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THIRD BALKENENDE CABINET
The Third Balkenende cabinet is the current cabinet of the Netherlands. It was formed on 7 July 2006 after a crisis in and the subsequent resignation of the second Balkenende cabinet. This minority cabinet of CDA and VVD was negotiated by former prime minister Ruud Lubbers[1]. The main tasks for this interim cabinet are the preparations for the early general election on 22 November 2006 and the preparation of the 2007 budget.
Although only a minority of members of parliament will be represented in the cabinet, the cabinet will have full power to propose laws, each of which needs to be supported by an ad hoc majority in parliament. The constituent parties of the third Balkenende cabinet do have a majority (of one seat) in the senate.
Minority cabinets are rare in Dutch politics: the previous minority cabinet was the 1982-1983 cabinet Van Agt III.
Composition
The third Balkenende cabinet consists of 16 ministers and 7 junior ministers (staatssecretaris). These positions are divided among the coalition members according to their size in parliament: CDA supplies 9 ministers and 4 junior ministers and VVD supplies 7 ministers and 3 junior ministers. All members of this cabinet also served in the second Balkenende cabinet, except for junior minister for Education Bruno Bruins, who was scheduled to succeed former junior minister Mark Rutte, when the second Balkenende cabinet fell unexpectedly. Joop Wijn (economic affairs) and Atzo Nicolaï (governmental reform and kingdom relations) were promoted from junior minister to full minister to replace the D66 ministers in the second Balkenende cabinet[2].
Ministers
Junior Ministers
References
External links
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