WILLEMSTAD--The Second Chamber of Dutch Parliament is pleased that the Governments of Cura�ao, the Netherlands, St. Maarten and Aruba intend to cooperate more, but first wants to see how this works in practice. As far as coalition parties VVD and CDA are concerned, the Kingdom Law Person Traffic is still on the table.
The parliamentarians were reacting to the results of the Kingdom Conference, which state that the four countries find it important to simplify the movement of people and goods within the Kingdom. On January 19, during the regular consultations between the four Ministers of Justice, a workgroup will be appointed to research the possibilities and simultaneously replace the current workgroup of only the Netherlands, Aruba and St. Maarten.
According to the final conclusions, "The system of the current National Ordinances Admittance and Expulsion is the principle point of departure for the activities of the new workgroup."
As far as VVD and CDA are concerned, this doesn't have any consequences for the intention of the Dutch government to introduce a Kingdom Law Person Traffic. "It's quite straightforward. The Kingdom Law Person Traffic is simply mentioned as intention in the coalition agreement and will be carried out. That intention will become a law."
Bas Jan van Bochove of CDA also referred to the coalition accord for the VVD/CDA cabinet that is also "tolerated" by Freedom Party PVV. "An agreement was made on this, so a Kingdom Law Person Traffic will be realised.
"At the same time, I conclude that progress has been made. We know there are different opinions on this matter in all parts of the Kingdom. We shall see how it goes."
That "wait and see attitude" also goes for other agreements from the Kingdom Conference.
"It was a balanced outcome, I'd say. I've spoken to all Prime Ministers afterwards and got the impression they were pleased too, but I still want to study the details," added Van Bochove.
VVD member Andre Bosman said, "The statement that all countries see an added value in the Kingdom is positive, but I refuse to comment. I'm very curious what the parties will say once they're back on the islands, certainly Cura�ao and in particular Helmin Wiels."
Ineke van Gent of GroenLinks spoke similar words: "The agreement to work together is good, but we'll have to see what the cooperation is worth on the ground."
Ronald van Raak of the Socialist Party (SP) said it appeared the countries still disagreed on many points, especially regarding the future of the Kingdom. "Prime Minister Eman wants to work together and Prime Minister Schotte actually wants to continue without the Netherlands. That difference will always reappear. So, that's where we begin with a vision on the future."
Wassila Hachchi of D66 found that concrete decisions mostly had been postponed, with the exception of the larger influence in foreign affairs. "To me it actually seems a compromise document in which many matters were deferred."
Nevertheless, Hachchi is pleased that the Caribbean countries feel the need for a Kingdom secretariat and that the establishment of such will now be further investigated. She had introduced a motion last year for a professional support entity, because many preparations for consultations between the four Kingdom countries are currently still performed by officials of the Dutch Ministry of the Interior and Kingdom Relations.
"It's not a matter of copying, cutting and pasting, but about influence of the Caribbean countries and professional support." Hachchi's motion was rejected at the time, but now that there is a definite need for such an institution, she will try again to convince the Dutch Government of its importance.
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