Marriage: an inalienable right?
In a ruling last week, the European Court of Justice ruled the income requirement for Dutch residents to bring their partners from abroad was a clear violation of European laws for family reunification.
Since 2004, anybody who wants to bring his or her partner to live in the Netherlands needs to earn at least 120 percent of the minimum wage. This condition effectively makes it impossible for people on welfare to marry a foreigner and live together in the Netherlands, but also excludes students and those working part-time.
The income requirement is but one of many introduced in recent years by the Dutch government that has been looking to limit immigration in general. Foreigners looking to marry a Dutch resident are now required to complete a language and citizenship test in their country of origin for instance. In addition, both partners now need to be at least 21 years of age.
What do you think? Is it reasonable to place demands on people looking to bring their spouses to other countries? Or is the right to marry whoever one pleases an inalienable one? If you have personal experience with this, please share it.
Thursday 11 March 2010, 22:38
I’m an American and at one time I was considering marrying a native Dutch man (and current citizen)- the man I loved. I would have married him for love, and vice versa. It didn’t matter to him that I was an American, nor did it matter to me that he lived in the Netherlands. Somehow we would find a way to be together.
After we knew we were wanting to be together, we started talking about how everything would work. We realized marriage would be good for immigration- in either country, but wouldn’t be easy.
But first and foremost we loved each other and wanted to be together.
Countries shouldn’t make it difficult for spouses/families who want to be together. I understand there are those who abuse the system, but that won’t change no matter what restrictions are placed.
Friday 12 March 2010, 14:15
These restrictions were based on bios against the non-western immigrants (especially the Turks and Moroccans).Its a brain child of extremely narrow minded people, who used their narrow vision to adopt ridiculous policies.
Its a universal human right of any individual to choose and marry where ever,when ever and it should not be in the hands of few bureaucrats to use their ‘rules and regulations’.
Age limit,income level or the language rules are the worst law’s, which by all means are violations against the human rights!! Because they were introduced under prejudice and under the anti-foreigners sentiments!!
Friday 12 March 2010, 14:23
A few years ago I became involved with an American woman I met in Chicagoland. When things became more serious we started looking into living together. I was not opposed to living in America, but as I still had to finish my studies moving to America was not really an option. $15,000 a year is pretty much the lowest tuition fee possible, which in contrast would be able to supply us easily for over a year in most European countries. The Netherlands, however, had this ridiculous income requirement.
The basic principle behind the income requirement might make some sense – you don’t want people to rely on government support – but the specific legal implementation is (or now apparently was) just plain ridiculous. Taking myself as an example, I had savings of about €20,000 (whatever the non-EU citizen makes or has in savings is considered irrelevant, which again is silly at best). We can sustain ourselves for about €1,000 per month, so simple math concludes that this would be enough to sustain ourselves for 2 years even if there were no income whatsoever, if she didn’t have savings, and so on and so forth. Compare this to someone who makes €2,000 a month with practically zero savings at a rent of €1,200 a month or so who might lose their job in half a year given the current economic situation. Who’s in a better position then? But never mind simple logic, the law is the law.
There’s a simple solution to the problem. Moving to any other EU country will make you an EU-citizen, which gives you more rights than you have as a Dutch citizen in your own country. Ironically, citizens from a country with equally xenophobic laws, like Denmark, could move to the Netherlands to profit from these very same European regulations.
We have been happily living in Belgium for about a year now, and we don’t intend to move back to the Netherlands (we could, because after 6 months in another EU country the non-EU citizen somehow obtains the right to move into the Netherlands).
Where things are different between the Netherlands and Belgium, things are typically better in Belgium. A few examples:
- public transport: think a bit of how the Netherlands used to be in the ’90s. You could buy tickets on the train, there was no OV chipcard… you can get a yearly subscription for De Lijn for €150, etc. Much better.
- American (and many other country’s) driver’s licenses are acknowledged and a Belgian driver’s license can be acquired once residency has been attained. In the Netherlands my wife would be allowed to drive with an international driver’s license, but despite having 12 years driving experience she would eventually have to take a Dutch driving test. If this were like it is in America (where it costs $20 or so) this wouldn’t be much of an issue, but nowadays the whole shebang would cost at the very least €300. Perhaps not the biggest issue, but it’s money that could be spent better.
- In the Netherlands a request to become a resident costs about €800. In Belgium it costs about €40. Need I say more?
That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Suffice it to say, in the end we are actually quite glad that the income requirement forced us to move here rather than having to pay at the very least €1,000 extra for no reason whatsoever and having to exert a lot of effort to overcome annoying hurdles thrown up by the xenophobic government.
Friday 12 March 2010, 19:40
This is new. I know hardly anyone interested in marriage in the Netherlands except for political reasons.
Tuesday 16 March 2010, 4:25
Marriage is a privilege not a right.
