Proposition 52K2299

Projet de loi portant des dispositions diverses.

General information ¶

Submitted by

CD&V Leterme Ⅱ

Submission date

Dec. 4, 2009

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

EC Regulation administrative sanction work occupational accident copyright occupational disease anti-discriminatory measure foreign national civil defence cheque collective agreement service industry electricity supply disabled person family benefit product quality quality label air transport migration policy research body severance pay development aid public safety parental leave workers' representation police political asylum political refugee registration of a company social-security contribution welfare social dialogue social security town-planning profession criminal law telecommunications trade union rail transport refugee employment policy self-employed person health insurance

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

CD&V LE PS | SP Open Vld MR

Voted to reject

Groen Ecolo N-VA LDD FN VB

Abstained from voting

Vooruit

Party dissidents ¶

• Peter Luykx (CD&V) voted to reject.

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

Dec. 22, 2009 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

Mr. Speaker, we have adopted the text as transmitted by the Senate and we regrettably have to reject the amendment of Mr. Landuyt, because we could join the wisdom of the Senate regarding the equalization in the Judicial Code of the diploma-required master equivalent to a licensed or doctor, so that also in our Judicial Code the new educational reform has been incorporated.

Dec. 22, 2009 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

There are several rapporteurs, namely Mr Baeselen and Arens, Mrs Staelraeve, Mr Deseyn, Mrs della Faille and Mrs Lecomte.

Mr. Speaker, our Committee on Foreign Relations mainly examined two or three articles of the law containing various provisions relating to the role of the CTB.

I am referring to my written report for the various interventions.

I am referring to the written report.

I also refer to the written report.

The next reporter is Mrs. Della Faille.

It refers to the written report.

The same goes for Mrs. Lecomte.

Several speakers were registered for the general discussion, namely Mrs. Genot, Mr. Goutry, Mr. Weyts for the Internal Affairs section, and Mrs. Smeyers.

The Interior Minister is now present. Therefore, I propose that Mr Weyts be the first to give the floor.

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, I would like to speak first of all about the procedure for the discussion of this draft. The members of the Commission for Home Affairs received this 412-page draft in their inbox on Wednesday evening. Of course, it is not entirely about internal affairs. It was discussed and voted in the committee for half an hour the following morning. However, we had made a clear agreement a few days earlier at the Conference of Presidents. The agreement was to leave a minimum of 48 hours between the submission of the documents and the discussion in the committee. In this case, we barely got 12 hours. Speaking of the revaluation and mouth-death of this Parliament...

Mrs. Minister, your liberal colleagues hold a minute of silence in the Flemish Parliament because the debate is held in the small hall rather than in the large hall, but at least the debate is held there. Here was it: sit, silence, vote and it doesn’t control you, outside!

Basically, the mergers of the police zones are an important part of the draft various provisions relating to Home Affairs. Everyone agrees that the merger of police zones needs to be done quickly. All police experts with the liberal expert Brice De Ruyver at the head, the federal police council, everyone agrees that, in addition to the existing cooperations, there is a need for cooperation through mergers of police zones. This is finally becoming possible. Everyone agrees that de-fusion is crazy.

All experts say there is a need for more collaboration and more scale effects. We need fewer police zones, rather than more.

In the report on police reform, the Federal Police Council explicitly states, I quote, “Scale corrections by local police should remain limited to supporting those zones that seek scale-up on a voluntary basis.” Only scale enlargement, no scale reduction.

Suddenly we read in the media that two PS mayors, allegedly those of Elsene and those of Brussels, cannot deal with each other. The coincidence wants the two to be in the same police zone and so they also prefer not to cooperate with each other in the police zone. This police zone should therefore be dispersed in Brussels. Exactly about Brussels, all experts agree that there should be no more but fewer police zones. We, by the way, advocate, and we are not alone, for one capital police zone, one centrally-led corps with various district commissariates. Nowadays there are often different police zones active and responsible for the same problem areas, for example zone South for Kuregem in Anderlecht and zone West for the Birminghamstraat which lies next door. Consequently, common sense says that a defusion of police zones is ⁇ completely impossible in Brussels, it is completely pulled out of the pot.

The mind of Open Vld and CD&V also says that. The response from CD&V is, by the way, the fiercest. I have here an interesting communiqué from CD&V. I quote: “CD&V does not want to know of a split of the police zone of Brussels capital. The Brussels parliamentarians Vandenbossche and Debaets find it revengeful that the internal problems within the PS would prevail over the public interest. They believe that a merger of the Brussels police zones can work more efficiently and there can be more blue on the streets. Vandenbossche and Debaets correctly refer to the recent riots in Anderlecht, where the inability of the local authorities to respond adequately in crisis situations was clearly revealed.” A very furious reaction, therefore, from CD&V, which says that there cannot be a defusion of police zones. CD&V, like Open Vld, by the way, fully supports the vision of the N-VA.

That are all principles, that is one policy vision, that is one vision op how we de affairs better would be able to organize voor de burgers en voor de policeagenten maar – ik geef dat toe – het maakt enigszins abstraction van de zuiver particuliere belangen van de PS. Yes, so goes that not in this land. This is ⁇ not the case in this government. As two PS’ers meet each other a problem have in er staan what wetten in praktische bezwaren in de weg, must die wetten in praktische bezwaren opgeruimd werden. Zo wordt een Brusselse burenruzie plots een staatszaak. "Een zaak van twee kibbelende PS'ers wordt plots een zaak van 10 million Belgen." Plots must it possible made be dated in Brussels but also in whole Belgium police zones not only can fuseren but also defuseren. De Vlaamse regeringspartijen zoals CD&V in Open Vld wordt dan het zwijgen opgelegd by their own regeringsleiders. If the PS wants it, Leterme wants it.

In the explanation of this draft various provisions there are quite a few letters about the merger of police zones, but it is actually barely rumored about the possibility that is legally created for the defusion of police zones. Article 166, meanwhile Article 192, however, clearly opens the possibility of, and I quote, “change of the boundaries of the established police zones insofar as this does not result in the number of police zones established in implementation of paragraph 1 being exceeded”.

What is actually stated here? Do what you want, throw the whole bullet on police zones and overload the re-registration, but only make sure everything is limited to a maximum of 196 police zones as they exist today. How small or large these police zones are, it does not matter. The fetish is the number of 196. It is only for the show. It is only to be able to the Flames that there is no addition at all and therefore it can not be so bad. That is for all clarity the cloth for another painful bleeding from CD&V and Open Vld. It is true that in Limburg there are two police zones asking parties for more cooperation, for more security and who therefore want to work on a merger of their police zones, as all police experts prioritize. But here they abuse the noble intentions of these mayors and chairs of the police zones as a blanket for the bleeding of CD&V and Open Vld. If these Limburg police zones merge, the Brussels PS zones can defuse. That is the deal.

Therefore, together with colleague Paul Vanhie, I have submitted two amendments, in order to respond to the views of CD&V and Open Vld. A priority amendment, submitted together with Paul Vanhie, proposes to simply remove Article 192, now Article 166. Thus, the possibility of defusing police zones is simply deleted. This is according to all the statements taken by the Flemish government parties. If that is too extensive, I have another concrete proposal that may even go further into the desiderata of CD&V and Open Vld, in particular an amendment that proposes not to do so for Brussels if defusions are allowed. For the Brussels Capital Region, this does not mean a possibility of defusion. I have already heard consensual sounds from the government’s banks. Therefore, there is a hassle for this amendment. Collega Vanhengel, who knows the Brussels territory perfectly, sitting next to colleague Turtelboom, supports this amendment. So I would say, let you go to the vote and follow at least your own position.

Colleagues, I just ask for the approval of these amendments, five minutes of political courage. In the other case, in Brussels and Flemish-Brabant, you can explain that after two years as a ruling party you have still failed to split the electoral district Brussels-Halle-Vilvoorde but the police zone Brussels-Elsene. That will be your final result. The first one has been asked by all the Flammers for fifty years, the second one is asked by none.

I must say that Mr. Weyts is not very consistent in his presentation. He says that these articles allow for mass defusion, but at the same time he also says, which is also very clear in the bill on various provisions, that there can never be more police zones than at the moment.

In addition, we here allow voluntary mergers and also rearrangements on a voluntary basis. I will give a concrete example. If the judicial landscape reform is there, then there may be a police zone that is in the wrong place and that may not match the police zone. Should there be no rearrangement? In this way, for example, a municipality can withdraw from a particular police zone and immediately join another police zone. This is how these articles should be read.

I advise Mr Weyts to read the articles before the vote very carefully again, and above all to build some consequence in his speech.

Mr. Speaker, if there is one thing not to do, it is to defuse police zones in Brussels. That would be the biggest mistake we could make. It is not because some people do not agree on the ground temporarily that structures need to be reformed. These are not built around people but must be precisely designed to survive temporary misunderstandings between irresponsible people.

Mrs. Minister, why does the article describe a detailed procedure for merging zones and not dividing zones? However, a division of a police zone involves more in terms of distribution of staff and all possible means. So why is the division not described in the article?

The previous comments are very positive. I therefore expect the members of the majority to agree to my amendment. My second subsidiary amendment aims at least for Brussels to remove the possibility of defusion from the law.

I assume that both Minister Turtelboom and Mr de Donnea can fully support my vision, which they have just confirmed. They can therefore approve the aforementioned amendment, for which I thank them.

Mr. Speaker, I have a question about some articles in the chapter on Social Affairs. However, the articles directly relate to the police zones. I don’t know when I can answer my question best.

(...), but Mrs. Minister of Internal Affairs will remain present and, if necessary, explain the articles.

Mr. Speaker, as regards Mr. Vanhie’s comments, before the voluntary merger everything has been clarified and the execution can be taken by a simple royal decree.

In the event of a rearrangement, case by case will have to be considered which municipality, for example, wants to leave a zone to join another zone. In that case, much more work will need to be done on the ground to verify whether the rearrangement is useful and timely. The file must then also be submitted to the Council of Ministers, as a rearrangement is a much more complex matter, which cannot simply be poured into general rules.

Therefore, the answer is clear and clear, and it also endorses the philosophy of the articles in question, which is the voluntary merger.

There are no more statements for the Internal Affairs section. We therefore move on to the Social Affairs section, for which as speakers are registered Mrs. Douifi, Mrs. Genot, Mr. Goutry, who had already announced his presentation several times last week, Mrs. Smeyers, Mr. Bultinck and Mr. Gilkinet.

First, I give the word to Mrs. Douifi. Mr Bonte and Mrs Kitir also register on the speaker list.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Prime Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen of the Government, colleagues, my discussion is mainly about the chapter on social integration, and more specifically about the reception of asylum seekers. We have discussed this in the committee extensively with Secretary of State Courard, but of course, this issue now affects much more people than just asylum seekers who are not or are not provided with adequate shelter.

Mr. Prime Minister, my group fully agrees with the government on one point. You said recently in your government statement that the current saturation of the reception network for asylum seekers is unacceptable. This is unacceptable, and we agree with it. Only it has been unacceptable for longer than since your government declaration. When Minister Turtelboom was still Minister of Asylum and Migration in this government, and when Minister Arena was still in charge of reception, the problem of saturation of the reception network already arose. The problem is not new. The problem has not become suddenly acute today; it has been present for more than a year.

Mrs. Arena began at that time. I note, Mr. Delizée, that the government — and in particular Secretary of State Courard — immediately took action at that time. He immediately pulled his hands out of his sleeves. Only we have seen little of structurally complementary shelters that are in the first instance needed.

What have we seen from this government? A cumulation of emergency measures. Affected persons were captured again in hotels and these are currently over-saturated. This government still pays approximately 30 euros per day for accommodation in hotels of approximately 1,200 people, families with children, for whom the procedure is running.

