Integration overhauled: Loan system abolished
The integration policy is undergoing a drastic overhaul. The aim is for newcomers to start working immediately and learn the language in the meantime. Municipalities will draw up an individual integration plan for all people integrating. The loan system with which newcomers still purchase their integration course will also be abolished. Minister Koolmees writes this today in a letter to the House of Representatives about his plans for a new integration system.
In the minister's plans, the working method for integration courses will be different from now. Municipalities will purchase the lessons. For this they use the money that is currently still being paid out as a loan to the people integrating themselves. As part of their personal Integration and Participation Plan (PIP), newcomers then receive an offer from the municipality for an integration programme. In this way, abuses and fraud at providers are prevented as much as possible. It remains the responsibility of newcomers to comply with the civic integration obligation within the period of three years and thus to take the exam.
Koolmees wants status holders to get started with their integration from the very first moment. Municipalities will activate and guide them in this. This means that in the first period municipalities will pay for things such as rent and costs for insurance from social security benefits for beneficiaries. The duration of this support differs per individual and is recorded in the PIP. In contrast to this extra guidance, people integrating who do not make sufficient efforts are faced with sanctions, such as a fine, more often and more quickly than in the current system.
In the new integration system, higher language requirements are set for people integrating. Currently the required level is A2. That will be B1 because it increases the chance of a job. Not all newcomers will be able to reach this level. A learning level and learning route are therefore laid down in the PIP. Everything is also aimed at helping newcomers with a lower language level to become self-reliant as quickly as possible. Work is the keyword here.
The intention is that the new integration system will start in 2020. In recent months, the minister has developed his plans for the new integration system in close cooperation with all parties involved. For example, talks were held with about 100 experts from municipalities, Refugee Work Netherlands, scientists, employers and other ministries.
Evaluations and studies have shown that the current integration system is too complicated and ineffective. Koolmees wants a lot of attention for monitoring and evaluation in the new system. In this way, adjustments can be made quickly where necessary.
See also:
https://nos.nl/artikel/2239449-nieuwkomers-krijgen-persoonlijk-inburgeringsplan-taalniveau-omhoog.html
The increase to B1 level -within 3 years after arrival- is quite something, I have the impression that for many this is a bridge too far... Speaking Dutch as the majority of the Dutch can do is a great goal, but A2 within 3 years is quite an achievement for many immigrants. It would not surprise me if in practice large groups end up on A2 again. It is nice that a municipality is now not expected to put the person integrating in a standard class with A2 students and explain how an ATM works and we do not circumcise girls here... As if the majority of immigrants have been pulled from under a rock or from behind a coconut tree and they have no ambitions such as good B1 mastery of the language and a nice job. We will see…
The letter from the government:
“In recent decades, different views on integration and advancing insight into how newcomers can best and fastest become a full part of Dutch society have led to a large number of changes in policy. Despite all these changes, no system has yet been found in which people integrating adequately, quickly and in large numbers achieve the desired end goal. (…) Even after adjusting the system, it remains a challenge to achieve the desired end results. In the coming years, the parts with less practical experience in particular will be monitored and, if necessary, adjusted in order to gradually strengthen the system.
(...)
To achieve this, I focus on a number of lines that are innovative compared to previous systems:
– A Dutch diploma, without unnecessary loss of time, is the best starting position for the labor market. Young immigrants are therefore guided as quickly as possible to a Dutch vocational training course.
– Intensification of the learning routes. In order for the majority of people integrating to achieve language level B1 within a few years, it works best if learning the language is combined with (volunteer) work.
– No more exemptions based on demonstrable effort. Everyone learns to manage in society.
(...)
The improvements are aimed at all persons subject to the integration requirement: man or woman, in possession of an asylum permit or other type of residence permit.
(...)
One of the key points of the coalition agreement is the increase of the required language level for the integration exam from A2 to B1. B1 thus becomes the standard language level. This is the language level that is necessary to have the best possible starting position on the labor market. However, it is a reality that not everyone has the ability to reach this language level. (..) To this end, three different learning routes are currently being considered.
Three learning routes
B1 Route (Route 1):
The standard is that those subject to the integration requirement follow the route that leads to the B1 exam. Only through an objective test can it be established that those integrating who cannot pass this level may take exams at a lower level. (…)
Education route (route 2)
The educational potential of people integrating must be better utilized because this is badly needed for a sustainable perspective on the labor market. Approximately 30% of those subject to the integration requirement are under 30 years of age and have an entire working life ahead of them. (..)
