Peter Pannekoek receives plenty of support after a swipe at Rutte about 'state kidnappings'

Comedian Peter Pannekoek receives massive acclaim on social media after he called the out-of-home placements of children of benefit parents 'state kidnappings' in This was the news . He hit the nail on the head about the more than 1115 children who are still not at home, is the consensus. Both Peter's name and the hashtags #1115children and #stateabductions are trending on Twitter. MP Pieter Omtzigt has meanwhile argued for a hotline and an independent investigation.

“If one child is kidnapped tomorrow, the country will be ablaze. Do we have Amber Alerts, searches in forests'', said Peter on Thursday evening in front of 1.2 million viewers on NPO 1. Now there are 1115 children away from home, they have been 'working on it' for six months, but there is still no answer. single child at home, says Peter about Omtzigt's observation this week.

Six months ago, the cabinet acknowledged that more than 1115 children of parents who were victims of the allowance affair were placed out of their homes between 2015 and 2020 . The children ended up with a foster family or an institution. Prime Minister Mark Rutte called the matter "very serious" and promised to look into it carefully. It is mindblowing that the children have still not been reunited with their parents six months later, said Pannekoek.

,,It is said that there is a team on it, they are working hard on it,'' said the comedian. "Suppose there are fifty people in the inspectorate on this case, who can get one child back a week, can't they?" He does not understand that (until now) there is hardly any fuss about it. ,,I doubt all the time: either we don't realize how bad it is, or we realize it somewhere, but we just don't want to see it, because it's so bad'', says Peter.

Staatsontvoeringen

To make the seriousness of the situation clear, only one term is appropriate, he thinks. “I would like to coin the word so that we realize how bad it is, these are just state kidnappings. They are kidnappings by the state.”

On Twitter, the comedian receives almost unanimous support and praise for raising the subject. His own tweet with the clip alone was liked 4,400 times and retweeted over 1,200 in a matter of hours, while other versions also racked up hundreds of likes, with captions such as "apt" and "extremely strong." Pieter Omtzigt also shared the fragment.

Reporting point

According to him, there should be a reporting point where both parents and children can report to arrange a reunification. The MP also called for an independent investigation into the forced custodial placements, on which the House of Representatives had previously passed a motion. This is not the case if this is carried out by the Health and Youth Care Inspectorate and the Justice and Security Inspectorate (as the cabinet wants), the MP believes.

Both inspectorates are not independent and they will not investigate individual cases, he says. The inspectors may be involved in the investigation, but not take the lead. According to Omtzigt, a professor or former judge as research chair would be a better fit.

He finds the SP on his side. ,,As far as I'm concerned, teams must start working on restoring a bond between parents and child from tomorrow', says Renske Leijten (SP). GroenLinks also believes that more haste should be made with the restoration of contact and possible relocations. “We really need to look at what is best for the child,” emphasizes Lisa Westerveld (GroenLinks).

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