Initiatives have been taken. Four to five instructions have been issued to relieve the overcapacity of the regular reception network a little. All sorts of categories of persons for whom a procedure is underway have actually been opened and given them a document with which they can register at will in Flanders, Wallonia or Brussels. One would see further.

Very shocking was the period when Fedasil could no longer do anything, not even send elsewhere, but simply a guide for the homeless — un guide pour les sans-abri, Mr. Delizée — accompanied the asylum applications.

When this government appeared two years ago and announced that the asylum issue would indeed be made an important dossier as a Minister of Asylum and Migration was appointed for the first time in our country, I was delighted with this. The challenges in this area are not small. The challenges are huge, both in our country and at the European and international level.

But what have we noticed? Since that announcement, it has actually gone up. There are currently four ministers, plus the prime minister, responsible for asylum policy. So the asylum policy in our country has been degraded to a part-time job for some within the government or even to a part-time job within the government. Never before have so many members of the government been in charge of asylum policy, never before have applications been so little under control, never before have there been so many applications, and they continue to rise. On average, there are currently 1,500 asylum applications per month.

Never before has the reception law been applied so little. That reception law, however, was precisely intended to have everything well under control, to provide people with the first asylum application a nice route guide, with the final either the decision that the applicants can stay here, or the decision that they are rejected and must return. The spirit of the Acceptance Act was, in any case, those who needed to meet and conduct a check during the entire procedure.

So we are almost back in two years, and that is a very regrettable matter, colleagues.

In addition to all the emergency solutions, which are still insufficient, the law provides several provisions — to excess of disaster if it is later approved — in the ultimate solution that consists in further extinguishing and almost abolishing the Accommodation Act of 2007.

The reception law, which imposes the government to provide for each asylum applicant a material reception and material assistance, is now completely overturned by article 140 of the law containing various provisions, because there they open the door wide to again implement the financial assistance through the OCMWs.

I really did not expect that. I hear Minister Turtelboom say for two years that financial aid is not desired and that one does not want to do it again. I hear Senator Nahima Lanjri of the CD&V group say in the press for weeks that financial aid should be stopped and that the 2007 Acceptance Act must urgently be fully re-applicated. I heard several weeks ago also members of the Vld group, Ms. Avontroodt, pleading to ensure that the financial assistance and the spread to the OCMWs are not re-implemented.

We did not expect that, on the contrary. Additional financial resources were provided this year. A small €10 million this year was spent to create additional shelters through Fedasil. All financial resources have also been set up to create shelters in 2010. Therefore, we did not expect the door to be opened again for financial assistance. Nothing is less true. This was approved by majority against minority in the committee. So there is a huge contrast between what the government announces and what it does, and between what it says and does.

Measures are often false measures that do not offer a solution. By reopening financial aid, the government once again chooses to work on two paths. The track to provide sufficient material shelters in theory and the track to open the door wheel-wide to send asylum seekers back to the OCMWs for financial assistance.

This is a negative spiral. I am afraid that we will be on the ground with these problems for years to come. One gets less instead of more control, because once asylum seekers are forwarded instead of being assigned to a reception center, one actually doesn’t know where they are staying. We all know that the majority of asylum seekers turn to the OCMW of Brussels. The financial amount paid out, comparable to a living wage, also does not provide quality of life or accompaniment during the asylum procedure. As a result, one loses control, including to organize a, possibly voluntary, return. That is not a good thing.

By the way, we do not find that alone. The Flemish Association of Cities and Municipalities, VVSG, has voiced this position. Many local authorities and managers are also opposed to this. Right, information flow and transparency about the measure are currently not available. Communication has become disinformation.

Ms. Smeyers obtained, through a parliamentary question, figures on the spread plan, which her party has announced throughout the regional press. However, Secretary of State Courard has said in the committee that these figures are not correct. One can either call it a mistake of form of the government to officially communicate such figures, or disinformation. In any case, it does not help the local authorities. They also have the right to clarity. They also have the right to good governance for their social services. They also have the right for the government to take responsibility. This means that the financial assistance is not applied again, but that all resources are used to provide adequate material support.

On the humanitarian level, I also silently blame the government for something. One of the perverse consequences of the government’s failure to address the need for sufficient shelters to guarantee material assistance is that asylum seekers in the procedure are displacing the traditional homeless in the shelters. Every day we read messages from social services, such as Samu social in Brussels, which do not have sufficient shelters for the homeless, because asylum seekers in the process are also calling there.

We have not heard much about structural emergency plans from this government, except for the call of the prime minister last week.

Colleagues, instead of a constructive, well-controlled and well-organised asylum policy, both in terms of the competence of Minister Wathelet and the social competence of Mr Delizée, we are a very bad example, while we should just be a model for the rest of Europe, ⁇ in a year in which we take over the European Presidency. It is politically and humanitarianly irresponsible.

I do not know whether Minister De Crem has returned with you, Mr. Prime Minister, but I would still like to hear what is the real reason why Defense, with its fleet, which can handle such a budgetary and infrastructural task, does not intervene. All resources in each area are available. They only need to be activated to unblock the problem. Colleagues, the lack of shelters can be perfectly unblocked as Minister De Crem, of course supported by the government, this afternoon orders to make everything operational in order to send the homeless and asylum seekers in procedure who, thanks to the government, are without shelter, to the casernes available. However, the locations cannot be activated because there is no transport. One must explain to people on the street, to families with children on the street, that there is no possibility to do so. I would like to get an answer to that.

I regret that Mr. Courard was absent, given that an important paragraph came from him. I hope your colleagues, Mr. Leterme, Mrs. Milquet and Mr. Delicate will be able to answer questions.

In fact, the part concerning the reception of asylum seekers in the draft law containing various provisions is important because there could be both an improvement and a deterioration of the situation. A series of articles will help exclude certain people from receiving applications, which will result in a drop in Fedasil figures. Nevertheless, Mrs. Milquet, those excluded persons who will no longer be welcomed by Fedasil will remain in Belgium and will find themselves in the network of the Brussels SDF mainly. According to Dutch-speaking social workers, it would even seem that the CPAS of Antwerp sends the SDF to Brussels by paying them for their train ticket. As you can see, the situation in Brussels is very special. I am therefore concerned about a series of measures that will decrease the number of asylum applications but will not decrease the number of people without host and without resources on our territory.

These measures are presented in the turmoil that stirs us in terms of reception because it has been more than two years since reception is completely disorganized in Belgium. This is not proper to our country. This is a widespread movement across Europe: the numbers are increasing! Belgium, on the other hand, is responsible for leaving this opening to a regularization and for not taking consistent measures to manage the reception properly.

The current situation is serious because the people who are outside are under our responsibility. Let us be clear! Leaving people on the street is inhumane and degrading treatment. This attitude is subject to criminal prosecution and each of us should be aware of it.

This project includes a series of measures that will result in reducing the reception. Why Why ? Because we are unable to manage the situation. Currently, 1,200 or 1,300 people are welcomed in hotels, but 1,300 to 1,600 people are outside. When I ask him, Mr. Courard himself says he is unable to specify the figures. But we are taking a series of steps to continue the reception in the same way, without taking into account the report of the federal mediators, and this is a great regret.

Indeed, this report of the Federal Ombudsmen on the open centres issues a series of recommendations. However, one of the articles envisaged in the project goes even against what the mediators propose. These emphasize, especially in the case of families with children, that it is important that the material reception does not extend excessively because it tends to destroy families: the family father, the family mother no longer exercise the authority, since a large number of inadequate family reception structures favor the collective life. In this case, parents no longer occupy their place, which is very damaging in the long run for family flourishing.

Nevertheless, here, nothing is undertaken to get out of this system and stop this effect. When material assistance was planned, the idea was initially that asylum applications should be processed quickly and that people should leave within six months. As you can see, this is far from the case. Currently, they spend two, three months outside, three, four months at the hotel – still without having submitted their asylum application –; after only, they enter centres and then start the examination of their asylum application, apart from the most skilled who have managed to find a job before.

On November 20, we celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. According to this text, children should be heard when procedures concern them. However, the government provides for sanctions that could lead to their exclusion. At no time is it specified whether children will be audited; and we do not know whether decisions will be made in their best interests.

I am also concerned about the fate of the sick. Until now, when someone got sick, he was applying for regularization for medical reasons. During the examination of this application, he was welcomed. From now on, the acceptance of this person by the reception structure and his prohibition to leave will be checked. Let’s be clear, several people may live outside a host structure, but they may need medical follow-up that they don’t get in their country. But how will they survive, given the slow processing of medical application files by the Office of Foreigners? This examination can actually take a year or a year and a half! How will these sick people survive outside, without help or guidance? I am especially concerned that the only appeal body is the Labour Court. You are not without knowing that it may be very fast in some regions, but that it is also overcrowded in others.

I would like to address another aspect. The measures can now be taken by royal decree. This is exactly the opposite of what the Federal Ombudsmen demand.

I do not quite understand why this path was chosen, except that it is, in my opinion, the fastest and most arbitrary path to eventually exclude people.

The following article provides that a person putting in danger a person of the structure may be subject to an exclusion penalty. A priori it is said that it is common sense itself: if a person is dangerous for workers or other people in the center, it is normal that he goes out. The problem is that by talking with people in the field, you realize that these dangerous people are often psychiatric cases, which need a particular framework.

Experiments are underway – in Yvoir for example – to properly accommodate those cases that require special guidance. What is proposed here is not that at all: psychiatric cases are on the street. Madame Milquet, once again, it is the Brussels Region that will have to take care of these cases that fall within asylum and are excluded for a month. This is a bad measure that will appear unhealthy for the SDF networks of our big cities that will have to appeal once again.

The last measure I would like to return to concerns the multiple requests that we have heard a lot about in this Parliament. Everyone said a priori that after having submitted two, three or four asylum applications, the case was not very serious and that it was normal to no longer grant the reception of these applicants. This is what has been decided here: more reception of asylum seekers from the third application.

Let’s be clear: some cases are only taken into account in the sixth or seventh application. I was talking last week with a social worker at a reception center who explained to me that a young Iranian had only revealed his homosexuality at the end of his eighth asylum application. Talking about these kinds of things is ⁇ complicated for some people and is not done until you have been able to establish a trusting bond with one of the social workers.

Who are then those famous people who “abuse asylum,” as the project says? They are Afghans. In October, there were 425 multiple requests. They came from Afghan applicants. Hundreds of Afghans filed multiple applications in October 2009, 44 Iranians, 39 Iraqis. These hundreds of Afghans who will be denied reception will not return because they cannot be expelled to Afghanistan.

by Mr. De Crem is not among us, but he might explain to us that the situation in Afghanistan is far from being fuzzy!

The hundred Afghans whom we will exclude from the aid by voting on this project – I am talking only about the figures of October 2009 but, today, they are more numerous and count by hundreds – will go knocking at the doors of the structures for SDF of the Regions, and in particular those of the Brussels Region. These Afghan families will find themselves in the streets and will depend on public charity.

I must admit that I do not understand the measure. This is equivalent to transferring the federal burden to the Regions responsible for homeless people. I find this situation unjustified. Belgium is guilty because it does not properly handle asylum and protection applications of Afghans.

In 2007, 14% of Afghans were granted subsidiary protection and 9% were granted asylum. In Italy, 98% of Afghans received this protection and 23% received asylum. In Norway, 93% received protection; in Austria, 84%. Belgium with its 14% and 9% of protection measures in favour of Afghans is clearly wrong. And in fact, the people concerned will not join their country. How many Afghans have left Belgium this year? and nine! This means that the hundreds of Afghans who will be excluded from the reception will not return and will find themselves in our streets and in the structures intended to host the SDF, which will contribute to creating new problems. Certainly, places will be released, but other people will find themselves on the streets.