Z-route (independent with language) (route 3)
For the majority of people who now receive an exemption, the A2 exam is also out of reach. For example, people with a limited ability to learn or people who are illiterate in their own language. (…)
V. The examination system
“With the introduction of the Civic Integration Act 2013, the examination system has changed. From this moment on, the language components were examined separately and in 2015 the exam component ONA was added. As far as ONA is concerned, there is added value in preparing the person integrating for the labor market, but - as the evaluation of the law shows - the way in which ONA is currently tested is ineffective. ONA in its current form is very theoretical and requires a certain degree of language proficiency that many integrators do not yet have at the start (…)
The current integration exam consists of seven parts:
1) speaking skills, 2) listening skills, 3) writing skills,
4) reading skills, 5) Knowledge of Dutch Society (KNM),
6) Orientation on the Dutch Labor Market (ONA) and
7) the Participation Statement.
The Participation Statement has already been decentralized under the responsibility of municipalities. For ONA it applies that (as already announced) this will also be given a decentralized, practice-oriented interpretation, which optimally contributes to the integrator getting to work.
(...) "
Source: https://www.tweedekamer.nl/kamerstukken/brieven_regering/detail?id=2018Z12976&did=2018D37329
Totally agree with you Rob. Level A2 is not easy for many newcomers, let alone B1. The wish is the father of the thought, whereby the wish to expand language knowledge will not work in practice. As Rori points out, many Dutch people are already unable to reach the B1 level and I can also imagine that Janbeute will have a splitting headache, so to speak. I have also received it in the past, also from civil servants who had to implement the integration law but apparently came from another planet. Just now Minister Koolmees, the minister who will introduce the new integration plan, visited Jinek. He and the other attendees were presented with a number of questions from the current integration exam, which are too bizarre for words and to which the correct answer could not be given. Questions and videos that, if you ask me, were invented by lunatics. Harry Romijn therefore has a point, the Netherlands is desperate for professionals, but thousands and thousands of newcomers are required to follow very expensive courses. Courses with lots of nonsensical subject matter, which no one is waiting for and contributes nothing to the factual basis for which integration is intended. It is big business with a lot of money involved.
Reading through all this gives me a splitting headache.
How did those Vietnamese boat people from the early XNUMXs manage to integrate silently into Dutch society ?
I can still remember from then, I lived in Steenwijk and nearby was a reception center in an old training school near the village of Gelderingen in Steenwijkerwold.
Many soon went to work in Zwolle at the Scania truck factory and will probably not have had a Dutch professional diploma.
But as usual, the Dutch government and its associated civil servants have to come up with something new, which will probably come to nothing.
Because as I wrote before, you don't learn integration from a course, but it comes from your heart.
Jan Beute.
I know Dutch people from certain provinces in the Netherlands who are not even able to pass B2.
So this is another extra brake for foreigners, unless you enter via the Mediterranean route, Turkey or MSF.
I don't understand much of this "integration".
Why should someone who is excellent at welding, for example, first learn Klomperian, where to apply for social assistance, at the expense of the community, while this same country is sobbing for this kind of skilled workers. The same goes for car mechanics, construction workers, electricians, etc. At "my" garage, a Syrian understood everything within one hour, including the electronic adjustment equipment, and could teach his Dutch colleagues something! A Syrian medical specialist, who we had after an accident would have kissed their hands there if he was going to operate on us, but in NL he is not yet allowed to put a plaster, because he does not even have a Dutch first aid diploma.
How many foreigners have excellent jobs in Thailand without understanding more than 50 words of Thai?
https://www.medischcontact.nl/nieuws/laatste-nieuws/artikel/syrische-arts-zoekt-ervaringsplaats.htm
https://www.medischcontact.nl/nieuws/laatste-nieuws/artikel/syrische-artsen-willen-snel-weer-aan-het-werk.htm
https://www.ad.nl/binnenland/deze-syrische-vluchtelingen-zijn-helemaal-ingeburgerd~a2bfa28a/
Totally agree. There are expats who detest the bureaucracy in Thailand, but the Netherlands can also do something about it. Sometimes on other points, sometimes on the same points such as work permits.
Have a Maltese friend who lives in Malta and people are not difficult there. Consequence: many foreigners (who would be banned in the Netherlands or seen as economic refugees if it is not worse) work their way to a new future in Malta without a course telling what to bring for the hostess at a birthday party. Definitely not a priority.
Some time ago I did the integration test myself (online) and passed with flying colors.
So my Thai wife is not eligible for this when she comes to Holland
if I understand or read it correctly.