NZ Herald
  • Home
  • Latest news
  • Herald NOW
  • Video
  • New Zealand
  • Sport
  • World
  • Business
  • Entertainment
  • Podcasts
  • Quizzes
  • Opinion
  • Lifestyle
  • Travel
  • Viva
  • Weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • New Zealand
    • All New Zealand
    • Crime
    • Politics
    • Education
    • Open Justice
    • Scam Update
  • Herald NOW
  • On The Up
  • World
    • All World
    • Australia
    • Asia
    • UK
    • United States
    • Middle East
    • Europe
    • Pacific
  • Business
    • All Business
    • MarketsSharesCurrencyCommoditiesStock TakesCrypto
    • Markets with Madison
    • Media Insider
    • Business analysis
    • Personal financeKiwiSaverInterest ratesTaxInvestment
    • EconomyInflationGDPOfficial cash rateEmployment
    • Small business
    • Business reportsMood of the BoardroomProject AucklandSustainable business and financeCapital markets reportAgribusiness reportInfrastructure reportDynamic business
    • Deloitte Top 200 Awards
    • CompaniesAged CareAgribusinessAirlinesBanking and financeConstructionEnergyFreight and logisticsHealthcareManufacturingMedia and MarketingRetailTelecommunicationsTourism
  • Opinion
    • All Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Editorials
    • Business analysis
    • Premium opinion
    • Letters to the editor
  • Politics
  • Sport
    • All Sport
    • OlympicsParalympics
    • RugbySuper RugbyNPCAll BlacksBlack FernsRugby sevensSchool rugby
    • CricketBlack CapsWhite Ferns
    • Racing
    • NetballSilver Ferns
    • LeagueWarriorsNRL
    • FootballWellington PhoenixAuckland FCAll WhitesFootball FernsEnglish Premier League
    • GolfNZ Open
    • MotorsportFormula 1
    • Boxing
    • UFC
    • BasketballNBABreakersTall BlacksTall Ferns
    • Tennis
    • Cycling
    • Athletics
    • SailingAmerica's CupSailGP
    • Rowing
  • Lifestyle
    • All Lifestyle
    • Viva - Food, fashion & beauty
    • Society Insider
    • Royals
    • Sex & relationships
    • Food & drinkRecipesRecipe collectionsRestaurant reviewsRestaurant bookings
    • Health & wellbeing
    • Fashion & beauty
    • Pets & animals
    • The Selection - Shop the trendsShop fashionShop beautyShop entertainmentShop giftsShop home & living
    • Milford's Investing Place
  • Entertainment
    • All Entertainment
    • TV
    • MoviesMovie reviews
    • MusicMusic reviews
    • BooksBook reviews
    • Culture
    • ReviewsBook reviewsMovie reviewsMusic reviewsRestaurant reviews
  • Travel
    • All Travel
    • News
    • New ZealandNorthlandAucklandWellingtonCanterburyOtago / QueenstownNelson-TasmanBest NZ beaches
    • International travelAustraliaPacific IslandsEuropeUKUSAAfricaAsia
    • Rail holidays
    • Cruise holidays
    • Ski holidays
    • Luxury travel
    • Adventure travel
  • Kāhu Māori news
  • Environment
    • All Environment
    • Our Green Future
  • Talanoa Pacific news
  • Property
    • All Property
    • Property Insider
    • Interest rates tracker
    • Residential property listings
    • Commercial property listings
  • Health
  • Technology
    • All Technology
    • AI
    • Social media
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology
    • Opinion
    • Audio & podcasts
  • Weather forecasts
    • All Weather forecasts
    • Kaitaia
    • Whangārei
    • Dargaville
    • Auckland
    • Thames
    • Tauranga
    • Hamilton
    • Whakatāne
    • Rotorua
    • Tokoroa
    • Te Kuiti
    • Taumaranui
    • Taupō
    • Gisborne
    • New Plymouth
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Dannevirke
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Levin
    • Paraparaumu
    • Masterton
    • Wellington
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Blenheim
    • Westport
    • Reefton
    • Kaikōura
    • Greymouth
    • Hokitika
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
    • Wānaka
    • Oamaru
    • Queenstown
    • Dunedin
    • Gore
    • Invercargill
  • Meet the journalists
  • Promotions & competitions
  • OneRoof property listings
  • Driven car news