If the only answer to the crisis of the reception that the majority has to offer us is a carousel of the seekers and the weakest, it is scandalous!

The word is to Mr. Goutry, “third time, good time.” I would like to note that he will already reap the applause once. Today is his birthday. Mr. Goutry, I wish you a happy birthday. (Applause of Applause)

Mr. the quaestor, the whole Room hopes that you will do something extra tonight at the cold or hot buffet. It may be something more.

Mr. Speaker, please forgive me for having to consider your proposal for a moment. For together with the College of Questors we must hold an urgent meeting on this matter, since no member of the College should ever benefit himself.

Colleagues, Mr. Speaker, we held a good, detailed and, in my opinion, mature and balanced debate over the political borders in the committee last week on the crucial point of asylum policy and the reception of foreigners and asylum seekers. Questions such as how we should take them up or what we should do with them were addressed here.

It was striking that we in the committee managed to come above all across the boundaries of opposition and majority to the core of this multiple and serious humanitarian problem, which consists in the unrelenting flow of people who arrive in Belgium, submit an asylum application and then initiate a very difficult and usually long procedure – also through the many means of appeal and new applications that can be used. This has brought us to a very strange situation for decades.

In fact, we can assume that all those involved, once they have decided to flee their country and to knock at a country to apply for asylum, they have at that time completely turned the button for themselves. They assume that they will never return to their country again. An asylum seeker is unlikely to make such a flight attempt. He or she takes his or her family with him or her and escapes from his or her birthplace, family and social circle, to try his or her happiness but above all his or her safety in other countries.

This is exactly where the great difficulty lies. When people knock to ask for asylum, the asylum for them has actually already happened, and in their minds they should already get asylum. Also, the fact that they may receive the message that the asylum is rejected some time later does not have the same effect that we experience if a particular application from us is rejected. For them, rejection in some cases is even an anticipated decision. However, they are immediately turned around in search of a way to extend their stay in the country of asylum. After all, once they enter the country of asylum, they are convinced that they will stay there.

The longer people stay here, the more time also plays in their advantage. This has become such a difficult problem to manage that, despite the shortening of the procedures, we are still constantly overwhelmed by procedures and this takes a lot of time. Meanwhile, children are in school here and the family has begun its socialization and citizenship and it is very difficult to send people out of the country afterwards.

Structurally and fundamentally the most difficult point in the entire dossier is that of the people who cannot get asylum and have received a negative decision, almost no one leaves the country afterwards. Neither when they are expelled, when they stay here illegally, then still the people here continue to try their luck and seek them in some way, though very elementary and in very difficult circumstances, still shelter for themselves and for their families.

In this, of course, lies the big problem. This problem, of course, is not solved by creating material capacity in such a system - where previously financial support was also provided - but where there are always only new applications and one gets an influx without sufficient discharge of the system. The only possibility is to push the people out, but they stay here and always dive back into the health care network in a different way. Colleagues, we have had a mature debate on this issue because we realize that beyond the party boundaries, this problem has not been solved by anyone so far.

The problem is at least twenty years old and whatever one has done in the past and whatever one does now, one gets the problem very hard to control. There have been attempts at forced deportations in the past, but there have been very bad experiences with them. At the time it was so difficult socially that today there are not so many results. We have then tried through the voluntary expulsion policy, but also on this people only go mouth-mouth.

Mr. Goutry, I agree with you that we have had a good discussion in the committee. On the last things you are coming to say, I would like to give a different light. You say that the problem in our country has been ongoing for twenty years. However, the problem has been addressed in recent years.

In the mid-1990s, when, among other things, the Flemish socialists were in the government, when a new Commissioner-General came in, in that period, for example, the number of asylum applications was managed to halve from about 40 000 per year to about 20 000.

This was due to a tight but humane approach to the dossier. Both are perfectly possible. It can be a policy, but then it must be strictly carried out. Humanitarian work can only be done if the lines of the legislation are strictly followed.

With this government, since its inauguration, there is a fundamental difference from all previous governments. In the policy note of Mr. Courard, though a member of the government of this government, one openly admits – and I do not judge the regularization campaign now – and one can read explicitly, black on white, that the regularization measures have produced an attraction effect.

That is the first reason why since the summer, since the decision of the regularization instruction, asylum applications have been at the peak until today. This may be of a temporary nature, but I have to hear the first concrete measures and proposals that will do something about it. What has been decided? So far, it has been decided to regularise. This is a political choice, but I will not go into it for a moment. In any case, the regularization campaign is the cause of this.

Of course, this is about a short period. Colleague Goutry, re-allocating financial aid will only increase the suction effect. In addition, it also imposes taxes on local governments. It has apparently become very difficult for everyone in this policy, for the asylum seekers themselves, but also for the people who try to do good governance in this at the administrative level.

I must honestly say, colleagues, that I am a little scared by the presentation of my colleague Goutry. It is slightly different from those in the committee. I congratulate him on behalf of my group for his speech, worthy of an opposition. I now notice that he holds a soft, brave discourse in the best, Christian-Democratic tradition.

Colleague Goutry, that you now say that there is a consensus in the asylum dossier across all party boundaries, seems to me a little too much of the good. Now when you say that no one can solve the problem, I would like to refer to your own arguments from the good old days. We should not even go back so far. Then the Christian Democrats stood in the opposition and, for example, stormed for a stricter nationality legislation.

They have the Prime Minister in their midst. So I ask myself: what is it that prevents CD&V from addressing the asylum problem? They have the super-coordinator in their hands, who is the Prime Minister. What is happening here? It is wrong to say here and now that no one in the last twenty years has addressed the problem when you are in the cockpit yourself. Now they must concrete the objections they then raised from the opposition banks.

Read your opposition speeches several years back and work on them. You should not do anything else as a majority.

I have a message for Mrs. Douifi. Her reasoning is that the regularisation procedure in Belgium has an attraction effect. I just ask her to look around in Europe. She will see asylum applications increase in all neighbouring countries of Belgium, the Netherlands, France and Germany. There is no regularization process.

Second, Mrs. Douifi, I want to show you again that there is no direct link. Those who are now applying for asylum know that they will not meet the criteria in the instruction. They know that! Through objectivity and transparency, they know that today there is no link between the fact that one is presenting an asylum application now and the possible arguments raised in the future in a regularization procedure. Therefore, it is absolutely incorrect to link between the regularisation procedure and the increase in the number of asylum procedures in Belgium.

Mr. Wathelet, the largest category that will be excluded from the reception if we vote this law containing various provisions - the component of multiple applications - are the Afghans. Do you find it normal that Belgium currently grants asylum to only 9% of Afghans and subsidiary protection to 14% of them, while the majority of other European countries do so at a rate of 70 to 80%? Afghans need temporary protection as long as the conflict in their country is not resolved. They have the right to be protected; what they were already denied! Now we will refuse to accept them and send them back to the SDF networks!

Mr. Speaker, I would like to present a few quotes from the policy note of the State Secretary for Social Integration, who belongs to this government, Mr. Wathelet.

“One of the main elements that explains the reception crisis in Belgium is the clear increase in the number of asylum applications, and therefore of the completely new persons in the reception network. This was already the case in 2008, when Belgium saw a 10% increase in the number of asylum applications compared to 2007, after that number had decreased for several years.”

Minister Wathelet, before this government took office, the number of asylum applications was therefore under control. Moreover, the numbers were in a declining trend.

“The first eight months of 2009 confirm in a very clear and undeniable way that rising trend, given that during this period the number of asylum applications increased by 27 %. This evolution is only partially explained by the multiple asylum applications.”

Ladies and gentlemen, a short parenthesis. The approach to these multiple asylum applications had to continue, so to speak, for a large approach. The approach to the multiple asylum applications was communicated by Prime Minister Van Rompuy as the effort on asylum policy. That announcement was accompanied by the announcement of the regularisation criteria. Multiple asylum applications will also be addressed. This should then be the strict counterweight for the regularization campaign. All the rest that was announced, especially the hypocritical marriages, family reunification and nationality legislation, is still waiting.

I complete the quotation.

“This evolution is only partially explained by the multiple asylum applications. Indeed, if only the first asylum application is taken into account, there is still an observable increase of 24 %.”

Finally, the Government Agreement of 18 March 2008, which provides for regularisation criteria, and the reporting on the importance of the asylum procedure in that framework, have made the asylum procedure in Belgium clearly attractive. This has de facto had consequences in terms of the number of persons entitled to receive.”

Mr. Speaker, I will decide. “It is therefore not to be expected that Belgium will become less attractive for the next year,” which is meant for 2010.

That is so black on white to read in the policy note of a member of the government, also one who is responsible for asylum policy.

What is proposed today in the law various provisions will only aggravate this matter and the government knows that. But as soon as the government agreement has been concluded, and as soon as the announcements have been made in the summer of this year, the doors have been opened wide. Unfortunately, and I say this with regret in my heart, nothing has been put against it. So, in this regard, we should expect nothing more in this legislature, I fear.

I would like to allow Mr. Wathelet to speak, but I had asked for the word for him. Mr. Wathelet, you can answer me immediately because I find your naivety and relativity in this completely misplaced. You fit perfectly within this government by simply lying that there has been a suction effect some time before that second regularization round and now also already in anticipation of a third regularization round. I am not saying that they will come, but the asylum seekers are convinced of it. Those people are in such crisp conditions and know that Belgium is not a country like all other countries in asylum and migration policy. They are now putting all their beans per week on a third regularization round. I find it really wrong that you, for example, also on Sunday night on Panorama for all television-watching Flanders and Belgium say that the government is not stupid and will not give those people any papers if they have no right to it. Those people are waiting for that regularization round, and Mr. Courard has said it with so many words in his policy statement: there has been a suction effect and there will be a new suction effect. I would like to know from you why you relative these facts?

Mrs. Smeyers, you asked me a question on this in the committee last week. I have told you how many files we have sent to the Prosecutor’s Office regarding all abuses of procedure submitted in the proceedings at the Foreign Affairs Service, all false documents discovered at the Foreign Affairs Service in medical certificates and in false identity cards. Everything we discover in Foreign Affairs we send to the parket. This really shows that we do our job as well as possible. Of course, there will always be fraudulent behaviors. This is the case in foreign affairs, but unfortunately also in other affairs.

Second, Mrs. Douifi, look at the figures from abroad. The Netherlands does not have a regularisation procedure like Belgium, as far as I know, unless you have other information. There, however, there is the same increase in the number of asylum procedures as in Belgium. The same goes for France. One might try to explain that this is the effect of the regularization procedure, but that is not the case. Explain what the link is. What added value would someone in a regularization procedure have by starting an asylum procedure now? Explain it to me. This would provide no added value for the regularization file. Why Why ? Because the criteria apply to the past. This only applies to persons who initiated an asylum procedure four or five years ago or who have resided in Belgium for five years. For them, the anchorage can be demonstrated now, before 15 December. Therefore, starting an asylum procedure today brings nothing new in a file.

As regards multiple asylum applications, subsidiary protection mechanisms can still be decided at the CGRA level, in particular for persons who may have stateless status. In addition, in the asylum level, these are persons who have submitted successively asylum applications.

This means that some asylum applications have already been rejected, that the refugee status has not been recognized for these people. I insist: the fact that the current texts do not provide for a consequence in matters of reception applies only to those whose new element has not been demonstrated at the time of the introduction of the dossier.

In other words, they are persons who have not been granted refugee status and who, at the time of introduction of their file, are unable to demonstrate the presence of a new element that would justify the admissibility of their asylum file and could give rise to reception. Thus, if a person reinserts an asylum file and the file is admissible due to a new element, they will obtain, of course, reception. What is more normal!

