DutchNews Podcast

Dutch rescue workers join the international team searching the rubble of this week's earthquake in Turkey and Syria for survivors. Back home, Mark Rutte surveys the wreckage of his asylum policy as the Council of State throws out a rule delaying family reunions. The team investigating the MH17 disaster say the chain of command went all the way up to Vladimir Putin. We ask if Dutch cheese and Belgi...

The distant goal of putting Russia on trial for invading Ukraine moves a step closer as a dedicated prosecutor's office is set up in The Hague. Mark Rutte avoids a diplomatic incident as he takes French president Emmanuel Macron out to an Indonesian restaurant. The Dutch and German armies look set to integrate further, though there's bound to be a row about who owns the bicycles. Questions are ask...

A feast of ophef this week as the widow of singer André Hazes sues a juice channel presenter who called her a 'gecremeerd kroket' while Belgium's prime minister gets his flags in a twist. Richard de Mos rolls up in a garish stretch limousine for the start of his trial, where he's accused of running a criminal network in the heart of The Hague. The government promises to send more tanks and weapons...

Mark Rutte went to Washington this week and said the Netherlands would definitely send some weapons to Ukraine at an unspecified time in the near future. Mayors in three cities suggested digital banning orders to curb gang violence, even though they don't know what they are, how they'd work or whether they're even legal. Good news on the energy front as gas prices start to come down and Geert Wild...

2023 gets off to a shaky start with Gert-Jan Segers stepping down as leader of the ChristenUnie party. The cabinet's plans to control immigration come unstuck in court, forcing asylum minister Eric van der Burg to kick the latest measures into the long grass. The looming recession has puts a dampener on the housing market as prices decline after nine years. One commodity that's apparently impervio...

It's that time of year when we look back over those fleeting flare-ups of outrage and opprobrium that feature in the Ophef of the Week slot. Relive obscure controversies such as the celebrity who took her own mob to the supermarket. Recall the overpriced phone booths in the ministry of horrors. Do you remember which Belgian club was condemned for appointing an over-exposed former football director...

Sigrid Kaag is dispatched to Paramaribo as the cabinet's efforts to apologise for the Dutch slave trade fly into a whirlwind of recriminations. Back home, Wopke Hoekstra is shocked – shocked! – by a report exposing institutional racism at the foreign affairs ministry. Dutch Moroccan footballers, meanwhile, have no regrets as they eclipse Louis van Gaal's Oranje at the World Cup. Gas supplies look...

The cabinet makes a sorry spectacle of itself this week as its attempts to apologise for slavery come apart at the seams. Rabobank, a co-operative bank set up to lend to farmers, is suspected of getting its hands dirty with money laundering, financing terrorism and rigging bond deals. As the economy cools, Dutch households turn down the thermostat and tighten their belts in anticipation of a 4% dr...

A week totally devoid of plot twists includes another farmers' protest, a pre-nuptial agreement between GroenLinks and PvdA, and a warning from the AIVD that Russia and China might be spying on us. There's a double dose of ophef as sports minister Conny Helder leaves parliament early to fly to Qatar, then says 'never mind' to the desert state's human rights record. As Oranje sleepwalk into the Wor...

Inflation is a growing problem, and not just for the Oranje fan who was kicked out of a Qatari stadium this week for accessorising his rainbow armband with a pair of false breasts. Brussels tells finance minister Sigrid Kaag to redo her budget arithmetic as fears of a recession deepen. The Dutch government makes farmers an offer they can't refuse to settle the nitrogen crisis. The Bible Belt becom...

Eight years after the shooting down of flight MH17 over Ukraine, three men are given life sentences for the murder of the 298 passengers and crew. The reality of the ongoing war was brought home for Wopke Hoekstra, who had to take shelter from Russian missiles on a visit to Kyiv. The war is also set to push the Netherlands into a recession by the end of the year, but economists are hopeful of a re...

Mark Rutte took a flight out of Egypt this week to fend off a mutiny in his party on asylum. It's not just the wolves that are feasting in Gelderland as a restaurant in Nijmegen is named the best place in the world for plant-based cuisine. The government still can't decide on a new pension scheme, and you'll have to wait longer to claim it anyway after the retirement age goes up again. Louis van G...