Tuesday 16 March 2010, 11:53
@Jaap den Haan:
Political reasons meaning what precisely? Besides, the laws are essentially equivalent if you wish to live together with a civil union or some such. Marriage is only a part of the picture.
@Jan N.:
In 1948, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was adopted by the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA). Article 16 of the UDHR reads:
Probably more important to us EU citizens, the text of the UDHR is also implemented in the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union. Specifically, article 9.
I am not a lawyer, but while Dutch immigration policy might potentially not be inconsistent with the letter of the law (one might argue that these rights are not obstructed because we can live together in any other EU country and America – I don’t know how valid such reasoning would be legally), it most certainly is not in accordance with the spirit of the law.
Tuesday 16 March 2010, 16:15
Marriage is a right,it’s citizenship that is a prvilege
Wednesday 17 March 2010, 21:49
Alfie, as far as I’m aware this is solely about obtaining a residence permit (and thus the ability to found a family, i.e. to live together and to be able to work). People typically only become eligible for naturalization (and thus citizenship) after living in a country for nearly a decade, though in the Netherlands I believe it’s “only” five years.
Thursday 18 March 2010, 10:01
My Boyfriend is currently getting a visa so that he (A Dutchman) and I (an Australian) can leave in Australia together. I think its great that Australia has an tough immigration policy. If we (Australia) are going to take on another permanent resident/citizen we want him/her to be worthwhile. I agree with Alfie, you can marry wherever the hell you want to, but whether the spouse’s country lets you in is a completely different question.
Saturday 20 March 2010, 7:32
whatäs about love, think again…
come to asia,..any place then see what the life is…
Saturday 20 March 2010, 19:55
I guess the discussion is a little out of focus. Questioning should not be about whether Dutch could marriage anyone the want, but indeed whether Dutch could marry a foreigner, bring him/her to The Netherlands where he/she would be entitled every right, including long-term residency and fast-track citizenship.
Political correctness doesn’t solve the issue that many immigrants barely assimilated into this country (if they have assimilated at all) marry people from abroad in their country of origin, then bring partners here, and form a family whose expectations of integrations become indeed slim – with all the side effects, like “guettoization” of certain ethnic communities etc.
So, if one wants to go to [fill your country] and marry a partner there, it should be ok. However, if you want to bring someone to this country, the partner should at least master the language and prove he/herself able to integrate in Dutch society. Otherwise, the Dutch partner could happily move out to their partner’s country – if it is love, love goes anywhere, huh?
I do agree, though, that income requirements are not the best way to deal with the problem. A whole revamp of the “family reunification” scheme is needed, one that favors high-skilled immigrants and avoid that a single immigrant, 10 years later, managed to bring her/his whole family: parents, adult sons, uncles, even cousins. This is a real shortcoming of the current policy.
Monday 22 March 2010, 19:16
I like what the ECJ said. It said that a more case-by-case approach was necessary. Excluding things like savings, the incoming partner’s earning potential, studiefinanceering, etc. is stupid.
Thursday 15 April 2010, 5:21
personally, I think it is totally wrong to impose your will on the masses against their own choices beacaus it is a total bleach of fundamental human righs. Having voted to the fact that mariage is an-inalienable right,I hereby suggest that it not good for some group of people to make it difficult for general public simply beacause they are in authority, pls let us always try to use our human conscience, and not applying certain policies to the detriment of others just for selfish interest,let us be humans and not devils.
Sunday 6 June 2010, 10:18
I am a UK citizen living in NL for 8yrs. As far as I know the situation is not much different in the UK. eg, If someone of Pakistani descent was to marry a person from their parents home village (not unusual) this does not give the spouse automatic right of entry.
The concern of all governments is that people moving to their country are able to support themself & not be a drain on the welfare system.
For most of the time I’ve lived here I was employed by UK companies, taxes paid in the UK. If I was out of work for any time I had no right to benefits as I had paid no tax here.
I have no problem with this, but it can always be stretched to the point where it becomes discriminatory. Also, there will always be those who use the discrimination argument to get what they are not entitled to.
Administrations then have the tricky problem of deciding who is in need & who is a con artist.
For the government it’s a “no win” situation.
There’s an expresion in English, “you can please some of the people some of the time but you can’t please all of the people all of the time”.
Whatever you do there will always be complaints from certain quarters. No system is perfect but I believe that parliamentary democracy is the best one we have. We can’t eliminate mistakes we can only minimise their occurence.
Tuesday 8 June 2010, 12:51
#Khalid
‘Its a universal human right of any individual to choose and marry where ever,when ever and it should not be in the hands of few bureaucrats to use their ‘rules and regulations’’
Yeas it’s a right, but it’s not a right to expect that somebody else pays for it. And thats the de facto case with many immigrants.
Tuesday 17 August 2010, 21:58
iam a somalian citizen living in South Africa, i got married to a Dutch lady but unfortunately i was told to learn Dutch language as one of the requirements but i was un able to do due to un avoidable circumstances.