I am very happy that there is a debate.

I would like Mr. Goutry to have the opportunity to complete his presentation. Members of the government can always replicate afterwards.

Mrs. Getty, very briefly, you have the word.

My question to Mr. Wathelet was very precise: what will we do with the hundreds of Afghans who will find themselves on the streets and who will be driven out of the reception structures? Will you send them back to Afghanistan? What will we do with these people?

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, I am delighted that my argument gives rise to a debate so that things can be clarified on the other side.

I have some experience, but I still find it more difficult to have a good debate in a plenary session than in a committee. The style of speech is different. There is a little less listening and one tries to make more of his point. Therefore, in the beginning of my argument, I wanted to say exactly that in such a file it is very difficult to make many points. The case is so difficult on a humanitarian and ethical level that I absolutely do not feel called to make a point here.

Let’s be honest, we could check the history, one made the reception law just before this government, because when the water was on the lips. At that time, financial aid was rightly converted into material aid. It was thought to be the solution, but two years later we must conclude that that remedy is not the solution either. It may also not be the solution, because the problem lies much deeper and is much more structural. Anyone who comes here with an asylum application is there from the first day he or she arrives here convinced that he or she will stay here. That is why it is so hard to deal with it in a good, correct and humanitarian way. I said this in the committee last week.

In asylum policy, the expulsion policy, the concrete implementation of just legal decisions, is the most difficult pillar to handle. This also differs in mandatory and voluntary expulsions, where, among other things, several powers play. Indeed, asylum seekers absolutely do not want to be expelled, under no circumstances, because the country of origin does not want them back or because they do not follow the procedure correctly and do not follow the order of expulsion. Then begins the problem. This cannot be done otherwise, because then one comes to a cumulation of applications from asylum seekers residing here and the government is indeed forced to regularize, because it cannot otherwise. By the way, this has also happened before.

I agree with the position of the Secretary of State. It is not an isolated problem. It will not be due only to the fact that this government would handle it poorly. Expand this story to the last twenty years. It is also an international problem. Only this morning we heard in the news that a new suction effect has also emerged in Calais. The people are back, despite the fact that they were expelled there a few months ago. Hundreds of people offer themselves again.

Those people do not disappear. They stay here. At some point and in some way, they then offer themselves for the assistance. That is what is so difficult to control, especially because there is always an unpredictable element involved.

When you book hotels, you expect people. This is sufficiently reserved in advance. When people enter here, they suddenly stand in front of the door of the OCMW, in the transit center and in our reception structures. This can be very difficult to predict. One can only try to silk with the crane open. Therefore, it is an extremely difficult problem.

Effectively attempts have been made to reduce the suction effect by converting financial aid into material aid. That is a merit. But I am also concerned about Article 140. Its application, however, occurs in exceptional circumstances and is first consulted with the Government. That article can work provided that there are good and balanced criteria, which I believe should also be revised in the light of this matter.

I do not approve Article 140 with enthusiasm, I confess that very honestly. We take a step backwards by replacing material support with financial support. However, if I have to choose between that and offering nothing to the people, I support Article 140 for humanitarian reasons alone.

Mr Goutry, you are not obliged to subsequently approve Article 140. In the best tradition, specific to the Christian Democrats when they sit in the opposition and talk about five minutes of political courage, you will no longer need five minutes if you want to be consistent with what you say. An amendment of the Flemish Interest was submitted to remove Article 140. There is a similar proposal from the Sp. a. group. Therefore, you do not have to approve Article 140 against your opinion. You simply support the opposition’s amendments and you can do what you really want to do. Follow your conscience for once, be a fool in the majority, and vote for Article 140.

Especially now it is not a time to do things against your will, Mr. Goutry. You will not approve that article with all your heart, but the majority will approve it.

Mr. Bultinck, it may not be too late yet. The majority can still think about whether or not to approve the amendments to remove Article 140 tonight.

Mr. Goutry, however, I ask for your support because all the energy, all the political action force of the government — at least if it is present in this file — must be used to fully spend the financial resources that have been created even before this year and which must surely meet for 2010, on the implementation of material shelters. Now approve the article and thus open the door, but at the same time say that it is actually not a good measure, which is going into the red twice, Mr. Goutry.

Mrs. Speaker, colleagues, despite the fact that it is undoubtedly not done to express its opinion on a tribune and also to be constructively critical from the majority, I continue to do so. I find it much more courageous to do that here on the tribune than to then press the white button steamlessly and thus choose the flight. I am not flying at all. I remain in the middle of the problem because I myself am impressed by it, because I myself as OCMW chairman have to deal with it. Fortunately, this is not the case every day as it is a small rural municipality.

I have been following the whole problem for many years. For many years I have listened to everyone who talks about this problem, both in this house and elsewhere, and I have come to the conclusion that whoever has the solution would do well to immediately ask for the word and go to this speaker. The solution does not exist. We will only be able to come to a solution when a very structural, with a lot of time, a lot of persistence and unity, across the governments and political parties, a policy can be established that can be supported by all actors that depend on it. It must then also rely in large part on the correct expulsion and the correct execution of the decisions that people can legally request. They have a lot of possibilities to defend themselves.

This brings me to Article 135. This is going in the right direction because it limits the marginal procedural possibilities in part. This is a step in the right direction, although there are still many questions to be raised. After all, there will be a transition period and maybe there will also be a vacuum. It will be difficult for a certain period of time. Once a third application is submitted, it will have to be examined, but what will happen between the moment the third application is submitted and the moment one is asked whether or not the new elements are sufficiently admissible? There are still many humanitarian, practical issues that will make it difficult for people on the ground to continue to survive here.

Ladies and gentlemen, I agree. We are facing an unimaginably impressive and profound humanitarian issue. This is not a Belgian problem, but a problem at the international level. It is a problem of the rich countries against the other, for help shouting countries. People who have difficulty and come here are faced with the limited capacity and the limited support of a richer society. It is always so. People have their mouths over, but it is difficult to come up with a practical answer. We talk a lot, but taking action is much more difficult. We are faced with the problem of people who come in search of their happiness. For them it is difficult and disappointing when they get a negative advice.

The government has logically provided new resources for additional material reception. I appeal to the Government, in this case to the Prime Minister who contributes to the dossier, to make sure that the resources needed to expand the reception capacity are used. Colleagues, I am deeply convinced that the continuous expansion of storage capacity and of structures does not provide a solution if we fail to improve the flow in the structures. Previous governments have already tried. The first person who knows the solution should always come and say it.

I saw how the people of N-VA participated quite ludically in the debate. Mrs. Smeyers was also involved. I did not intentionally want to conduct the controversy from this speech stand. It has greatly disturbed me that N-VA saw in all this human misery the possibility to morally base itself on an old parliamentary question, and on the old figures of this summer’s virtual spread plan. This has nothing to do with the current reception. They have succeeded in spreading these figures. The municipalities were scared. They have seen how many people they might have to accommodate. These are false numbers that are only used for the communitarianization of a human problem that has nothing to do with the breaking line between nationalities.

(Applause of Applause)

Mr. Goutry, you will receive long-term applause. I assume that you bring this instructed, this dedicated number at the end of your intervention.

What is the reality? We have submitted the written request for objective figures and must write reminder letters to the Secretary of State three or four times. In the end, we had to threaten that if we did not get the numbers, we would have to submit the matter to the chairman of the House. Two days after that threat, we received the requested numbers and the next day they were published.

These are the most recent figures we could get from the Secretary of State of your government. When he provides us with the wrong figures, it shows again and again the incompetence of the man who must control that file.

Mr. Jambon, I find it even more sad that you are trying to defend yourself. You should know very well, as a member of Parliament, that you should not let it depend on the answer of the Secretary of State, but that you should know the dossier yourself enough to know that it was about the spread plan 42 of this summer, which is a virtual plan that is always formed as long as there is still some financial aid. It still exists from the old law, one cannot do otherwise. It is about six hundred people, not about ten thousand.

You just made an extrapolation and told all reporters up to the smallest villages that they had to be ready. For example, you said that in the small, rural municipality of Beernem seventy-six persons would offer themselves. Nothing is less true, however, because there may only be four people in our municipality. In the meantime, you have disrupted the social support level, not brought any solution, and only put people against each other. It is scandalous! (Applause of Applause)

Mr. Goutry, you are a good vassal of the government. You were also in the committee. I have given Mr. Courard the opportunity more than once, in the plenary session and in various committees, to give the correct numbers. I would like to ask Mr. Leterme again later and I hope that we will get a response. That will then be the difference between the debate in the committee and the debate in the plenary session.

I find it very low on the ground whatever you said in the committee, in particular that I would only play on the community aspect. I have repeatedly stated that community interests and humanitarian interests in these are ⁇ reconcilable and that it is not just about that. I have also explicitly dismissed all the misguided policy on asylum and migration. I just want to know what’s going on now, of that community squat. That’s in the margin, but that’s part of it. These two issues are intertwined in this debate. I find it low on the ground that you accuse us that we are only working with community interests.

I would like to say a few words in support of my colleagues in the opposition. I think it is frankly scratch that now, from the majority, one dares to blame the opposition for packing out with wrong numbers or not. Mrs. Speaker, Mr. Prime Minister, we will do the exercise later in the hope that this time, it will then be the third time, maybe we will get the correct numbers.

Fourteen days ago, in this plenary session, my colleague Francis Van den Eynde questioned Secretary of State Courard on the whole problem. The Secretary of State was not in power to give a correct answer. We have submitted this discussion to the committee. There, the Secretary of State has managed to say that only 50% of those asylum-seekers will eventually be allocated to Flanders.

What can guarantee us that these are correct numbers, if in response to a written question from a colleague, he speaks first about 80 % and then about 50 %? Who believes that man? That is the fundamental problem with the Secretary of State.

Furthermore, there is another fundamental problem. We cannot even confront the Secretary of State with concrete questions, because he is probably already standing on the skiatters in some holiday resort today, rather than here giving definitive figures to Parliament once and for all.

Mrs. Speaker, Mr. Goutry, for a moment, this is not about making points, it is about getting a clear answer from the government. Mr. Prime Minister, in that sense, I am glad that you are present, hoping to get an answer now and to know what we will vote about later. I am speaking more specifically about Article 140 of the law containing various provisions.

Mr. Prime Minister, you also know that since the Alexius Agreement there has been a huge suction effect of asylum seekers, that there has been an enormous need – which had already been there but has become even greater – of shelters, and that Fedasil is holding hands in the hair and has sought refuge in hotels. Refugee Work Flanders even planned to build a tent camp.

At the end of last summer, then the old spread plan – based on a 1999 KB that we all know in the meantime – has been deepened again and the OCMWs of various cities and municipalities have been attributed with the notice that they must provide x-number of shelters for the case, and that is already the case, the regular shelters would be overcrowded and there would be no place anymore.

I then addressed Secretary of State Courard and this question was scheduled shortly after the summer. He has already said then, and that has been his answer throughout the whole story, that those numbers are theoretical. At the time, he didn’t say they didn’t knock. At the time, I didn’t have an overall picture of those figures.

As Mr. Jambon said later, after a few months and repeated insistence – I wonder why this had to take so long and why those figures remained so hidden – I have finally been able to see the total spread plan 42. Then Mr. Goutry appeared, I really regret, that there was a community shattering. I have asked questions about this, as well as about those numbers.

