Taxpayers' money used to finance Labour Europropaganda campaign: SP
demands explanation
http://international.sp.nl/bericht/34568/090515-
taxpayers_money_used_to_finance_labour_europropaganda_campaign_sp_demand
s_explanation.html
Taxpayers' money used to finance Labour Europropaganda campaign: SP
demands explanation
May 15th, 2009 . The SP has, not for the first time, tabled questions
to the Christian Democrat-Labour coalition government on the subject of
Labour's apparent policy of using public money to further the party's
ends, rather than the national interest. Labour Party (PvdA) Secretary
of State for Europe Frans Timmermans set off last week, along with a
coterie of Labour's great and good, on a pro-EU tour organised by a
bureau of prominent PvdA personalities, This would have been
unobjectionable had it been financed by the PvdA, rather than by the
taxpayer.
However, "the initiative '27 hours for Europe' had a strong flavour of
Labour," was the conclusion drawn by SP European affairs spokesman
Harry Van Bommel. The events involved were organised by a company, BKB,
run by prominent Labour personalities. Many prominent Labour figures
took part in these events, including Minister of Education and Culture
Ronald Plasterk, Secretary of State for Public Health Jet Bussemaker,
and the mayors of Rotterdam, Groningen and Utrecht.
Frans Timmermans Labour Secretary of State for Europe Frans Timmermans
"It's quite clear that this became no more nor less than a propaganda
tour, an opportunity for Labour's enthusiasm for the EU to be heard
loud and clear," said Van Bommel. "Virtually nothing was said about the
criticisms with which people in the Netherlands have responded to such
matters as the over-hasty expansion of the European Union, the
bureaucratic character of the EU and the democratic deficit. This tour
became nothing but a propaganda festival, paid for out of our taxes."
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