Puzzles & Quizzes

  • Puzzles
    • All Puzzles
    • Sudoku
    • Code Cracker
    • Crosswords
    • Cryptic crossword
    • Wordsearch
  • Quizzes
    • All Quizzes
    • Morning quiz
    • Afternoon quiz
    • Sports quiz

Regions

  • Northland
    • All Northland
    • Far North
    • Kaitaia
    • Kerikeri
    • Kaikohe
    • Bay of Islands
    • Whangarei
    • Dargaville
    • Kaipara
    • Mangawhai
  • Auckland
  • Waikato
    • All Waikato
    • Hamilton
    • Coromandel & Hauraki
    • Matamata & Piako
    • Cambridge
    • Te Awamutu
    • Tokoroa & South Waikato
    • Taupō & Tūrangi
  • Bay of Plenty
    • All Bay of Plenty
    • Katikati
    • Tauranga
    • Mount Maunganui
    • Pāpāmoa
    • Te Puke
    • Whakatāne
  • Rotorua
  • Hawke's Bay
    • All Hawke's Bay
    • Napier
    • Hastings
    • Havelock North
    • Central Hawke's Bay
    • Wairoa
  • Taranaki
    • All Taranaki
    • Stratford
    • New Plymouth
    • Hāwera
  • Manawatū - Whanganui
    • All Manawatū - Whanganui
    • Whanganui
    • Palmerston North
    • Manawatū
    • Tararua
    • Horowhenua
  • Wellington
    • All Wellington
    • Kapiti
    • Wairarapa
    • Upper Hutt
    • Lower Hutt
  • Nelson & Tasman
    • All Nelson & Tasman
    • Motueka
    • Nelson
    • Tasman
  • Marlborough
  • West Coast
  • Canterbury
    • All Canterbury
    • Kaikōura
    • Christchurch
    • Ashburton
    • Timaru
  • Otago
    • All Otago
    • Oamaru
    • Dunedin
    • Balclutha
    • Alexandra
    • Queenstown
    • Wanaka
  • Southland
    • All Southland
    • Invercargill
    • Gore
    • Stewart Island
  • Gisborne

Media

  • Video
    • All Video
    • NZ news video
    • Herald NOW
    • Business news video
    • Politics news video
    • Sport video
    • World news video
    • Lifestyle video
    • Entertainment video
    • Travel video
    • Markets with Madison
    • Kea Kids news
  • Podcasts
    • All Podcasts
    • The Front Page
    • On the Tiles
    • Ask me Anything
    • The Little Things
  • Cartoons
  • Photo galleries
  • Today's Paper - E-editions
  • Photo sales
  • Classifieds

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / World

Dutch voters get chance to show their Animal instincts

Bloomberg
3 Mar, 2017 04:00 PM4 mins to read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  Sign in here

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save

    Share this article

The billboards are out as the Netherlands gets into campaigning mode ahead of the election on March 15. Photo / AP

The billboards are out as the Netherlands gets into campaigning mode ahead of the election on March 15. Photo / AP

Minor parties expected to play a major role in forming a coalition government.

The animals are on the march.

When traditional politics fractures, new parties come to the fore. And in the Netherlands, the Party for the Animals is in the running for the March 15 national election.

While Geert Wilders' Freedom Party and Prime Minister Mark Rutte's Liberals fight it out for first place, the need for coalition partners means the Animal party could play a role in creating a working majority needed to form a government.