It’s not just about that community shattering. It also means that we, Flanders and Wallonia, but especially Flanders for 88% versus Wallonia for 11%, must take care of the reception of asylum seekers. This is a result of ten years of mispolicy. Since the first round of regularization in 1999, no work has been done on a sound asylum and migration policy. The gates are open here. We do not have a sound expulsion policy and that now results in a much too limited number of shelters and in the fact that OCMWs now again have to provide places for various asylum seekers. I hope you can give a proper answer soon.

You have also said in “De Keien van de Wetstraat” that there is a shredding and that the 1999 criteria need to be revised. I have faced Secretary of State Courard with your response in “De Keien van de Wetstraat”, but again I have not received a reply in the committee whether those criteria will be revised or in what sense they will be revised. I spoke against a wall in the committee. I hope it is different today.

Mr. Wathelet is still here. His relativization and his naivety still bark high peaks. I think it has been a very good broadcast, pleasure for the VRT, that they have dared to highlight the extent of the mispolicy in our country, with testimonies of lawyers who honestly admit – and they color within the lines of the law – that they recommend their clients to make an asylum application after an asylum application in order to gain time and thus search for new facts in order to be eligible for an acceptable asylum application. There are people who say that they are now sitting in the illegality waiting for a third regularization period. Do you think this is so humanitarian, Mr. Goutry? I’m sure Mr. Goutry is calling.

So I want to hear from you, Mr. Leterme, and it will then be the first time I receive a response from the government, how the fork is on the stake. Article 140 also speaks of a temporary measure. But in anticipation of what is this a temporary measure? Is this a temporary measure as your refuge in hotels was a temporary measure?

I do not believe it. So I ask you specifically when you will work on a sound asylum policy.

Article 140 speaks of a royal decree. Will there be a new royal decree or will the government continue to use the old royal decree 99? Will there be new criteria to eliminate the aforementioned Community divestment? These are my concrete questions.

I cannot say more about the dossier. I did not say anything else in the committee. Mr Goutry, you claim that the speaker in the plenary session is used to make gross statements. However, my statement today differs in nothing from what I have already stated three times in the committee.

However, I hope to get an answer now.

Honestly, I cannot follow well. Now let the Secretary of State answer. However, I have actually allowed myself to register as a speaker in the debate. So I do not understand exactly why the Secretary of State will respond in between now.

But there is no problem, Mr. Bultinck: you will intervene in a few moments. by Mr. The Secretary of State asks me for the word and it seems normal to me that I give it to him to answer a question that has been asked to him.

This morning I will try to be the voice of Secretary of State Courard. I will replace him this morning.

I would like to thank the speakers who spoke here on this subject. Everyone agrees that the problem of the number of asylum seekers in our country is ⁇ difficult. It is a difficult challenge. This debate has proved that.

The authority of colleague Courard is limited to the reception. However, the problem is much broader. The government is trying to address the issue globally. Mr Wathelet has already answered on certain points.

Mr. Secretary of State, allow me to interrupt you. Other colleagues are still registered for this topic. If this does not bother you, I wish you could conclude after hearing all the speakers.

You are absolutely right, Mrs. President!

Absolutely absolutely . I thought everyone had intervened. There is no problem.

Mr. Secretary of State, I have a little compassion with you today. You must replace Secretary of State Courard here and your first attempt to do so is, I must say, not good. You are a convinced defender of the Parliament. We know each other from the Social Affairs Committee. I find it sad that you must now commission Secretary of State Courard, who after the debate of the past weeks probably chose his vacation destination rather than the Parliament to answer colleagues who still struggle to ask difficult questions. I deeply regret this.

When we go to the essence of the debate, ladies and gentlemen ministers, our group finds that the component of Social Integration, which includes the reception of asylum seekers, can be reduced to – I do not exaggerate – one big mess.

Here and there, some fires are extinguished, here and there, some problems are attempted to be solved and some abuses that exist in the sector are attempted to be corrected through this part of various provisions. As far as we are concerned, however, it remains in the margins of prutsen. Some emergency measures have been taken, and some additional crisis response is provided. I have been able to see that the Prime Minister offers a number of additional shelters in his own province. I refer to Langemark and Oostende, Mr. Prime Minister, where you think asylum seekers should go to accommodate.

There is no solution to this asylum problem. I would like to expressly refer to the increasing number of asylum applications. I refer to the policy letter of Secretary of State Courard, where he says the following. “The Government Agreement of 18 March 2008, which provides for the regularization criteria, and the reporting on the importance of the asylum procedure in this regard, do ensure that there is a lasting suction effect and ensure that we will not solve the problem fundamentally in 2010 as well.”

Ladies and gentlemen of the government, you cannot blame the opposition for referring to that policy letter of the Secretary of State where it can be read. The Secretary of State, who belongs to the same government, courageously acknowledges that there is a fundamental problem and that there is no chance that it will be solved now.

The first question that arises is that of responsibility. I confess that not everything is the fault of the current Secretary of State, Mr. Courard. In the end, he will have to overcome the misconduct of his predecessors. Collega Arena is in our midst and colleague Turtelboom has just left. I point you to the months-long struggle between those two ladies who in the past were responsible for asylum policy, and you understand that this is a lasting mess. There was no understanding at the time. Then, of course, one cannot expect the problem to be solved to the bottom.

The next element is the entire debate about the powers. We see that these powers are spread over four excellences. There is, however, a very large constant, Mr. Prime Minister. The constant is that the whole gap on asylum and such reception problems lies with French speakers. So it is logical – let us just say that – that Flanders get an asylum policy that is contrary to what Flanders want. That policy is not updated, as the French speakers have a completely different view of asylum than is common in the north of the country.

To the colleagues of N-VA I must then honestly give a little bit of a spark by saying that you too had actually approved the government agreement of 18 March 2008, where the whole problem of regularizations and the like is provided. I am, of course, a satisfied man if I find that N-VA is now opposing the current asylum policy together with the Vlaams Belang. But it is good to keep an eye on history from time to time and know that you did approve the government agreement of 18 March 2008, under Leterme, then as prime minister, and with registered regularisations.

Colleagues, the whole debate on the bill containing various provisions has naturally focused on the notorious Article 140, which provides for a new possibility to provide financial support.

Mr. Secretary of State, I must admit that your colleague Courard dismissed the various provisions contained in the draft law very well. One had to have some experience in Parliament to find out where now that famous financial support was shut away by the government. It is in the vague definition of “balanced distribution between the municipalities on the basis of certain modalities”. Finally, it is intended to provide the legal basis for a new spread plan.

That is the whole debate. The whole debate in the committee also revolved around this. I have already mentioned this in my interventions. There is a lot of discussion about numbers, while still no one knows who now has the correct numbers. I hope that one person from the government will soon be able to give correct figures. In fact, there was also a whole debate about whether it is correct that Flanders should provide for 88% of this reception. I also recall the explanation of colleague Avontroodt, fourteen days ago, from his own majority, who came from his town of Schilde to say that it was God-plained that considerable Schilde should provide for more than 124 new candidate-asylum seekers, which seemed to her not a correct affair.

State Secretary Courard has tried to save himself in the committee by saying that it was a theoretical model. In practice, only a good 600 people would be relocated. In the end, we were not allowed to see it as a real model that would be applied sooner or later. It was a theoretical exercise, a speculation from the government. Well, Mr. Secretary of State, you must be able to convince me today on behalf of the government that it was indeed a mere theoretical exercise. The Association of Flemish Cities and Municipalities is in trouble. That disturbance, also interpreted by OCMW presidents of your own majority, is indeed justified. Now the government has to give the right answers.

The Secretary of State has managed to come up with completely different figures than the mentioned 88%. He referred to the spread plan number 42 and dared to point out that in the current state of affairs, Flanders would only be responsible for 50 % of the reception or 14 asylum seekers per 10 000 inhabitants. Brussels would be responsible for 10% or 16 asylum seekers per 10,000 inhabitants. Wallonia would be responsible for 40 % or 20 asylum seekers per 10 000 inhabitants.

Secretary of State Courard went a step further. He turned the roles in the whole, community debate that had arisen. He stated, however, that the local reception initiatives, which are relatively more prevalent in Flanders, are well subsidized. He thus turned the community shattering to death.

I regret that the Prime Minister is now gone, but somebody from the government will soon have to be able to answer the following questions. What figures do we have? Which figures are correct? Is it true that the figures with which the N-VA members have packed out, namely more than 80%, were somewhat exaggerated?

Mr. Secretary of State, Mrs. Minister, are the figures given by Secretary of State Courard in the committee correct? The spread, according to his interpretation, suddenly turned out to be a completely different spread. He completely reversed the community shattering. It would be good that the Government would answer the above-mentioned, first, concrete question of our group today, before we can proceed to the vote on the articles concerned.

A second element that I would like to introduce for a moment in the debate is the whole debate about the fact that Minister Bourgeois, on behalf of the Flemish government, had protested against the figures of the spread plan 42, as they have been discussed here for a while.

Mr. Secretary of State, Secretary of State Courard dared to say in the committee that the whole debate and all misunderstandings in a good conversation between Prime Minister Leterme and Minister Bourgeois had been cleared.

It would be good for us to get an answer to this concrete question of our group today. Are there really all the misunderstandings of the job in the file in question? Is it true that Mr. Bourgeois, as a Flemish minister, satisfied himself with the responses of the Federal Prime Minister?

The answers to the above questions are crucial in order to be able to assess who in the file in question plays which game and who in the file plays which role. They are also crucial to know which answers are now finally and definitively given in Parliament.

Colleagues, we remain that the re-provision of financial support through Article 140 is a misleading of format. Anyone who has followed the file a little in the past knows that it will inextricably have a huge suction effect. This is also essentially contested by no one who knows the file. That is also one of the reasons why we will re-submit our amendment, which we have submitted in the committee, in the plenary session and we will explicitly ask our colleagues not to approve Article 140 and to remove it by amendment from the draft law containing various provisions, even if it was only to be definitively free from that ambiguity.

In this sense, I would like to declare very clearly that we will oppose it and that we will not approve the bill containing various provisions, among other reasons, in addition to quite a few other reasons. Here and there, however, there is a little marginalization and some measures are provided to reduce the major abuses, which exist in asylum applications, a little bit, but that is completely insufficient for our group. We will make this clear with a clear no-voice in the mood, later or in the night hours.

Mr. Gilkinet, with your consent, I will allow myself to put in order the people who want to finish the Social Affairs section so that they can address the Employment section. I have Mrs. Kitir who will intervene on Social Affairs; then it will be Mr. Kitir. You and your partner have the opportunity to speak on the job. In this way, Mr. Delicate can answer globally.

Mrs. Speaker, if the next speaker is Mrs. Kitir, I suspect that we are closing the chapter on Social Integration, and it is desirable that Mr. Delizée answers the questions related to the reception of asylum seekers.

That is OK for me.

Mr. Mr. Kitir speaks on the same subject as me, i.e. employment. Having completed the social integration section, I propose that the Secretary of State, Mr. Delizée may answer in the place of the Secretary of State Mr. by Courard.

very well ! I was informed that Ms. Kitir would also speak on this subject. We will listen to Mr. President’s response. We were delighted before we continued our discussions.

I am at the disposal of the Chamber.

The first speaker, Ms. Douifi, referred to an extensive debate that took place in the committee. I refer to the report of this debate, which contains some answers from Secretary of State Courard.

It is true that a saturation of the network has occurred for several months and that there is a overpopulation in the centers. Ms. Douifi spoke of a cumulation of emergency measures. There is indeed an urgent problem and that also requires urgent actions and answers.

I give a few figures. More than 20,000 asylum applications will be submitted this year. Our reception capacity is around 17,700 seats. That is not enough. Each month there are 350 new applications in our country.

The Government and the Secretary of State have tried to find solutions to this problem. For example, at the end of December, 260 new places will be added through local reception initiatives.

