Hugo de Jonge — © AFP
A bill by the Dutch Minister of the Interior Hugo de Jonge has caused some commotion among our northern neighbors. The plan to delete the word “mother” from the population register and replace it with the term “parent from whom the child was born” has already been scrapped.
The change in law was part of a so-called ‘collective law’, which is intended to correct purely administrative errors – such as typos, defects and incorrect references. It is therefore not clear what the proposal is to replace the term ‘mother’ with ‘parent from whom the child was born’.
The bill provoked strong reactions. For example, MP André Flach of the religious party SGP announced that “an extremely sensitive change is being concealed by the cabinet”, the liberal VVD member Silvio Erkens called on the government to withdraw “this disastrous plan”, and Geert Wilders wrote on Twitter: “Of course the word mother must remain in the population register! Go away with your ‘parent from whom the child was born’, Hugo de Jonge. Support for SGP’s resistance against this woke madness.”
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De Jonge announced that it was a mistake and quickly adjusted the plan. “An unnecessary error that will soon be corrected by an amendment to the House of Representatives,” it said on Twitter. “The word ‘mother’ is beautiful and deserves a place in our law. And now back to work!”
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