The Boer Burger Beweging (BBB), also known as the Farmer-Citizen Movement, has released its election manifesto ahead of the Dutch national elections that are set to take place later this year in November, calling for the Netherlands to have opt-outs from European Union policies in key areas.
The election platform, released on September 8th alongside a draft candidate list, calls on the Netherlands to “negotiate an opt-out on migration and nature policy” regarding European treaties.
The BBB has been entirely at odds with the European Union’s policies on the environment, much of which have been headed by Dutch politician Frans Timmermans, known by some as the ‘Climate Pope’, who is also running in the upcoming election.
Specifically, the BBB is opposed to nitrogen restrictions and the Dutch government’s pledge to reduce emissions by buying out thousands of farmers and shutting down their farms, reducing livestock numbers by as much as ⅓ in order to meet the nitrogen reduction goals set to be in place for 2030.
The farmers’ protests which erupted in much of the country in opposition to the government’s climate policies, led to the formation of the BBB in 2019, with the party shocking many earlier this year by winning the country’s regional elections in March with 19.19% of the vote.
The European Union passed another policy in July, the Nature Restoration Law (NRL), which also looks to aggravate conflict between Dutch farmers and the European Union.
Under the rules of the NRL, 30% of European land will be designated as protected land, meaning that no agricultural production will be allowed on the land. Farmers in Cyprus claimed that the NRL could make as much as 78% of their farmland unusable due to the regulations, protesting against the law prior to its passing.
“Before accepting the Nature Restoration Law, we will make an analysis of the socio-economic impact of this law, so that before its entry into force we have the opportunity to adjust our implementation to the negative effects of this law,” the election platform states.
The BBB election platform also gives the party’s stance on immigration, which had not been widely publicised previously. Much like other populist parties in Europe, the BBB is firmly against mass uncontrolled immigration and calls for a quota of asylum seekers at just 15,000 a year, with numbers above that managed by the European Union migration deal.
The migration deal, which ended in June, was backed by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and allows countries like Italy which lie on the EU border to have stricter policies at the border and send back rejected asylum seekers.
Other European countries that do not lie on the border will be given the option to take in a number of migrants per year or pay money into a European Union fund aimed at helping pay the burden of housing and caring for asylum seekers.
Poland, a country normally allied with Prime Minister Meloni regarding mass migration, has heavily criticised the agreement and is set to hold a national referendum on the issue in October, asking the Polish public if they would approve of accepting thousands of migrants from abroad.
The Dutch Farmers’ Party backs the migration deal in terms of allowing EU border countries more leeway in processing asylum requests at the border but it also calls on border countries to cooperate with the Dublin treaty, which requires asylum seekers to seek asylum in the first EU country they step foot in, rather than head to a country of their own choosing.
“Currently, we see that countries at the external borders do not comply with this regulation because it does not suit them. Strict compliance is necessary to properly work together,” the BBB states in its platform.
Under the Dublin Treaty, countries like Germany and others have the right to deport asylum seekers to the first country they arrived in, but in practice many deportations are unsuccessful.
In 2022, Germany attempted to deport around 70,000 migrants under the Dublin regulations but was only successful in returning 4,158, or around 6%.
The BBB’s main ideological rival in the November election is Frans Timmermans, who is set to lead a coalition of parties in his bid to become prime minister after resigning from his post as European Commission Vice President last month and being elected leader of a joint list of the Greens and the Labour Party (PvdA)
Polling released last weekend on September 9th puts Timmermans’ coalition in third place, however, behind the centre-right People’s Party (VVD, the party of outgoing Prime Minister Mark Rutte), and the newly formed New Social Contract, a Christian democratic party launched less than a month ago. The BBB, meanwhile, is polling in 4th place.
None of the parties is expected to break the 76-seat parliamentary majority on their own, as the leaders in polling, the New Social Contract, are expected to win just 28 seats. While the BBB may not outright win the election, they may play a part in a possible future government coalition or play a kingmaker role.