There is a mobilization of various departments, including Defence and the Regie der Gebäude, for the opening of new locations. During this period, 236 new places for new asylum seekers will be added in Dinant. There are also 162 new seats in apartments through the Regie der Gebäude, Refugee Work and CIRE. There will also be 200 additional places in cooperation with Defence and another 200 places in cooperation with the partners of the reception, the Red Cross in Heusden-Zolder and Banneux.

The budget also includes new amounts for 2010: 60 million and 16 million euros for new places.

Thus, these are the measures taken by Mr. Courard and the Government in relation to the demand for shelters.

Regarding multiple requests, my colleague Wathelet has already answered, but I would like to insist on this point again.

I would like to emphasize that this measure allows the right to submit an asylum application at any time and to apply to the asylum authorities when it contains new elements. The right to reception, which is linked to the procedure, is no longer automatic from the third asylum application, this is to avoid people from submitting an asylum application with the sole purpose of extending their right to reception.

It is important to remember that this right to a third request still exists, but also that it will be worth checking the new elements.

In response to Ms. Genot’s intervention regarding the extension of the right to material assistance, a medical check will take place. A simple medical certificate will not suffice; more precision will need to be given. Of course, emergency medical assistance remains valid for all people who can use it.

Regarding the comment on the federal mediators, the latter ask the government to respect the European directive which asks it to grant a reception to persons seeking asylum from our country. The policy of Mr. Courard and the provisions presented today go in this direction.

As for Article 142, Secretary of State Courard indicated in a commission that these were sanctions affecting applicants who had committed very serious acts in the centers. This article therefore brings a legal response related to order and security in all centres, both from the point of view of other residents and staff.

by Mr. Goutry asked me about the deadlines for processing the files of the third application. The Secretary of State requested that the time limits for the analysis of new elements be very short so that a decision can be made quickly.

Finally, the last element that was advanced by several speakers concerns the distribution plan. I can only recall what has already been said. The distribution plan is a mechanism that concerned the old legislation, that is, before the January 2007 law. Today, it no longer makes sense to talk about a 15,000-seat distribution plan. This is a residual system that still concerns 611 old files. by Mr. Courard said this and repeated it during the discussions in the committee, which is very certain in the report.

Here, Mr. Speaker, are some clarifications that I would like to make in this debate, in addition to the answers already given by my colleague, Melchior Wathelet.

Two elements remain. I would like to use the presence of the Prime Minister to clear some uncertainties between him and the Secretary of State.

First, Mr. Secretary of State, for the figures refer to the written report of the Public Health Committee. In other words, you confirm, on behalf of the Government, that the figures in which Flanders account for more than 80 % of the reception of asylum seekers are incorrect and you confirm that the figures of Secretary of State Courard, in which Flanders account for 50 % are correct. It is important that you confirm this.

In the meantime, we are already familiar with the secretary of state with a number of things, especially that he is unable to formulate a correct answer to difficult parliamentary questions.

Following a good parliamentary tradition, I want to make sure that we agree on the figures.

Mr. Prime Minister, it is especially useful that you are back in the hemisphere, because I was happy to receive confirmation from you about the next. In your capacity as Prime Minister, you had a conversation with Flemish Minister Bourgeois. Can you confirm that it was a good conversation and that all differences between the Flemish Minister and you, competent at the federal level, have been resolved? From that answer it will become clear whether some part of the debate has become unobject and whether certain individuals, if they agree, play games.

It would be good if both the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State would give satisfaction on these two punctual questions.

We understood it: a category of asylum seekers (multiple requests) will have to leave the centers to leave space for others. I think mainly of the Afghans who will have to leave the centers and find themselves on the streets.

In Brussels, we live in a “social pesticide” and the number of people who address our shelters is already very large. To best manage this situation – although there is no ideal method to handle such situations well – it is crucial for us to know how many people will leave the reception centers and when. We already know that they will have five days to do this. How many multiple asylum seekers are targeted and when will they leave? I don’t know how we will absorb this social misery that will be poured out in Brussels.

Two short answers or reactions.

I would simply remind the first speaker that the number of persons concerned by the distribution plan is a residual system of 611 files.

With regard to the second intervention, in the person of Mrs. Genot, it is difficult to make an estimate. According to my figures, those who submit a third or more applications make up 7% of asylum seekers. The estimate, with all the limitations of such an exercise, indicates that the intervention would affect 700 to 750 people.

As for when they would come out, it would first require that the law be voted and enforced, but, more fundamentally, it must first introduce a new application. The device would only be valid from the moment these people have introduced this new request, which they will do gradually, over time.

In the current state of affairs, this is what I can answer to these two speakers.

Mr. Speaker, if you allow me, I insist that my good regional colleague, the Prime Minister, would answer the concrete question whether the conversation between him himself in his capacity as Prime Minister and coordinator of the entire asylum policy and Flemish Minister Bourgeois was a good conversation and whether all differences were resolved there. This is, of course, crucial for this debate that has received a community impact. So I would appreciate it if he had the kindness to answer it.

Mr. Speaker, the conversation that took place on my initiative with the Prime Minister of Flanders, Mr. Peeters, and Mr. Bourgeois was about my request to the competent Flemish government to fulfill its competence in the field of homeless people. Following that conversation, we had an exchange of views on a number of issues of asylum and migration policy. Flemish Minister Bourgeois had a few questions about this.

I then agreed that we would look at those points. I plan — I suppose in the course of January — a consultation with colleague Bourgeois to answer the seven or eight questions he has submitted to the federal government on behalf of the Flemish government. These answers are almost ready. We can therefore enter into consultation with the Flemish government in the course of the month of January.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Prime Minister, Mrs. Minister, Mr. Secretary of State, Dear colleagues, I would like to begin my discussion with a question to each of you. We can assume that each of us considers the well-being of a child important, regardless of whether it is a child of a worker, of a self-employed, or that it comes from a poor family.

I therefore regret the unauthorized adjustment in the Section Guaranteed Family Benefit. Children of parents without professional status, i.e. primarily parents with a living wage, who receive a guaranteed family allowance. The basic amount is equal to that of the employees, but with a modest income they receive a social allowance, which makes the total amount higher than that of the employees. Children who are entitled to child allowance in another scheme, but whose family income is less than 3 753 euros and whose amount of child allowance from that other scheme is lower than in the self-employed scheme, under those conditions, receive a supplement from the system guaranteed family allowance to that amount. Alleszins is about children from a family with a very modest family income.

Over the years, the amount of the allowance for the first child of the self-employed has been gradually increased in successive steps, thus minimizing the difference with the basic amount among employees and yet reaching 5 euros per month. Adding the age allowance, which was not halved for the oldest or only child for self-employed persons, as opposed to that of workers at the beginning of the 1990s, may result in the total child allowance of a child of a self-employed person being now even higher than for a child of a worker.

For years, children from families with a very modest family income have been denied the right to child allowance like workers, let alone like the ordinary guaranteed family allowance. They were given only the amount for self-employed. Now that it is established that the amount for self-employed may in some cases be higher than for workers, the children from poor families are suddenly denied that a few euro difference per month and that is unfair.

It also illustrates that it is more than ever necessary to harmonise amounts in the systems of employees and self-employed persons. As a result of the successive increases in the system of self-employed persons, the additional costs thereof are, by the way, very limited, especially if in that exercise one would also halve the age report of the first child.

This would avoid children who receive child allowance from a system that is traditionally considered to be worse and has been gradually improved, would differ from the child allowance from the better system, namely from the workers.

The report states that the measure in question is intended to restore coherence between the different Belgian child benefit schemes. But the adjustment with the proposed measure has the effect that children who are entitled to another scheme, the family guarantee, i.e. the total supplement, no longer receive. Not only the increased amount is retained, but also the total supplement, the supplement they are lost. It eliminates any legal basis for supplementation.

I do not understand why this measure is taken. It is about a few euros. For people from a poor family, those few euros are very important. If it really is only about the increase that they get, about the amount that they get more than self-employed, then the minister himself is authorized to adjust that through a KB.

Therefore, we submit an amendment to remove the adjustment and we give the Minister the power to adjust only the increased surcharge through a KB. All those who also consider the rights of children important will today support our amendment.

I have not only bad news. I also have good news. I am very pleased that Minister Onkelinx has kept her promise to my colleague Peter Vanvelthoven on the special contribution to social security for disabled border workers.

As a result of a 2007 legislative amendment, the special social security contribution is completely unintentionally withheld from this benefit. Minister Onkelinx has now answered by letter that it will correct that default retroactively, so back to 2005, and that the refund will take place automatically.

Since it is not allowed to withhold social contributions on the same income in different countries, the law provided until 2005 that no special contribution could be withheld on the income of border workers, even if those were taxed in Belgium. As a bilateral agreement between Belgium and the Netherlands entered into force in 2005, which now subjected the income of border workers to Dutch taxes, this exclusion was removed. In fact, it was thought that by this new arrangement the income would not be eligible anyway. However, it was forgotten that on the social benefits paid out by the Dutch Social Security, the special contribution is still withheld in Belgium when part of the family income is acquired in Belgium.

In numerous questions about this to Minister of Finance Reynders, he has always acknowledged the problem, but has always pushed the problem out. Therefore, I am also pleased that Ms. Onkelinx has taken over the bill and removed the injustice in the legislation.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker, Mr. Speaker. I would like to point out that the fourth point of our agenda is also the discussion of the draft law to promote employment. Following this, I will later formulate some more general considerations.

What brings me to the point of speech is the conclusion that we are in this draft. You may have different opinions about one thing. You can meet or meet at impossible times, try to do legislative work as soon as possible on the initiative of the government or on the initiative of the parliamentarians, which then creates the necessary chaos in the agendas. Then ministers must immediately fly back from the other part of the world. Much worse, however, is that here we will pass laws, Mr. Prime Minister, of which we now know that they carry mistakes, of which our citizens become the victims.

I would like to address the President. Mr. Speaker, is it true that there is already a correction issue regarding the program law coming from the Senate? We will see.

There is a draft, but we just agreed to examine it during the first parliamentary working week of January.

Here, they are already there. The law has not yet been published, Mr. Prime Minister, and the repair laws are already coming. When we debate draft laws in a committee and we make comments and concerns, also of a technical nature, to prevent errors from occurring, to protect that people are victims of them, it is really annoying that the majority in its great urge says that they are not needed. Again and again we find that then we get right, months or years later, to then yet again put the points on the i and also clarify the rights and duties of each one, so far my general introduction.

I want to illustrate this, colleagues, with what lies ahead of us. We have spent hours in the committee and in the plenary session debating Article 87, in particular on the question of what should be done with the proceeds of administrative and criminal fines in social and labour law? The amendments we had submitted on this subject were wiped off the table. Two days after we said in the plenary session that there was a technical problem and that the text needed to be amended, which was strictly contradicted, the Minister of Labour came into the committee with a bill aimed at the legal anchoring of the allocation of the proceeds resulting from administrative and criminal violations of the social and labour law.

This is exactly what is now in the design. That is what the government considers. That is what the majority is trying to do. However, we must confirm, colleagues, that one is also here in an impossible curve. At the moment, the draft law on the Social Criminal Code is still being discussed in the Senate. It must also be published afterwards. As a result of the discussions here it contains the provision that the proceeds are allocated to the Treasury. This was the notorious amendment that was submitted to the Justice Committee, I understood. Those revenues do not return to social security.

At this point, Mr. Speaker, we are bowing over a bill that says just the opposite. Even the best lawyer in the country does not know at this time which law will come into force. Will these revenues be allocated to social security? Will the proceeds be allocated to the Treasury? In any case, both provisions are fundamentally in conflict with each other.

