page_title: First Rutte cabinet
section_title: Formation
hierarchical_section_title: First Rutte cabinet / Formation
caption_attribution_description: Nederlands: Janet Napolitano (Homeland) ontmoet staatssecretaris Fred Teeven van Veiligheid en Justitie tijdens haar werkbezoek aan Nederland in 2011
context_page_description: The First Rutte cabinet, also called the Rutte–Verhagen cabinet was the executive branch of the Dutch Government from 14 October 2010 until 5 November 2012.
  Te cabinet was formed by the conservative-liberal People's Party for Freedom and Democracy and the christian-democratic Christian Democratic Appeal after the election of 2010. The cabinet was a right-wing coalition and had a minority in the House of Representatives but had confidence and supply from the Party for Freedom for a majority. It was the first cabinet of Liberal Leader Mark Rutte as Prime Minister. Christian-Democratic Leader Maxime Verhagen served as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Economic Affairs, Agriculture and Innovation. The cabinet suffered no internal conflicts but fell just 1 year and 6 months into its term after the Party for Freedom withdrew its support on 23 April 2012.
context_section_description: Following the collapse of the fourth Balkenende cabinet on 20 February 2010, elections for the House of Representatives were held on 9 June 2010. As usual in Dutch politics, none of the parties had a majority and several informateurs were appointed to investigate the formation of a coalition cabinet. A broad coalition consisting of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA) and the Labour Party (PvdA) was briefly looked at, but dismissed. Then negotiations for a "purple plus" coalition consisting of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), Labour Party (PvdA), Democrats 66 and GreenLeft lasted for about three weeks, but the parties could not reach agreement on the amount of budget cuts.
  Finally, a construction which is rare for the Netherlands was investigated: a minority coalition consisting of the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy and Christian Democratic Appeal (together 52 out of 150 seats in the House of Representatives), supported in parliament by the Party for Freedom (PVV) (24 seats), to make the smallest possible majority of 76 seats. The right wing PVV had the largest gains in the recent elections.
  The stated reason for this construction was that parties agreed that the largest party (the VVD) and the party with the largest gains (considered the 'winner' in Dutch politics) needed to be in power. Only the Christian Democratic Appeal could or wanted to help make a majority, but they were against forming a proper coalition with Party for Freedom (PVV) because of their different views on Islam and immigration. Therefore, negotiations were held to form a coalition agreement between the People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD) and Christian Democratic Appeal (CDA), and to form a "parliamentary support agreement" between all three parties, which were successfully finished on 30 September 2010.
  When Rutte took office on 14 October, it marked the first time that the VVD had led a government since its formation in 1946. It also marked the first liberal-led government since 1913.
  Opposition parties and commentators expected that the coalition would prove to be unstable because at a special Christian Democratic Appeal conference, about a third of the party members voted against the formation of this cabinet. Also, at least three members of parliament in the CDA parliamentary fraction indicated to have difficulties with the cabinet. Eventually they left the parliament or supported the deal, pointing to the approval by the majority of the party conference.
  When the cabinet took office, the three parties had a minority in the Senate of 35 out of 75 seats. The parties hoped this would change following the Dutch Senate election of 2011, but they obtained 37 seats, one short of a majority. A small protestant party, the Reformed Political Party, which obtained one seat, supported the cabinet in the Senate however.
  The cabinet consisted of 12 Ministers and 8 State secretaries. The positions where divided equally among the coalition members, regardless of their respective size: People's Party for Freedom and Democracy (31 seats in parliament) supplied 6 Ministers and 4 State secretaries, and Christian Democratic Appeal (21 seats) also supplied 6 Ministers and 4 State secretaries.
caption: State Secretary for Security and Justice Fred Teeven and United States Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano in The Hague on 22 June 2011.
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