Overview
- The cabinet announced the decision on Thursday, July 2, and Minister Pieter Heerma told the Tweede Kamer the smaller ballot will be introduced nationwide for the 2029 European Parliament elections because the Electoral Act (Kieswet) must first be amended.
- The new ballot will list only parties and candidate numbers, requiring voters to mark one box for the party and a second box for a preferred candidate number rather than showing candidate names on the paper.
- Local pilots first run in the 2024 European elections and continued through the March 2026 municipal tests, with municipalities such as Tynaarlo reporting practical gains like easier stacking, fewer torn ballots, faster counting and less quickly filled ballot boxes.
- Trials showed a modest rise in invalid votes when voters ticked non-existent candidate numbers while clearly choosing a party, and Heerma proposes that such party-intent votes be allocated to the party’s list leader so they still count.
- Heerma is also advancing legislation to create a dedicated body to detect foreign information manipulation around elections, following similar initiatives in France, Germany and Sweden, and experts warn the change could nudge voters toward party-centered choices rather than person-centered ones.