Mr. Bonte, you know well that the law stipulating that 90 % of the proceeds from administrative fines – not from criminal fines – go to the RSZ, and that 10 % go to the Treasury, applies from the entry into force of the law containing various provisions.

The other law, which still needs to be approved by the Senate – you have been sitting here long enough, Mr. Bonte, to know that too – will come into force no later than 1 year after its publication. It is obvious that in anticipation of that other law the present text will apply.

Mr. Bonte, frankly, I would be ashamed in your place. You have been sitting here for a long time. You know very well how that structure was built. Then come to your point: just say it doesn’t suit you! But it is well arranged!

I will, of course, exaggerate on the remarks made by Mrs. De Block! Mr Bonte, the two legal arrangements are absolutely not contradictory. First of all, a decision was to be made for 2010 and I can’t believe that you don’t want this return to the ONSS. In fact, 90% of administrative fines will go to the UNSS and 10% to the Treasury.

In addition, the Senate must finalize the work on the Social Criminal Code, which did not apply in 2010. He was therefore fully responsible for making a decision for 2010. This decision is clearly defined in the law containing various provisions in the Employment section: 90% to the UNSS, 10% to the Treasury for administrative fines. For us, this measure is very important, especially at the level of the ONSS.

Mr. Speaker, the Minister told us that this measure concerning the discharge of 90%/10% of the administrative fines would be sustained. What matters to me, from next year, is to know how the distribution will be settled in terms of criminal fines. However, this work still needs to be done.

I also thank the members for their interventions.

Mrs. De Block, we have known each other for a long time. You know, I don’t feel ashamed so quickly. Mrs. De Block and Mrs. Fonck, however, I would like to point out that there is indeed a contradiction between the provision that was adopted here last week or two weeks ago and which stipulates ...

Mrs. Fonck, you shake “no” with your head. Will we bet that the Senate will make an adjustment to the law that we have passed in the House? Will we make the bet? I predict that there must be an adjustment to the law that you had to get approved here mordicus. You will have to give me the right, because they are working on it today.

Mrs. Fonck, Mrs. De Block, a second, fundamental matter is the following. You are talking about shame. You must then explain to me how you get rid of the fact that you declared here last week or two weeks ago during a two-hour debate in the plenary session that it was absolutely unnecessary, because the destination of the proceeds of the administrative fines was legally established. So it was not necessary and you had all confidence in the government. It was not necessary. Today, however, you will approve a draft law in which you strongly advocate that 90 percent of the administrative fines and 50 percent of the criminal fines should be paid to the RSZ.

Mrs. De Block, you make a twist in two weeks of time: it can count. Mrs. the minister made her curve even more rapper: she only needed two days.

Mr. President, Mr. Bonte, I refer to what I stated in the committee.

There is no conflict between various provisions, which is a provision in the Social Criminal Code and another provision in the present bill. The provisions on administrative fines were deleted in the Social Criminal Code after a discussion and submission of an amendment in the committee. The only applicable provision is, therefore, the provision in Article 87 of the draft law at issue.

There remains, as you know, a small problem. After the deletion of the relevant provision in the Social Criminal Code, a small provision remains. The provisional measures stipulate that the current law of 1971 would be abolished. Of course, the aforementioned provision is not correct. Thus, after the evocation in the Senate of the aforementioned draft law concerning the introduction of a Social Criminal Code, an amendment will be submitted to remove the provision in question.

So here we have a clear provision with a very clear distribution key – 90 % and 10 % – which will become structural after a small amendment in the Senate.

I am grateful to the Minister for his explanation. I hope the ladies Fonck and De Block have listened. There is a problem, and it hears the name: Article 13b. It will be effectively deleted in the Senate. Then we can repeat the debate in this Chamber.

In other words, there is a contradiction. You know that very well. It is a good thing that the Senate will correct this. If this meeting is still taken seriously, it is better to listen to arguments and avoid this cinema.

Mrs. De Block, you are right on one point. The files were confused. We have seen enough in the Social Affairs Committee that we had to discuss three draft projects and a budget at the same time. It is the government that disrupts everything. It is the government that makes mistakes. It would be nice if you admitted it. We will remind you when the draft comes back from the Senate.

Mr. Bonte, I see that you are aiming us with fun!

First, there is no contradiction. Then I repeat that there is no problem, in the law with various provisions, regarding the article in question because, precisely, it regulates the situation 90/10 for 2010. Furthermore, I have never denied – and as I know, Mrs. De Block also – that this draft on the Social Criminal Code, including its article 13ter, is now in the Senate; therefore it is not our responsibility, here today, to debate in his place. Finally, it is obvious that Article 13ter is fundamental.

Mrs. Fonck, your responsibility does not begin in the morning and end in the evening. This is not the responsibility of a legislator. It has been up to two weeks since you approved something else here with full conviction. This needs to be corrected in the Senate. However, praise yourself fortunate, it will come back and you will be able to correct your own mistake.

Colleagues, I just want to point out that the way of working leads to accidents. For example, in the Chapter on Pensions, I have to note this in connection with Articles 27 and 28. I would like to discuss this in the presence of the Minister of Internal Affairs. Ladies and gentlemen, this is not insignificant. It is not insignificant for Parliament itself because it is again an illustration of stop and go. However, it is in any case important for police zones. What is it about? The issue is that employers who use the CDVU for their betting calculation, the betting service of the government, since they know limitations for non-payment of social security contributions. As of January 1, 2009, that is, at the beginning of this year, they have been reduced from five to three years. The legislator then ruled that a five-year limitation period was too long and that we had to go to three years. What do we see in this bill? The limitation periods are too short, they should not go back to five years, we now go to seven years. In other words, even there, the bill creates massive legal uncertainty for the governments that depend on it.

In concrete, this is about contributions that have not been paid to the accountant, to the secretary of the police zone. Then we end up in a very strange discussion. The State Council says this cannot be done. One cannot say at the beginning of the year that the limitation period is shortened from five to three years to say on 22 December that it is extended from three to seven years. This creates legal uncertainty. What about the aged amounts? However, the majority here says that we should do this and that the State Council is wrong, otherwise those people will lose their pensions.

Well, colleagues, if this could be true, then we should call a big alarm here and review our entire pension legislation. If it is true that if the employer does not pay contributions the employee who has worked loses his pension rights, then we will get very big accidents here. It has also been subsequently admitted that this argument does not cut wood. If the employee provides his/her benefits and pays his/her contribution, he/she retains his/her pension rights and that is good too. It is, by the way, a foundation in our pension legislation that in this way it is not dependent on whether or not the employer is sluggish.

The concrete question I am facing is the following. Mr. Doomst, you also have something to do with police zones and police colleges. This law now aims to collect contributions from the special accountants, the secretaries, with retroactive effect of seven years. My question is therefore very simple. We are drafting budgets everywhere: in local governments, in provincial governments, in police zones and in police colleges. There is, as I know, no police station in this country that takes this law into account. The question with which I am present and which I would still like to be answered by the Minister of Home Affairs, ⁇ later, is: are there directives issued for the police zones to make them careful to pay those late contributions from seven years ago?

From five to three, and from three to seven, all in one calendar year. In terms of good governance and legal certainty, that can count.

Colleagues, I would like to draw your attention to another third point: Articles 47 and 48, not insignificant articles in the context of enforcement. In fact, I would like to know Mr. Devlies’ opinion on this. It is about the fact that since year and day the social partners, employers and trade unions, unanimously and repeatedly request to work on the establishment of a committee to regulate the employment relationship. It is about the instrument that needs to come up to counter the false independence. This committee does not exist yet, but should have been established two years ago. That committee is not there because the legislature has forgotten to provide for a sufficiently long period in which the minister can act.

The Minister had to set up this committee by the end of 2007, then by the end of 2008. At one point in Parliament I questioned State Secretary Devlies on this. I asked him why these false self-employed are not addressed. He said that he would rather not want, but that he no longer has the power because the delegation period of power is over.

What does this government do? In Articles 47 and 48, it follows the suggestion of Mr. Devlies and extends the term of office until 1 January 2010. Another nine times sleep and the power period is gone again. What we know with certainty is that this committee is not composed. The royal decree is not finished, nor is the ministerial decree. In other words, as I announced in the committee, after 2 January, as soon as the Parliament meets again, I will have to go to complain to Secretary of State Devlies again. Together with me, shoulder to shoulder, he will complain, saying that it is a pity that we can do nothing about false independence. But in fact it is because the blue do not “build” in this government, which the secretary of state so literally says. Mrs. De Block, that may be above your head, but in any case it is from that angle that the wall is erected to surround social fraud, very widespread social fraud, by the way...

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Mrs. De Block, I will repeat it until something moves. And you know why? Because I am concerned about the SMEs and family ⁇ that are breaking the current band. Look at the bankruptcy figures. Take a look at the figures of small and family-owned enterprises that are breaking away from this distorted competition. I wake up from that. I try to do something about it year after year and year after year I hear the rest of the government say it’s the blue who don’t move. That is the reality.

Colleagues, this is, in any case, again a beautiful illustration of what a foul legislation we are making here. We will give a delegation of powers until 1 January 2010, for nine days. However, I think that everyone is convinced that in those nine days on government level little will move to nothing.

A fourth point addresses the questions for clarification. I want to repeat one question. On Friday morning, December 18, 2009, we submitted them to Secretary of State Courard. I have understood, Mr. Delizée, that you are today the porte-parole of Mr. Courard.

We had a discussion that Friday morning within the framework of employment measures, but also within the framework of the voluntary community service. According to the government, it has its importance as a step forward for young job seekers, sharpening experience, work ethos and discipline. There is something to say for that. Per ⁇ it is indeed better to give young people a training in a military framework, than to let them fall into unemployment. From this philosophy we can only contribute to this.

Intriguing was the discussion about why existential minimum tractors are not welcome. How does that come? Are they not considered sufficiently good to enter this voluntary community service together with other unemployed?

My question is very technical. At one point there was a non-debat going on here: it was legally difficult, it was technically difficult, the services were against, the cabinets struggled with it. However, it is up to the legislator to create opportunities for subsistence-minimum tractors. The number of these young people in the living wage system increases twice as fast as in other age categories. That the measure is socially necessary and useful is undisputed, but it was considered technically difficult and legislative it was not obvious to regulate that.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have searched and questioned again. It is sufficient for Secretary of State Courard or the Government to add a sentence to an existing KB which regulates allowances above the living wage — you may still know the matter; for example, the allowance that child allowance or alimentary allowance is not charged in relation to the living wage — namely that the Land Defense allowance is not eligible for the re-calculation of the living wage.

I want to write it myself, but I have no authority for it. By adding this small sentence to the KB, Mr. Secretary of State, you also create the possibility to open the voluntary military service for living wreckers. If a group of them had virtue, it would be that group. From a social point of view, it would be most meaningful if that group were eligible.

The question remains whether the government or the secretary of state is willing to modify that KB as soon as possible. I have understood that in the meantime eight hundred eighty-eight people are knocking at the door of Land Defense to begin. I hope that there are not too many lifelongers at the moment, because they could suffer unnecessary cold.

Another element, Mrs. Minister, is the amendment that allows us to discuss the draft only today. This amendment should help reduce the shame of the social partners and the government for not getting a breakthrough in the statute of workers and servants. That is why we are debating this today. This amendment should definitely be implemented.

I would like to make a correction. I read in the press this weekend that the arrangement would be that all workers would be entitled to 1,666 euros during the first six months of the new year if they were dismissed. This has been ⁇ in almost all newspapers over the past week.

The truth is that it is a part of the workers. It is not about all workers. A part of the workers will receive 1,666 euros in the case of dismissal. I think that in the full crisis period, it is not a bad thing to spread messages that are not correct at that point.

