Minister wants answers from councils with no refugee housing

Asylum minister Bart van den Brink is demanding local councils which are not providing enough beds for asylum seekers explain why they have failed to comply with legislation requiring them to do.

Currently 250 out of 342 local authority areas are not taking their fair share of refugees, as required by a law to spread them more evenly around the country.

Next week, the minister plans to summon councils to explain why not, current affairs show Nieuwsuur reported on Thursday evening.

NOS has an interactive map showing how many refugees, excluding Ukrainian nationals, are being housed and in which local authority.

It shows, for example, that many of the richest parts of the country – such as Blaricum, Laren and Gooise Meren – have no refugee accommodation at all, while Bloemendaal on the coast provides 28 places rather than 151.

By contrast parts of northern Groningen – which includes many of the poorest areas in the country – as well as wealthy Wassenaar provide far more beds than they have been asked to.

By providing proper accommodation, officials hope to avoid this week’s problems in which refugees were forced to sleep outside or were bussed, late at night, to sleep in emergency accommodation in halls.

The law requires local authorities to provide an additional 40,000 beds before the end of the year. But there have been a string of violent protests against plans to establish refugee centres – even temporary – in many towns and villages.

In Loosdrecht, for example, the former town hall earmarked as a temporary centre was firebombed.

Meanwhile, in Utrecht on Thursday night, thousands of people gathered for a pro-refugee protest and to show their opposition to the recent protests. There were similar demonstrations condemning the rioting in Nijmegen, Leeuwarden and Groningen last weekend.

There is increasing evidence that the riots are being partly organised by extreme right-wing groups, and research by NOS has shown four in 10 of the troublemakers who have been arrested come from other parts of the country.