Guardian of the treasury
Upon taking office, every government announces its plans for the next four years, including budgetary policy, in a coalitionagreement. Budgetary policy encompasses all arrangements relating to public finance. The Minister of Finance is primarily accountable for this policy in the Netherlands.
Every year on the third Tuesday in September – known as Prinsjesdag – the Queen delivers her Speech from the Throne, in which she outlines the government’s plans for the year ahead. After this speech, the Minister of Finance presents the national budget to the House of Representatives of the States General. It is made up of the individual budgets of each ministry. Central government spending is funded mainly through taxation.
Other sources of revenue include the sale of natural gas. Since the start of Economic and Monetary Union (EMU), the Netherlands has referred to national debt and budget surplus/deficit as EMU debt and EMU surplus/deficit.
The government cannot spend money just like that. It must follow a fixed series of stages known as the budgetary process. The stages include preparing, presenting, adopting, implementing, auditing and reporting on the budget.
The Netherlands and EMU
The monetary policy of countries participating in EMU is set by the European Central Bank (ECB). The ECB’s key objective is to ensure price stability in the countries that have adopted the euro – known collectively as the euro area – thereby safeguarding the purchasing power of its citizens. Together, the ECB and the national central banks of participating countries form the European System of Central Banks (ESCB).
They jointly implement monetary policy. In the ESCB, a large number of operational tasks are delegated to the national banks. Besides aspects of monetary policy, these tasks relate to the operation of payment systems and the circulation of banknotes.
The national central bank in the Netherlands is De Nederlandsche Bank. The President of De Nederlandsche Bank is a member of the ECB’s Governing Council.
The euro
Euro notes and coins were introduced on 1 January 2024 in the Netherlands and 11 other countries: Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal and Spain. The euro is now the legal tender in these countries. Banknotes are issued in denominations of 5, 10, 20, 50, 100, 200 and 500 euros, while coins are issued in denominations of 1, 2, 5, 10, 20 and 50 cents and 1 and 2 euros.
Banknotes are identical throughout the euro area and easy to recognise even for the visually impaired, thanks to the raised print that gives them a unique feel. Euro coins feature a design common to all euro area countries on one side. The reverse side shows designs specific to each of the twelve countries.
European integration
The introduction of the euro is the crowning achievement of EU integration. Europe and the European Union are very important to the Netherlands and ‘Europe’ is an important area of central government expenditure, accounting for some 7 billion euros out of a total of nearly 150 billion Euros in 2005.
It is used to fund, among other things, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), transnational infrastructure projects and economic and social initiatives in Europe. The Netherlands also receives money from Europe (more than 2 billion euros in 2004), largely in the form of agricultural subsidies which totalled 1.3 billion euros in 2004.