All workers working in intercommunals, local governments, governments and for a large part in the non-profit sector will not receive €1,666 if they are dismissed.

Please spread the correct information, Mr. Minister. Don’t let people stand on the wrong leg in this way.

Why do I emphasize this again, colleagues? To indicate that this may belong to an anti-crisis policy, but on the other hand does not relate to the dossier of the unity statute nor to the dossier of the discrimination of which workers in that country are the victims under the law. This has nothing to do with this. Furthermore, there is discrimination among workers.

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One worker will receive 1,666 euros upon dismissal, the other worker will not receive it. If that is not discrimination! Is that not true, Mr. Vanhengel?

Mr. Bonte, let’s be honest. This is not a surprise for you! The social consultation took place with the social partners and the group of ten. The group of ten is responsible for social consultation with the private enterprises and now the non-profit sector, and so on, but not at all for the public office. We are talking about measures linked to the crisis. It is normal that the public office has a different system. If the social partners had achieved results, that would be a result for the workers of the private enterprises or the non-profit sector, but not for the workers of the public office. This is not a surprise at all, and it is not discrimination. With many measures, the same happens.

Mrs. Minister, you now refer to this arrangement as if it is the result of an agreement between the social partners. It is not so. This is a response from the government after it has determined that the social partners are blocked. That is what happens. I give you the right to behave in this way, you know.

If the government does this, why does it not do it for all workers? You now refer to the social partners in the public office and you say they should do that. I tell you that a worker in this country has a difficult time, and if he is fired, regardless of who his employer was, he has a ⁇ difficult time. If the government itself acts after it determines that social consultation fails, it would do better for all workers bound by a contract which you and I believe provides far too little protection to people who are sometimes years at work. This, I thought, is the criticism that we have together of the labour contract, of the labour statute, namely, that in comparison with the rest of the world, it offers far too little protection against dismissal.

If that’s our criticism, Mrs. Minister, I don’t see why the government, if it does, does it only for people in the private sector and not for everyone else. This is about hundreds of thousands of jobs, Mrs. Minister.

You are right that the devastation caused by the economy is much greater in the private sector. In other words, it would not cost the government a massive amount of extra money to treat all the workers of this country in the same way. That point I wanted to make. Therefore, I would like to urge, Mrs. Minister, that you or your services should distinguish from now on when it is communicated. It has nothing to do here with a unity status or an attempt at a unity status. It can fit into an anti-crisis policy. In that I can follow you, but make sure that the worker who goes to pick up the garbage baskets for the intercommunal for household garbage collection, has as many rights as someone who is working elsewhere.

I see Mr. Vanhengel shaking his head again.

He already gets more than any other, because he falls under COAs and IPAs.

Mr. Vanhengel, do you think that a worker in the rabbit foil sector has no cao above him? Do you think that a worker who is involved in the additional paritary committee for the workers has no COC? Or in construction? There are also COAs and the protection will very often be better than in the intercommunals.

Yes, but they do not pose any significant risk at this time.

This is about respect for workers, about equal treatment of workers. If they are less at risk of being fired, it will also cost the government much less. If two workers live in the same street and one must leave the intercommunal, the local government, the workplace of the OCMW or from article 60, then he receives no allowance, while the other worker, who leaves a company in a crisis situation, receives a allowance paid out by the government. These two people are in exactly the same situation; they are two workers who earn their bread by making their hands dirty. If they are fired, however, one receives a government premium and the other does not.

It is a choice of the government, Mrs. Minister. You have chosen it. I just ask to tell the truth here and beyond, and I do not say that every worker, if he is dismissed during the first six months of next year, will receive the same dismissal compensation.

I would like to comment on an amendment that I submitted together with Ms. Kitir. At some point, I hoped it would also find a majority. It relates to a problem that we do not experience, but that many unemployed people do experience during this crisis, namely that there is very much applied by job seekers, but that only in three out of ten cases an answer comes from the employer.

I think this shows a lack of respect for people. If one candidates for a vacancy that has been officially published, we must expect, colleagues, that people will get a response, even if it is a negative answer, but then we can still expect that one will get a response.

Recent research has shown that the crisis also plays a role in responding less and less to job-seekers’ applications. It costs nothing to the government. It costs nothing to the government. That costs the business an e-mail, maybe a stamp. Colleagues, it would be a good thing, especially in these bitter times, if we with this Parliament made a legal provision that people who are looking for work, people who apply for officially published vacancies – so it is not about the spontaneous applications – get a response.

In the Social Affairs Committee, we discussed this issue. We all agreed that it would be appropriate that job seekers who apply, who respond to announcements, receive a confirmation of their actions. In addition, the ONEM’s attitude has been denounced; in fact, accompanying the unemployed should not be harassment.

In these circumstances, we felt that it was better to proceed, at the return, to an in-depth analysis of this problem. The Minister informed us that she agreed to hold hearings, meet local officials or, in any case, national officials of ONEM to see how to improve the situation in terms of general support for the unemployed.

Mr. Bonte initiated this amendment in the committee and we even suspended the meeting for a while to examine it. It is also one of the many elements to be discussed on the table of the social partners. Everyone in the committee indeed agreed that applications should be treated with the necessary respect by employers. But to go so far, to incorporate in a law various provisions such an extensive amendment, we did not find it possible, especially because there were also sanctions for employers. I called it a sensible initiative in the committee, but it was prepared too prematurely. We also discussed this in joint consultation.

Your work is not lost, Mr. Bonte. We are willing to discuss this as a separate design or a separate topic in the future. You say that the measure costs the employer nothing, but Mr. Mayeur, as the OCMW chairman of Brussels, would have to use a number of full-time equivalents to send answers to those employers. I mean there are many aspects. Is it enough by mail? Should it be by letter? In what form? Is every application, even written on the corner of the kitchen table, also an application for work and so on? Is it also valid if one applies for a job that is really not within the margins of the diplomas and the professional competence of the applicant? All of this must be addressed. We have not dismissed your proposal. We suspended the meeting. We discussed that. We have received information about this through our channels. We have not taken light on this at all. The case is being prosecuted because we found that the measure could not simply include various provisions in a law.

Ms. De Block, in the program law and in the law various provisions, it is not different than that measures are pushed between. I would like to give many more illustrations of this. Let’s talk about garbage laws. We have discussed three of them in a row in the Social Affairs Committee, in which the government takes significant measures. I do not understand the argument that my proposal is too comprehensive. In all honesty, we have seen massive interventions here in the last weeks and even months. I recall the amendment submitted by colleague Fonck but actually by the government at eleven o’clock, which caused us to overlook the agenda of the plenary session. This is only substantial: for six months the measure applies that a private sector worker who is dismissed receives 1,666 euros!

These are substantial measures, including for a budget that we will discuss later and for which the government no longer has time to adjust them.

In any case, the above are substantial matters that may be at eleven o’clock. However, my proposal cannot.

Mrs. De Block, my proposal is not new. It does not fall from the air. We submitted the proposal a few years ago. Social partners have already considered the proposal.

The only question I have is the following. We have billions of euros left for support and employment. We have billions of euros left to cope with a banking crisis. We take all sorts of legislative initiatives that, with the best intentions, still hang with heels and eyes together. Why can’t money be allocated for a very balanced proposal for the hundreds of thousands of job seekers?

Mrs De Block, you’ve talked about working by email, and so on. However, all this is stated in the proposal. You can be for or against. We want to adjust the proposal. I would even like to tell the members who were not in the Social Affairs Committee that we were even willing to leave the sanctioning to the authority of the King.

Mrs. De Block and other members, the proposal simply aims to bring back respect for people who are in difficulty, who are in unemployment, who do their best and, whether or not hunted by OCMWs, RVA, VDAB and other institutions, apply for open, officially published vacancies. They must get an answer. Mrs. De Block, be assured, it will not cost the Brussels OCMW even one full-time equivalent to get through the intended procedure.

At the end of the debate, I would like to return to the reaction that also Mrs. Dieu has, namely the link between the obligation to respond to requests and the RVA sanctioning machines, as some call them.

If there is one thing we know, it is this. This is not the first crisis we are experiencing. This is not the first period in which there is a very high, structural unemployment, including among young people. If there is one thing we all know, it is that the worst service that can be done to people is that they are discouraged from applying and applying. The worst thing that can be done is to put yourself on the side and stop looking at the possibilities that may be here and there.

One thing is clear. When a person does not receive a response, such action is demotivating and discouraging. It works in any case and ⁇ in young people, structural unemployment in the hand.

My group continues to insist, hence the amendment we have submitted again. We remain prepared to leave the sanction to the King. In any case, it would be a very good thing to give an encouraging signal to job seekers in full crisis — not waiting for next year or within two years, if the worst hopefully is over. That signal is that they should continue to try and seek, that they should not be discouraged and that they may need to undergo vocational training because the tide will ever turn. They must therefore make sure that they themselves do not remain on the side completely dismotivated.

Colleagues, these were some of the things we wanted to communicate following this draft. The red thread in this story is that there are a lot of mistakes to be corrected here. With great certainty we can say that in the very short period that lies ahead of us we will also have to repair these bills again. I have pointed out the points, but you continue to persistently hold onto a series of mistakes. We regret to note that for job seekers, the minimum step that does not charge the budget is not intended. In any case, I will be able to speak in detail about the rest of the employment policy when we talk about the draft on the promotion of employment.

I also asked two specific questions. I see that Mrs. Turtelboom has returned for that.

Mr. Gilkinet is also on the speaker list and it is almost 13:00. I suggest that Mrs. Turtelboom, who has returned specifically, answers your specific questions. After that, we can pause for an hour and then continue with Mr. Gilkinet and of course with the answers of the other members of the government.

The discussion concerned the limitation periods and the extension of those limitation periods. I agree with what the competent minister in the competent committee has said on this subject. The extension of those limitations only ensures that we secure the pension rights of two categories. That is why the limitation periods have been extended. That is also the reason why the competent minister has taken that decision and has included that article in the law containing various provisions.

Per ⁇ you should first read the report of the competent Chamber Committee. In it you will read that the Minister of Social Affairs admits that the secretaries and especially the accountants, who are in the police zones, do not risk their pension rights at all. At least not. The argument that you repeat now, and which was already in the memory of explanation, is therefore gone.

The Minister of Social Affairs has given me and other members the right to point out that it is not right when an employer, in this case the police zones, does not pay his contribution, that the employee, being the accountant and the secretary, would therefore not receive his pension rights. You have spent enough time in the Social Affairs Committee to know that it is not true, when an employer does not pay his contribution, that the employee would therefore automatically lose his pension rights. If the employee can prove his performed working days in accordance with what he has to do, then he is entitled to his pension. This is also the case here.

Mrs. Minister, I referred to a few other elements.

At the beginning of this year, as of 1 January 2009, the limitation period has been reduced from five to three. Now we are at the end of this year and the limitation period is extended, from three to seven. The State Council says that this cannot be done, but the government continues. The consequences of this will be seen in practice.

In any case, my political question is whether you know one police zone that takes into account, when formulating his budget these days, the fact that he is better to register social security contributions in his budget for years back? In other words, are guidelines given or are they being made? If these guidelines still need to be delivered, you can best send them before the end of this year.

But like with so many provisions in the bill, decisions are made, but the government is apparently absolutely not engaged in implementing those decisions. I think I could have given enough examples of this.

The meeting is closed. The next meeting will be held on Tuesday, December 22, 2009 at 14.15.

The session is lifted. Next session on Tuesday, December 22, 2009 at 14.15 pm.

The meeting will close at 12.58 a.m.

The session is suspended at 12.58 a.m.

This report has no annex.

This report has no annex.