Discrimination test stays voluntary despite commission’s push

The Dutch home affairs minister has ruled out making an anti-discrimination tool compulsory for government bodies, despite a parliamentary motion that all public service providers should use it.

The tool, known as the discriminatietoets or discrimination test, is a self-assessment exercise developed by the State Commission Against Discrimination and Racism.

Over four group sessions, public bodies – government departments, councils, agencies – examine their own processes for areas where citizens could be treated unfairly because of their background.

It was designed to catch the kind of institutional bias that produced the childcare benefits scandal, in which the tax office wrongly accused tens of thousands of mostly minority-background parents of fraud.

Encouraging adoption

In a letter to parliament on Tuesday, home affairs minister Pieter Heerma said the test would remain voluntary. Roughly 40 public bodies have used it in the past six months.

He said the test is too new, that mandatory adoption could weaken the impact, and that some organisations already have their own equivelant instruments.

The ministry will instead spend more than €4.3 million between 2026 and 2030 on encouraging the test’s adoption, using training for organisations and embedding the test in the standard checklist that ministries already follow when drafting policy and legislation, and providing process coaches.

“Discrimination by the government is unacceptable,” Heerma said in a statement. “The State Commission has developed a powerful instrument with the discrimination test. We will now make sure it really lands at the organisations that need to use it.”

MPs called for mandatory use

The decision goes against parliamentary support. After a pilot in 2024 with customs, the city of Arnhem and student grants agency DUO, MPs said that all public service providers should use the test. The state commission has also called for mandatory use.

The commission was set up by parliament in 2022 as part of the response to the benefits scandal, and has consistently argued that discrimination by the state is not an incident but a structural problem – and that without mandatory self-assessment, scandals like the benefits affair will keep happening.

The Dutch government has so far spent more than €9 billion compensating victims of the benefits scandal, and in 2024 set aside a further €61 million to repay students discriminated against by DUO, which used an algorithm that disproportionately flagged students from high-migration areas.

The commission, whose four-year mandate is ending, will deliver its final report to the government on 8 June.