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There were record traffic jams on the Dutch roads on Tuesday as thousands of farmers headed for The Hague to take part in a mass demonstration, hundreds of whom are travelling by tractor.
Motoring organisation ANWB said Tuesday morning’s rush hour, with over 1,000 kilometres of jams, was the worst ever – with queues of 40 kilometres on the A2 from Utrecht to The Hague alone.
originally posted by: LightSpeedDriver
There are more pigs in stalls than humans living in Holland. Strange but true.
reply to operation mindcrime
Lol...nope
What LightSpeed said...farmers can't make a buck because emission regulations etc..
Peace
How the Dutch Fell Out of Love With the EU
After decades of embracing a firmly pro-EU stance, the Dutch appear increasingly out of sorts and disappointed with the European Union.
The Netherlands is too small to be considered a threat, but large enough to be taken seriously: with 17 million inhabitants, it might be called the largest of the small EU member states.
Strategically, the Netherlands has worked to maintain a balance in the EU: among the large countries, and among the institutions. It enthusiastically promoted British membership of the European Community in the 1970s to balance against Franco-German dominance. And it saw a strong European Commission as a way to keep large member states in check and promote the interests of smaller.
On foreign policy, the Netherlands favors strong international engagement but rarely takes a controversial position. The country wants a strong EU in international affairs to amplify its own bilateral foreign policy and address issues for which it does not have the bandwidth by itself. But it wants the European External Action Service to coordinate European foreign policies, not direct them.
Since the early 2000s, the Netherlands’ image as a mainstream, no-nonsense partner has changed: the Dutch have started to view the EU with growing suspicion. EU enlargement in 2004 altered the union’s internal balance and member states’ voting weights.The Netherlands has less of a say than some of the newest members, yet it is one of the largest per-capita contributors to the EU budget. Despite the benefits in mutual trade, a larger union meant the Dutch voice became softer. This proved particularly uncomfortable when member states agreed to hand over more powers to Brussels.
The eurozone crisis added further concerns about the EU’s direction of travel: the Netherlands became a creditor country that was asked to bail out Southern eurozone members while having to take their word for it that they would make the reforms necessary to weather the financial storm. The perception that the Dutch were left paying the bill while other countries flouted the rules became fertile ground for Euroskeptic politicians. It boosted the anti-immigrant, anti-EU popularity of Geert Wilders and made the Dutch government increasingly critical of the commission and ever-closer EU cooperation. The government saw the commission less as the defender of small countries’ interests and more as an overly ambitious regulator with an appetite to expand its reach.
Today, support for EU membership hovers at around 40 percent, feeding speculation that the Netherlands could be next to leave the club after Britain voted to quit in June 2016.
Brexit will also make it more difficult for countries to block decisions in the EU Council under the union’s voting rules.To stop France and Germany from pushing a decision through, a blocking minority of thirteen member states is needed. The EU’s new arithmetic puts smaller (and Northern) states at a disadvantage.
The Dutch government seeks a more pragmatic European Union, not a federalist fairy tale.
It remains to be seen whether the Netherlands can ensure that its interests are protected and its concerns heard in a union that will inevitably revolve around Berlin and Paris. For the time being, the Dutch feel they are being pushed—albeit reluctantly—ever closer to the exit.
originally posted by: paraphi
a reply to: operation mindcrime
A picture paints a thousand words...
originally posted by: Moravec
originally posted by: paraphi
a reply to: operation mindcrime
A picture paints a thousand words...
Emission of air pollutants According to target 2020/2030
RIVM = National Institute for Public Health and the Environment
originally posted by: chris_stibrany
a reply to: F2d5thCavv2
What happened with this; any response from government or anyone of note?
Thousands of irate farmers had driven tractors to The Hague hours earlier in their third large protest in a matter of weeks.
Tractor convoys set out in the early morning, first for the city of Utrecht and later to The Hague, causing long traffic jams across the Netherlands. More than 375 km (233 miles) of roads were blocked, drivers organization ANWB said.