Dutch government collapses after far-right party leaves coalition over immigration proposals

The Dutch government collapsed on Tuesday after disagreements over immigration proposals led to far-right leader Geert Wilders withdrawing his party from the ruling coalition.

Wilders said in a CNBC-translated post on the X social media platform that his Party for Freedom (PVV) party would be departing over the alliance's lack of support for their asylum proposal.

"We had no choice. I promised the voter the strictest asylum policy ever, but that was not granted to you," he said in a separate Google-translated comments on X.

The PVV won a landslide victory in the Netherlands' general election in 2023, knocking former Prime Minister Mark Rutte's party off the top spot. Despite the victory, the country's four major parties chose the former head of the Netherlands' intelligence service, Dick Schoof, as prime minister.

Conflicting ideas on immigration sank the former coalition in 2023 and ultimately led Rutte, the country's longest serving premier, to step down from the top post.

Wilders had on Sunday warned his party could leave the coalition.

"Let me be crystal clear. If the majority of our proposals from the ten-point asylum plan are not adopted by the coalition (and thus added to the Main Lines Agreement) and implemented by the cabinet as soon as possible, then the PVV will withdraw from this coalition," he said in a post on X over the weekend, according to a Google translation.

Last week the PVV put forward a 10-point plan to reduce immigration which included a call to halt asylum and temporarily stop the reunification of families for all asylum seekers who have been granted refugee status.

"We wanted a stricter asylum policy... You see that many countries in the European Union - Austria, Poland, Germany, Belgium, they go further in taking measures," Wilders said in televised comments, according to a CNBC translation.

The leaders of the other coalition parties accused Wilders of putting his own interests ahead of the needs of the country. "He chooses his own ego and his own interests," Dilan Yesilgoz-Zegerius, leader of Rutte's former party, the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy, told Dutch broadcaster NOS in Google-translated comments.

"I am astonished. He is throwing away the chance of a right-wing policy. This is super irresponsible," she said.

The Farmer-Citizen Movement (BBB) party said in a statement that Wilders had single-handedly pulled the plug on the government. "Governing the country is something different than threatening on social media," said Caroline van der Plas, leader of the BBB.

"This is completely irresponsible, reckless and incomprehensible for anyone who hoped for change."

The BBB party said the fall of the government now means "at least a year and a half of standstill," with left-leaning parties more likely to take over and put forward more lenient asylum policies.

Other opposition partieshave already called for elections, with the leader of the Socialist Party SP (SP) faction, Jimmy Dijk, saying in a post on X that now is the time for elections and "political change."