F-35 case involving the supply of weapons parts to Israel.

Stop profiling

The government is not color blind Background February 26, 2024By now, there are almost 70 thousand parents demonstrably duped in the Allowance affair. Due to the tax authorities's tough fraud policy, they often had to repay thousands or even tens of thousands of euros. Later, it turned out, among other things, that the tax authorities used a discriminatory algorithm to tackle fraud. Leijten believes that this type of profiling should be stopped altogether. “Both digitally and on the street. You can also check randomly. Surcharges are incredibly susceptible to fraud, so you take every hundredth or thousandth. '

'I don't think they want to acknowledge that they've caused so many other victims yet'

Writing her book was also 'a processing process' for Leijten. 'I was really angry for periods of time. When you are deprived of control of your life and children are involved, things happen that are really not okay. From “light things”, I say in quotes, such as no children's parties, to suicide. And everything in between. '

Monster head or tail

At the moment, the recovery operation to compensate affected parents is still fully underway. Initially, around 500 million was budgeted for it, it is already about 7.2 billion euros. “At least 2.5 billion of that is in the implementation costs alone,” says Leijten. “A lot of people who are hired externally, an awful lot of legal advice, lots of formal notices and procedural fines because they don't get their work done on time. At the same time, 2,500 people work in that entire implementation. I would say: let teams of three people solve cases, do one file a week and you'll be done within a year. But the worst part is that they don't trust their own people enough either. It often needs to be checked and it is checked whether everything is procedurally correct. “By the way, according to Leijten, this is “just the tip of the iceberg”, because the same fraud mechanisms that were used for the childcare allowance were used throughout the tax authorities. Also for the rent and care allowance. 'I don't think they want to acknowledge that they've caused so many other victims yet. When I sat in the Chamber, I never knew exactly, with everything we had found, whether we had got the monster's head or tail. And when you have the head, you don't know if it's a many-headed monster. '

© Eva Roefs

Renske Leijten: “The left really needs to look for a story with a perspective for how things can be done differently.”

Tough report

The Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry into Fraud Policy and Services found in a tough report at the end of February that “it could happen again tomorrow”. According to the committee, the patterns that underpinned the tough fraud approach have still not been broken. Leijten draws a similar conclusion. According to her, the problem is that 'the tax authorities themselves did not make any analysis'. “All those officials that Eva had to deal with are still working at the tax authorities. All in senior positions. I don't want them to be pelted with tomatoes at the market. But they are partly responsible for the creation or maintenance of this system. And they have always defended that internally as well. Then it's only logical to ask if it's not better to take on another position. “Leijten sees that people's “basic rights” are still being “massively violated” even today. “If people cannot get their rights, it is often the government that opposes them. Let's stop doing that. '

“You'll get bitten, right?”

The election results are therefore a result of this, says the former SP'er. She mainly refers to the result as a settlement with Rutte. “With thirteen years of policy, laughing away from problems, having no memories, lying. And there are a lot of people who have got the feeling that whether you get bitten by the dog or the cat, you will get bitten anyway. So I understand very well that people will then look for another story. And if that other story is highlighted: all problems are caused by “hunnie from outside”, then there is only one original, and that is the PVV. That is of course disgusting, but the VVD has put that map on the table by always saying that all problems are the fault of asylum seekers. They even dropped the cabinet about incorrect asylum figures. ' “We should certainly be concerned about that, but we also need to look in the mirror and keep analysing cleanly. The basic security of our rule of law is under severe pressure because the law has been stripped down and the police force is not in order. And my biggest pain lies in the Rutte II cabinet. A $50 billion wrecking ball went through our society. From elderly care and social workshops to community centers and the district agent; our welfare state has been demolished and partly by the PvdA. '

Woke

According to Leijten, the left has focused too little on 'the primary struggle for bread on the shelf'. “There is a lot of talk about ordinary people in ordinary neighborhoods with ordinary problems. On the one hand, because of the wake movement, which says: you are racists and climate deniers. And at the same time, you have the right-wing movement that only defends the interests of a number of powerful people and calls everyone who disputes that woke! So that keeps each other alive. It is a system that has an interest in people being busy with each other, so that power is not fought. '

“The left really needs to look for a story with a perspective for how things can be done differently”

The criticism of the SP is often that it is also easy, as an opposition party, to shout from the sidelines what is going bad. Those who want to govern must also make compromises. Unfair, says Leijten. According to her, “the sad thing about the SP” is that “other parties suddenly agree with us during election time, but then, we're alone again or we're crazy Henkie”. “Although I don't want to do too much Calimero about that, because we apparently don't get enough attention to the urgency of important themes.” Nevertheless, the elections were definitely about social security and health care, she continues. “Unfortunately, with our alternatives for market forces in healthcare, we never received support from left-wing parties. That's what people feel. The left really needs to look for a story with a perspective on how things can be done differently. If we keep challenging each other over who is purest, conservative and divisive political parties will continue to benefit.”We can't make it more fun van Renske Leijten will be published by Xander Publishers at the end of April.