“From the moment that David Cameron, the former UK prime minister, called a referendum on Britain’s EU membership, continental European political leaders had misgivings. In Denmark, France, Ireland and the Netherlands, governments knew from bruising experience that EU-related referendums could deliver results opposite to those planned.
Now the Netherlands wants to put the referendum genie back in its bottle. To the extent that is constitutionally possible, the ruling Dutch centre-right coalition is clamping down on referendums. By 76 votes to 69, parliament’s lower house last week approved a bill that abolishes advisory referendums permitted under a 2015 law.
The Dutch establishment’s worst nightmare is that political pressures lead one day to a referendum on EU membership and the people vote for “Nexit”. It is unlikely: as matters stand, there is no legal basis for such a vote. However, it is not completely unthinkable. After the UK’s vote in June 2016, Geert Wilders, leader of the far-right PVV party, tweeted: “Hurrah for the British! Now it is our turn. Time for a Dutch referendum.”
For sure, anti-EU sentiment, which has been rising in the Netherlands since the turn of the century, dipped after the Brexit referendum. The Dutch saw how that vote generated unusual political disorder in the UK. They tend to think that, in economic terms, Britain will suffer from Brexit — and they worry about the impact on their own country.
Yet Catherine De Vries, a Dutch political scientist, makes a valuable point in her new book Euroscepticism and the Future of European Integration. She writes that referendums could produce shock results in countries where voters think they are better off, in terms of economic performance and standards of democracy, than the EU as a whole.
Arguably, the Dutch are a prime example of this mood. The UK’s struggle to make sense of Brexit has tempered Dutch enthusiasm for “Nexit”. In principle, however, leaving the EU holds few fears for a substantial segment of Dutch society.
Under the 2015 law, a Dutch referendum is triggered if 300,000 people sign a petition. The outcome is non-binding, but politicians treat the vote as valid provided that the turnout exceeds 30 per cent.
The law’s disruptive effects became clear in April 2016. In the first vote held under its provisions, Dutch voters paralysed EU foreign policy by rejecting an EU-Ukraine association accord.
Turnout was just above 30 per cent, making the vote an unsatisfactory democratic exercise. Still, the Dutch government felt compelled to slam the brakes on the EU-Ukraine deal. It then secured concessions, including a promise that the accord did not confer EU candidate membership status on Ukraine. Last year it finally ratified the deal.
Meanwhile, another Dutch referendum is looming — this time, on an intelligence and security services act. Activists, angered at surveillance powers granted to government agencies, collected almost 400,000 signatures, triggering a referendum to be held on March 21.
Pro-EU politicians and constitutional experts have had enough. Last year’s annual report of the Council of State, a Dutch state body which advises on legislation, criticised referendums as likely to undermine representative democracy and the rule of law.
Curiously, this was once the view of David Davis, the UK’s Brexit secretary. In a 2002 House of Commons debate he called poorly managed referendums “a dangerous tool”. Dutch leaders would agree with him 100 per cent.”
Source: https://www.ft.com/content/06166110-1af0-11e8-aaca-4574d7dabfb6
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