The decision to pay former finance minister Gerrit Zalm a basic salary of €750,000 a year for overseeing the merger between nationalised banks Fortis Nederland and ABN Amro, has angered many opposition MPs.

Zalm, who was finance minister for 12 years, will get a bonus of €100,000 for every €1bn profit that is made when the combined bank is sold in a few years time, with a maximum of €375,000.
The basic salary is in line with his current pay deal at DSB Bank, where he is chief financial officer. But opposition MPs say it conflicts with government pledges to take action to moderate executive pay at state-owned companies.
The decision to pay Zalm such a large salary, four and a half times the prime minister’s salary, particularly angered MPs from the left-wing opposition and the anti-immigration PVV party.
Socialist Party leader Agnes Kant told the NRC that the pay deal is unacceptable at a time when a new morality is needed in banking. ‘If this is the new morality, then the future looks bleak,’ she said.
But coalition MPs back the move. ‘Zalm is a heavyweight. It is up to the finance minister to come up with a pay deal in line with market norms,’ a spokesman for the ruling Christian Democrats is quoted as saying in the NRC.
And Paul Tang, Labour’s finance spokesman, pointed out that Zalm will earn less than his predecessor Rijkman Groenink.
ABN Amro and Fortis Nederland were nationalised last month. On Friday, finance minister Wouter Bos announced that they are to be merged into a single state-owned bank. This bank will be put up for sale in a few years time.
Fortis Nederland’s insurance activities are to be sold off immediately.