The Senate approved a request on Tuesday, March 25, for advice from the Council of State regarding the consequences and potential actions if a budget is rejected. This includes the constitutional implications for individual ministers, the government, and parliament. More often than usual, substantive (plenary) discussions on budget proposals have taken place in the Senate over the past two years. Due to the changed composition of both chambers, where the governing parties lack eight seats for a majority in the senate, the question arose about the consequences of rejecting a budget proposal in the Senate. The factions of OPNL, GroenLinks-PvdA, SGP, D66, CDA, Volt, SP, PvdD, VVD, JA21, ChristenUnie, BBB, and 50PLUS voted in favor of seeking advice. The PVV faction voted against it, while the FVD faction was absent during the vote.
In 1907, a budget was last rejected in the senate, and the current Comptabiliteitswet 2016 (Cw) does not account for the possibility of a budget proposal being rejected. This makes the consequences unclear if a budget proposal is rejected in the Senate. Previously, there was also a need for clarity in the House of Representatives. For this reason, the House broadly accepted the Grinwis motion to ask the Court of Audit for advice on this issue. This request for advice was sent last week. The Senate is now doing something similar with a request for information from the Council of State.
In its request, the Senate seeks attention for questions such as to what extent can one fall back on the approved budget of the previous year after rejecting a draft budget, whether the government may submit a new draft budget if the parliament has rejected the first draft, and what are potential shortcomings or uncertainties in existing legislation. The Senate also asks for clarity on the consequences of rejecting a draft budget for society regarding already undertaken obligations and the legality of entering into obligations and making expenditures after rejecting a draft budget. Does it matter whether it concerns obligations and expenditures for ongoing or new policies included in the (rejected) draft budget? And does it also matter whether it concerns cutbacks or intensifications? The Senate also wants to know what the consequences were of previously rejected budgets.