Coalition parties slide in new poll as D66 lose ground on left

The three parties that will form the next government have fallen back to 66 seats in the latest monthly EenVandaag opinion poll, the same number they won in October’s general election.

Progressive liberal party D66 are projected to win 26 seats, one fewer than they currently hold but a drop of five since the last poll in November.

EenVandaag said some left-wing voters who backed Rob Jetten’s party at the election had crossed over to GroenLinks-PvdA after D66 decided to go into government with the right-wing liberal VVD.

GL-PvdA is up five seats since the last poll and now stands on 21. One voter told EenVandaag: “Jesse Klaver has brought a different energy to the party and Rob Jetten has moved too far to the right.”

Jetten’s hopes of bringing GL-PvdA into the cabinet were blocked by VVD leader Dilan Yesilgöz, leaving the two parties to form a minority cabinet with the Christian Democrats (CDA).

The VVD, which joined the talks after the previous poll, has gained three seats to 23, swapping places with the CDA, which drops from 20 to 17. The VVD won 22 seats at the election, while the CDA took 18.

PVV drops back

Geert Wilders’ far-right PVV continued its sharp drop-off since the election, falling to 18 seats in the latest poll.

Wilders won 27 seats at the last election but voters appear to have been turned off by his stubborn refusal to work with the minority cabinet. His party suffered a blow last week when seven MPs broke away, led by Gidi Markuszower, partly because they wanted to take a more flexible stance.

Nearly four in 10 PVV voters said they would consider switching to Markuszower’s group, along with 23% of those who backed Joost Eerdmans’ JA21 at the election and 22% of Forum voor Democratie supporters.

“JA21 is taking a more positive approach towards the new cabinet,” one PVV voter said. “I think that’s important, because party politics alone aren’t enough for society.”

The losses for the PVV were offset by gains for JA21, up from nine seats to 12, and Forum voor Democratie, which won seven seats at the election but is now forecast to win 10. That gives the far-right block 40 seats, more than a quarter of the total.

Further down the order the farmers’ party BBB, the junior partner in the caretaker government, drop from four seats to one, while the pensioners’ party 50Plus, who have two seats, are up to four.