Short-term cuts not feasible, officials warn

It’s “not feasible” to introduce a penalty for students who take too long to complete their studies as of September 2026, officials argue after a "quick scan" of the coalition agreement. Their conclusions were published on June 7.

The parties PVV, VVD, NSC and BBB want to form a coalition. Therefore, they have drafted an outline agreement. The document foresees significant cuts in the budget for education and research, including measures to reduce the number of international students and a fine of 3,000 euros for students who take longer than one additional year to finish their Bachelor’s or Master’s degree.

Foreign students
The future cabinet wants to save 293 million euros by admitting fewer international students. This will be a complicated affair, according to the officials. “Influencing the intake of EEA students is against European laws,” they explain.

The cabinet is looking to solve this conundrum by enabling institutions to set up an enrolment cap for non-Dutch-taught tracks, retaining access via the Dutch-taught track. The officials are doubtful as to whether this will hold up in court. “The language-related measures in the bill may affect the intake”, they write, “but this is once again uncertain/difficult to predict”.

When it comes to internationalisation, the coalition wants to make "administrative agreements" with higher education institutions, but will the institutions cooperate? The officials feel this will be tricky “given that higher education institutions don’t benefit from it directly”.

The explanation isn’t included, but universities get money for each student they bring in. What’s more, they may well have a different opinion from the cabinet about the usefulness and necessity of internationalisation.

Suppose things do work out, how fast will the savings be made? The four new coalition parties already foresee a yield in 2026, but the ministries of Education and Finance only expect the effect to occur at a later stage. 

Student housing
However, officials at the Ministry of Interior believe that limiting the number of international students presents certain opportunities. They note that the intake of students from abroad has “tripled” over the past fifteen years, a phenomenon “that significantly contributes to the shortage of student housing”.

They are hoping that the coalition parties will involve the municipalities when making administrative agreements with universities. Municipalities are often responsible for housing foreign students, but the officials would like to assign a large portion of this responsibility to education institutions.

Slow-progress penalty
Such a penalty would require the law to be changed and the student financing agency DUO to modify its systems, two things that take time. This means that the cuts would have to be delayed by at least a year, according to the officials' estimates, generating a gap of 285 million euros.

That is if the savings amount to that much to begin with. After all, threatened by a fine, chances are students will complete their studies faster. In this case, they will not pay the fine and the yields for the government will be lower. Furthermore, the parties have not factored implementation costs into their calculations.

However, there is a chance that the savings target will be met after all because other students (not the slow ones) are expected to complete their studies even faster, therefore making higher education cheaper.

An additional problem is that even though the effects are difficult to gauge, part of the funding for education institutions is based on estimates. This is where things get a bit technical, but they’re in danger of undergoing double cutbacks. To prevent this, special agreements with the Ministry of Finance will have to be made.

Public transport card
Another measure that will probably be delayed by a year: Dutch students will no longer receive an allowance for their public transport card if they go abroad to study. Until now, the idea had been that the student public transport card is useless abroad, so the student would get money instead. Given the new estimates, the officials think this cutback will not yield 30 million euros per year, but only 24 million euros.

Sector plans
As far as the cost savings on the sector plans (215 million euros per year) go, the officials foresee fewer implementation problems because they don’t require new legislation, just the adaptation of an administrative agreement.

For the rest...
Things could become even worse. “The new budget rules and ambitious plans for cost savings (for example on EU contributions) entail additional risks for the budget of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science”, the officials say. But all is very much up in the air for now.