Holland

Dutch Stop Fracking Over Potential Earthquakes

November 14, 2018 By Alex Thomson, Channel4.com Resist! Earthquakes, Fracking, Holland

While fracking has only just begun in this country, the Dutch are waving goodbye to years of riches from gas extraction. Why? Because they can no longer stand the social and economic cost of hundreds of small earthquakes and thousands of properties damaged by the tremors gas extraction causes. The Dutch were told extraction was safe and well regulated, until their houses began cracking and falling down. We report from northern Holland.

Holland To Finland To Scotland, Basic Income Could Be A Reality Across Europe

January 31, 2017 Steve Rushton, www.occupy.com Educate! Europe, Finland, Guaranteed basic income, Holland, Scotland

By Steve Rushton for Occupy - Universal basic income is emerging as a realistic policy position across Europe. As we reported in late 2015, local authorities across the Netherlands are currently running trials to award every citizen unconditional money from the state. And this year, Finland started an experiment of 2,000 randomly selected people, all of whom currently receive out of work benefits. The first monthly payments of €560 ($590) were paid into those people's accounts within the last week, and the trial will examine the impact of that money on overall employment. Now, sweeping further to the west, plans are underway to establish basic income in the Scottish councils of Glasgow and Fife, revealing a groundswell of interest that is sweeping the continent.

Airline Drops Pianist From Entertainment Over Controversial Tweets

September 2, 2015 Brian Wise, www.newcoldwar.org Resist! Holland, Peace, Russia, Ukraine

By Brian Wise in New Cold War - KLM Royal Dutch Airlines has dropped a recording of the pianist Valentina Lisitsa from its in-flight entertainment system after receiving complaints about her Twitter commentary on the Ukraine-Russia conflict. Lisitsa, an ethnic Russian born in Ukraine who now lives in Paris, has drawn attention in recent months for her polarizing social media commentary about the conflict in Ukraine. She has compared President Petro Poroshenko’s government to Nazi Germany; her tweets about Ukrainians have been criticized as vulgar and offensive. Lisitsa maintains that her remarks have been misconstrued and are intended as satire. On Sunday, a Canadian-Ukrainian who identifies herself as Inna Thorn [an assumed name] wrote an e-mail to KLM stating she was “appalled to see Valentina Lisitsa being featured” in the Dutch airline’s in-flight entertainment system, which she spotted during a trip from Kiev to Calgary.

Dutch Gov’t Ordered To Cut Carbon Emissions In Landmark Ruling

July 27, 2015 Arthur Neslen, www.theguardian.com Resist! Climate Change, Environment, Holland

By Arthur Neslen in The Guardian - A court in The Hague has ordered the Dutch government to cut its emissions by at least 25% within five years, in a landmark ruling expected to cause ripples around the world. To cheers and hoots from climate campaigners in court, three judges ruled that government plans to cut emissions by just 14-17% compared to 1990 levels by 2020 were unlawful, given the scale of the threat posed by climate change. Jubilant campaigners said that governments preparing for the Paris climate summit later this year would now need to look over their shoulders for civil rights era-style legal challenges where emissions-cutting pledges are inadequate. “Before this judgement, the only legal obligations on states were those they agreed among themselves in international treaties,” said Dennis van Berkel, legal counsel for Urgenda, the group that brought the suit.

Utrecht Doling Out Free Money For A ‘Basic Income’ Experiment

July 11, 2015 Joshua Ostroff, www.huffingtonpost.ca Create! Holland, Living Wage

By Joshua Ostroff in The Huffington Post - The primary complaint by opponents is that it removes the incentive to work, resulting in efforts to make welfare as unpleasant as possible, from below-poverty-line payments and complicated qualification rules to judgmental monitoring and, in the U.S., dehumanizing drug tests. But there's an approach to poverty building momentum lately called the Basic Income Guarantee -- you can read our explainer here -- and in the Dutch city of Utrecht the theory is about to be put to the test. As the name suggests, the idea is to give everyone a basic income even if the recipient has or finds a job. The government would cover the basic living costs unconditionally and universally, without means testing or work requirements.

Justice For Mitch Henriquez: Black Lives Matter Goes Dutch

July 6, 2015 Mathijs van de Sande, www.roarmag.org Educate! Holland, Netherlands, police brutality, Racial Justice

By Mathijs van de Sande in RoarMag - This weekend, on June 27, the 42-year-old Aruban man Mitch Henriquez was brutally murdered by police in The Hague. Henriquez was visiting his family in the Netherlands, with whom he attended a music festival. While leaving the venue, Henriquez was beset by a handful of police officers, allegedly on the basis of the vague, unfounded — and, indeed, in due course falsified — suspicion that he was carrying a weapon. A press release stated that police had employed physical force, as Henriquez violently resisted his arrest. It also argued that only during the detainee’s transportation to the police station, Henriquez suddenly became unwell. He had to be reanimated in the vehicle, while being hurried to hospital. Henriquez died a few hours later.

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