Proposition de loi modifiant les lois du 18 juillet 1966 sur l'emploi des langues en matière administrative en ce qui concerne la surveillance de l'exécution de ces lois.
General information ¶
- Authors
- VB Ortwin Depoortere, Barbara Pas, Frank Troosters, Tom Van Grieken, Dries Van Langenhove, Hans Verreyt
- Submission date
- Sept. 30, 2019
- Official page
- Visit
- Status
- Rejected
- Requirement
- Simple
- Subjects
- Brussels region administrative supervision municipality use of languages
Voting ¶
- Voted to adopt
- Groen CD&V Vooruit Ecolo LE PS | SP DéFI Open Vld MR PVDA | PTB
- Voted to reject
- N-VA LDD VB
Party dissidents ¶
- Sammy Mahdi (CD&V) voted to reject.
Contact form ¶
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Discussion ¶
Sept. 17, 2020 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)
Full source
Frank Troosters VB ⚙
The proposal amends the laws of 18 July 1966 on the use of languages in administrative matters with regard to the supervision of the implementation of these laws. As the Chairman informed, this proposal has already been discussed in the committee, which I will not repeat, but will briefly summarize. Everyone knows that those who enter the Brussels local government must have knowledge of both national languages, except for professionals who do not come into contact with the public. To prove their knowledge of the second national language, candidates must take an exam at Selor. The Deputy Governor is charged with the control and supervision of the applicable provisions and in case of breach of the provisions he may proceed to a suspension.
After a suspension, there are two possibilities: either the municipality withdraws the suspended decision, or, if the municipality does not, the decision must be destroyed by the local custodial authority. In the case of the Brussels municipalities, the custody falls under the Minister of the Brussels Government, in the case of the OCMWs, under two colleagues of the Joint Community Commission.
The problem is, if the destruction by the supervisory authority does not take place within certain time limits, that a situation of unlawful hiring arises while the persons concerned are simply allowed to continue working. This, of course, opens the door to abuse, despite the fact that the Council of State has yet ordered the destruction.
The bill contains a lot of figures, all of which have been discussed, but I will now limit myself to the figures of 2019, the most recent figures. In the municipalities 70 % of the appointments were illegal and in the OCMWs the situation is much worse, as 89 % of the appointments were illegal. These figures illustrate what we have known for a long time. It is well known that since the custody of the Brussels municipalities has passed to the Brussels regional authorities, the destruction of the illegal appointments has remained a dead letter. In fact, if we look at the linguistic fairness agreement concluded within the Brussels government, which is actually a linguistic breach agreement, we can conclude that the Brussels regional custody authorities simply lack the applicable language laws.
In addition to the suspension power, the destruction power is deposited directly with the deputy governor. For two reasons, this bill is very important. First, the existing abuses, in practice the fracking in the Brussels administrations, are being stopped. Second, the proposal prevents it from getting worse in the future.
In this context, I refer to a writing by Luckas Vander Taelen in De Standaard.
The preparatory note of the preformator Egbert Lachaert makes the future for the Dutch speakers in Brussels not really good.
In the so-called preparatory note of Egbert Lachaert, there are proposals about Brussels. This is the only good news for the Dutch-speaking Brussels. The negotiators have some interest in their city. Those who read the Brussels ideas of Lachaert, the enthusiasm quickly disappears. You could expect that a Flemish preformator would once and for all want to end that illegal state and would propose to make the suspension of the deputy governor binding."
This is exactly what our bill is about.
“Unfortunately . Lachaert wants the opposite. He even puts forward an old French-speaking requirement, which has always been unacceptable for Brussels Flamings: bilingual services, single-speaking officials. In practice, it comes down to the fact that the Flamings almost become paria in Brussels and will get a separate lock. This as a taste for the anti-Flemish Vivaldi coalition of Egbert Lachaert.”
That is why we submit this bill. We would like to transfer the destruction power to the Deputy Governor, in accordance with the technical provisions in the document. I ask anyone who has a little Flemish or Dutch-speaking reflex to support this proposal.