The rise in nationalist sentiment, which has bolstered groups such as the UK Independence Party (UKip) and Marine Le Pen's National Front in France, threatens to disrupt the conventional order in the Netherlands, one of the core founding members of the European Union. A new governing coalition that successfully excludes the anti-Islam, anti-immigration Freedom Party - as the mainstream groups have promised - could require as many as six separate alliance members to reach a 76-seat majority in the Dutch lower house of Parliament. That's where Marianne Thieme comes in.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Thieme, head of the Party for the Animals, which supports animal welfare and the environment, said that the traditional parties will have to court a smaller faction like hers to make the electoral math work in putting a government in place.

"And that's a very comfortable position because we can stay committed to our ideals and from that perspective we will look at the propositions made," she said in an interview last week in her office in The Hague.

Wilders' Freedom Party and Rutte's Liberals are both expected to take 22 seats in the election, according to a EenVandaag poll published on Tuesday. The Party for the Animals would get seven seats, the most in the group's history and up from the two it currently controls.

After the election, the lower house of the 150-seat Parliament may be made up of as many as 14 different parties. And with the four mainstream groups - the Liberals, the Christian Democrats, the D66 party and Labour - expected to gain 70 seats in the ballot, a theoretical coalition of those groups would only need one additional small party, such as the Animals, to form a ruling alliance.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

The political system in the Netherlands has a low election threshold, with about 60,000 votes translating into a seat in the legislative body, Andre Krouwel, a professor of political science at Amsterdam's VU University, said in a telephone interview. If the Dutch system required a threshold similar to that in other countries, "five out of the current 11 parties wouldn't even be in Parliament now", he said.

Given the vagaries of the process, that means the biggest political group could be shut out of the new government, an eventuality that's come to pass three times since World War II. That opens the door for new parties.

"The Party for the Animals is an agenda-setting party and not a party that is driven by power or ruling the country," Krouwel said. "The Dutch aren't afraid to try something new and give a new party a chance."

Thieme, the only woman in Parliament how is leading a party going into the elections, said she'd only be willing to work with groups that accept her organisation's pillars, such as attention to the environment and economic change. Like-minded parties include the Christian Union, the Greens, the Labour Party, the Democrats and, to a lesser extent, the Socialists, she said.

Discover more

Travel

NYC icon closes for makeover

02 Mar 08:39 PM
World

Human life could be grown in lab

02 Mar 11:41 PM
World

AI experts plan for doomsday scenarios

03 Mar 04:00 PM
New Zealand|politics

Assimilation centres proposed for Muslims

05 Mar 12:11 AM

"We would expect the new coalition to work seriously on climate change," Thieme, 44, said.

"We must step away from the focus on economic growth as a solution for all the problems."

And while the party, which Thieme helped found in 2002, places animal rights as one of its central tenets, its interests are diverse. The group is also against free-trade deals and would like to research ways to get out of the common currency.

But the organisation's varied interests could aid the coalition-building process, she said.

"As we've seen in the past, small political parties can be the hinge point in the formation," Thieme said in an interview on national broadcaster NOS. "And if we were asked, we would come and negotiate."

- Bloomberg

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Save

    Share this article

Latest from World

World

US State Department to begin layoffs to downsize government

11 Jul 04:40 AM
World

Trump hits Canada with new tariff threat

11 Jul 04:40 AM
World

Aussie sporting first in racial abuse arrest

11 Jul 04:15 AM

From early mornings to easy living

sponsored
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from World

US State Department to begin layoffs to downsize government

US State Department to begin layoffs to downsize government

11 Jul 04:40 AM

The Supreme Court cleared the way for plans for mass firings at 19 agencies, departments.

Trump hits Canada with new tariff threat

Trump hits Canada with new tariff threat

11 Jul 04:40 AM
Aussie sporting first in racial abuse arrest

Aussie sporting first in racial abuse arrest

11 Jul 04:15 AM
Premium
Trump tariffs: What’s the latest on the trade war?

Trump tariffs: What’s the latest on the trade war?

11 Jul 04:03 AM
Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky
sponsored

Solar bat monitors uncover secrets of Auckland’s night sky

NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • NZ Herald e-editions
  • Daily puzzles & quizzes
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Subscribe to the NZ Herald newspaper
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northland Age
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Book your classified ad
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP