The memory of the past has never disappeared from the Senate. The feverish party politics that so often prevails in the House of Representatives almost never gains a foothold in the Senate. We see this in various customs that are significant for the atmosphere in the Senate. How far do the powers of the first chamber extend? Is the first chamber an outdated institution that no longer matters in our current democracy?
The first room
At the start of a meeting of the Senate, senators usually shake hands, making it clear, as it were, that they are first and foremost members of the chamber and only secondarily political opponents. The somewhat dignified solidarity is also evident from the seats: the members of the Senate do not sit together in groups, but sit together politically speaking.
The debates are also calmer: there is rarely any interruption. Sometimes the visitor gets the impression that people in the Senate are not supposed to interrupt. Of course, the difference in atmosphere is not only the result of a different mentality, there are indeed differences in powers and political approach with the House of Representatives. And it is mainly those differences that make things different in the Senate.
Election
An important difference with the other side (as senators sometimes refer to the House of Representatives) is the way in which the Senate is composed. (The eligibility for membership of the Senate does not differ from that for membership of the House of Representatives). Voting citizens elect the House of Representatives, but not the Senate. On the contrary, the voters of the Senate form a very small group: it is the members of the Provincial Council who elect the Senate.
Voting citizens therefore only have indirect influence on the composition of the Senate, namely through the elections for the Provincial Council (every four years). In addition, this influence is spread out somewhat, because the Senate is not elected all at once, but in parts. Every three years, half of the members of the Senate resign (sometimes 38 members and other times 37 members).
Each member of the First Chamber serves for six years. A change in this method of election can be expected in some time, which will mean that the members of the Senate will all be elected at the same time, every four years, by the Provincial Council. It is always groups of Provincial Councils that choose the new members (one time: North Brabant, Zeeland, Utrecht, Limburg, North Holland and Friesland; the other time: Gelderland, Overijssel, Groningen, Drenthe and South Holland). .
It is obvious that this method of election makes the members of the Senate feel much less like the voice of the voters than the members of the House of Representatives. Resigning and electing in parts also means that political shifts only have a certain delay in the Senate. For example, a political landslide in the Provincial Council elections will only be reflected in the Senate a number of years later, and then only half of it.
Only when the Senate as a whole is dissolved prematurely, which is necessary if the Constitution is amended and is therefore re- elected in its entirety by all Provincial Councils, will the delay disappear. Because there have been quite a few constitutional changes recently, the political composition of the Senate is less outdated. A new election of the Senate never leads to political surprises: the composition of the Provincial Council is known
Submissive role
The relatively loose link between the political composition of the Senate and political relations in the country is probably one of the main causes for the relatively small role that the Senate plays in the formation of cabinets. Although the President of the Senate, as well as his colleague from the House of Representatives, advises the Queen in the event of a cabinet formation, when forming a cabinet, attention is paid almost exclusively to the political relationships of the House of Representatives.
Of course, a new cabinet should also have the confidence of the Senate, but experience shows that a cabinet is accepted by the Senate as long as it has the confidence of the House of Representatives. The Senate rarely or never goes against the views of the House of Representatives when it comes to forming and maintaining a cabinet. It has never happened that the Senate overthrew a cabinet that was acceptable to the House of Representatives.
If that were to happen, the senators would create a virtually unsolvable problem. After all, the formation of the new cabinet would have to take special account of the relations in the Senate, which were apparently contradictory to those in the House of Representatives. The new cabinet would be acceptable to the Senate, but not to the House of Representatives.
This would have created a major conflict between the two chambers of the States General. But because the House of Representatives is directly elected by the people and the Senate is not, the views of the House of Representatives should carry more weight from a democratic point of view. The Senate has always kept this in mind and has therefore forced a minister to resign from time to time. but never an entire cabinet. There has been very little open conflict between the Senate and the government in our history.
Minor powers
The subordinate role of the Senate in the relationship between government and States General is also evident from the limited powers that the Senate has in the legislative procedure. Unlike the House of Representatives, the Senate does not have the right to amend (change) bills. The Senate also does not have the right of initiative (the right to submit bills itself). The Senate can therefore only approve or reject bills in their entirety. The result is that the debates in the Senate are limited to the broad outlines. The Senate only rejects bills in exceptional cases. The Senate tends to agree with the judgment of the House of Representatives. Only if the House of Representatives has made obvious mistakes will the Senate sometimes want to reject a draft.
Rejection also sometimes occurs if new developments have occurred in the period between the discussion in the House of Representatives and those in the Senate that justify a different judgment. The latter is sometimes the case in bills to amend, merge and abolish municipalities. There have been cases in which the population of the municipality(s) involved protested so vigorously that the Senate was impressed and voted differently than the House of Representatives. But in principle the Senate has the right to reject any bill
Time crunch
The Senate also plays a much less important role than the House of Representatives in budget discussion. This difference is partly due to the time element. According to legal regulations, the budgets must be accepted by the States General before the start of the new service year (which starts on January 1). In practice, this requirement is never met. The Government Accounts Act (the law that regulates the management of funds) therefore contains, as mentioned, a provision that allows the government to make advance expenditure (up to a certain amount).
But even when this provision is used, the Senate almost always runs out of time. It is not unusual for the Senate not to discuss budgets until March or April that should have been formally dealt with long ago. It is obvious that in that situation there is little inclination to discuss the various budget chapters in great detail.
In recent years, the Senate has been solving this problem as follows: as soon as a budget draft has been received from the House of Representatives, it is approved without discussion, followed by another policy discussion with the minister involved. Of course, there can then hardly be any real influence on the budget. (But that influence is not great even in a real discussion, because the Senate lacks the right of amendment and can therefore not change anything in a proposed budget.)
To cancel or not?
Due to both the lack of important powers and the delays in the processing of bills, the Senate has often been seen as a useless and redundant institution. The discussions about the usefulness of the Senate are almost as old as the Senate itself. We will not go into too much detail about the possible advantages and disadvantages of the Senate. It is especially important to us that she is there.
A well-known argument in favor of maintaining the Senate is the assumption that the discussion in the Senate is an additional guarantee of care in legislation. In return, we can say that the House of Representatives generally does not tend to work inaccurately and that accuracy will only increase if the
Members of Parliament know that it will not be looked at again by another council. In a number of parliamentary democracies, the Senate has been abolished without any real inaccuracies in the legislation.
Another argument in favor of maintaining the Senate lies in the origins of the members. The members of the Senate are less bound by party politics and, according to the reasoning, will therefore have a greater tendency to pay attention to interests other than party political. The facts indeed show that the Senate pays more attention to some principled aspects than the House of Representatives. However, this attention mainly takes the form of wise advice to the government and usually not of direct influence on policy.
Like the House of Representatives, the Senate also derives its existence from a provision in the Constitution. The abolition of the Senate therefore requires amendment of the Constitution; this in turn means that the Senate would have to decide on its own abolition. It is obvious that an institution with a long tradition will not quickly turn to it