Judith Tielen, “7 redenen waarom de VVD het ‘experiment basisinkomen’ in Utrecht afkeurt” [7 reasons why VVD rejects the basic income experiment in Utrecht]

A local branch of the powerful Dutch liberal party VVD has issued a strongly worded rejection of the proposed basic income pilot project for the city of Utrecht.

The VVD’s Utrecht spokesperson on work and incomes Judith Tielen writes that she is responding to questions from the public about the city’s “ridiculous experiments” and gives seven reasons why her party opposes the basic income pilot: poor experiment design; costs; the moral need for benefit recipients to reciprocate; the reasonable nature of current conditionality; the risk of increased “hammock-based” welfare scrounging; the primacy of national over local legislation as well as a general claim that basic income doesn’t solve anything but actually creates more problems.

The intervention by the VVD, whose leader is Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte, illustrates the lines of attack that basic income opponents will take when the Utrecht initiative is debated by local politicians in September [2015] and more generally, as basic income continues moving up the national political agenda.

Language DUTCH:

Judith Tielen “7 redenen waarom de VVD het ‘experiment basisinkomen’ in Utrecht afkeurt”, VVD Utrecht website, 11 August 2015