Early November is traditionally a fruitful time for conspiracy theorists, as Guy Fawkes, David Icke and Rian van Rijbroek will testify. The RIVM admits it mixed up its numbers on nitrogen pollution just as the Council of State tells the government to redo its homework on building permits. Dutch railway operator NS cuts services and raises ticket prices, but insist it's still the only company fit t...

This week, we look at two instances of climate activism in the Netherlands and ask why the superglue does not seem to work. Asylum minister Eric van der Burg's troubles continue as local councils give him yet another ultimatum about sorting out the mess of where refugees should sleep. House prices are falling and interest rates are up so no hope of much helpful happening on the housing market. Dut...

Wopke Hoekstra says Netherlands needs a 'constructive' relationship with gas-rich Qatar as he rejects parliament's calls to boycott the upcoming World Cup. Let's hope the relationship is constructed more carefully than the stadiums for the tournament, which cost the lives of thousands of migrant workers. Asylum minister Erik van der Burg is caught between a rock and a hard place after a court orde...

Inflation will stay high until next year, house prices are cooling and there's a wave of bankruptcies on the way. 2023 looks like a good year to hide under the bedsheets, which might have inspired one prisoner this week to execute a traditional-style escape. The Groningen gas inquiry continues, but not even the collective force of a thousand earthquakes can jog Mark Rutte's active memory. And Amst...

Johan Remkes, the government's polder tsar, works his magic again as Dutch farmers cautiously welcome his plan to buy out up to 600 of the biggest nitrogen polluters - essentially the same plan that sparked two years of furious protest. There seems little hope of reconciliation between Khadija Arib and her successor as chair of parliament, Vera Bergkamp, after Arib quits as an MP and accuses Bergk...

A bleak autumn looms as inflation surges to a new high, hospital beds start filling up with coronavirus patients and a battle royale breaks out between the Tweede Kamer's past and present chairwomen. Wages are also rising, though not as fast as inflation, and healthcare workers suffering from Long Covid could be in line for a €15,000 payout. But it's not all doom and gloom: some of Rembrandt's fin...

The inverted flags weren't the only sign of distress as the king opened Parliament for what looks set to be a gruelling year. The speech was rewritten at the last minute to include the goverment's hastily agreed energy price cap, one of several measures designed to bring down the soaring inflation rate. The cabinet walked out of parliament in protest at Thierry Baudet's latest conspiracy theory ab...

As a winter of bankruptcies and financial lockdown draws nearer, the government dips into its pockets to help households struggling with their energy bills. The train drivers' strike is settled with a 9.25% pay rise, but Schiphol's boss, Dick Benschop, pays the price for a summer of airport chaos. Another big earner, Sywert van Lienden, anxiously awaits to see if the report into his €100 million f...

The entire podcast team abandoned Paul by fleeing abroad, so no hour long episode as usual but only a brief overview of this week’s headlines. Agriculture minister Henk Staghouwer resigned after concluding he wasn’t the man for the job, Dutch leaders offered their condolences to the British Royal Family following the death of Queen Elizabeth II, the NS plans to cancel all train services as rail wo...

Exactly 350 years after the disaster year of 1672, the government faces an energy crisis, a refugee accommodation crisis and a nitrogen pollution crisis all at once. Wopke Hoekstra experiences an identity crisis as he oscillates between supporting the government's nitrogen policy as a cabinet minister and attacking it as leader of the Christian Democrat party. The earthquake crisis in Groningen tr...

Farmers this week stepped up their protests against the government's nitrogen policy by blocking deliveries of food to supermarkets. That was especially bad news for the government's new team of tax inspectors who have the Herculean task of classifying fruit and vegetables. While the farmers came under fire for ploughing up a nature reserve, police are facing questions after shooting at a tractor...

Farmers stepped up their protests this week, bringing two cows to The Hague to illustrate the effect of the government's nitrogen reduction plans. One cow would go to the slaughterhouse today, the other would go back to the farm to be slaughtered later. Police described the hardliners' approach as a threat to democracy as CDA MP Derk Boswijk was forced to stay home after his family was visited by...

After a two-year ceasefire during the pandemic, farmers warn their tractors are not for turning as a new wave of protests begins against the government's plans to cut nitrogen emissions. Coronavirus infections are rising but health minister Ernst Kuipers sees no cause for alarm, as long as everyone follows his lead and washes their hands. Mark Rutte makes a U-turn on Ukraine, Rob Jetten does an ab...