Islj 2009 3-4 - TMC Asser Instituut

or serious bodily harm. Such preparation can be evidenced by internetcommunications,
phone conversations, etc. The goal of this third pillar
is to enable the authorities to respond to the threat of disorder in
an earlier stadium. For example, if the police intercept a communication
on an internet message board between two groups of hooligans,
setting a time and place for a fight in a field somewhere, within the
current array of measures the police can only respond once an actual
fight breaks out. Under the new proposal, the person posting the message
could be prosecuted, without an actual fight breaking out.
The Football Law
The proposed Football Law was initiated on May 20, 2008 by the
Ministry of Domestic Affairs and the Ministry of Justice. On April 7,
2009, the proposed Football Law was approved by the Second Chamber
of Parliament with an overwhelming majority. The Second Chamber
made a number of far reaching amendments to the Football Law.
In the Netherlands, for a law to take effect, a couple steps have to
be taken. Most laws are initiated by the government, due to the complexity
of most laws and the resources of the Ministry. After a law is
initiated, advice regarding the law is asked of the Council of State.
Following this advice, the law is sent to the Second chamber of
Parliament. The Second Chamber can make amendments to the proposed
law. The Second Chamber then holds a public vote on the proposed
law. After the Second Chamber has approved a proposed law,
the proposal is sent to the First Chamber. The First Chamber cannot
make amendments to any legislative proposals. The First Chamber
discusses the proposed law and then votes on the proposal. A simple
majority of the votes suffices for the proposal to pass in the First
Chamber. If questions arise concerning a proposal in the First
Chamber, the vote can be held off for a period of time. However, the
First Chamber has no right of amendment and can therefore not
make changes to any proposed legislation itself. After the First
Chamber approves proposed legislation, the law can take effect after
it is signed by the Queen of the Netherlands.
The actual proposal for the Football Law, as it stands now, was initiated
by the Ministry of Domestic Affairs and the Ministry of Justice,
even though the first steps to come to such a law were taken by a number
of parliamentarians. The Football Law, after the Council of State’s
advisory opinion was received and attached to it, was sent to the
Second Chamber of Parliament. The Second Chamber discussed the
Football Law and made some (important) amendments to the proposal.
The Football Law was then voted on and with an overwhelming
majority approved by the Second Chamber. The Second Chamber
then sent the Football Law to the First Chamber, where it is currently
being discussed and awaits the vote in the First Chamber. However,
given the overwhelming majority the proposal received in the vote in
the Second Chamber, it is to be expected that the proposal will also
pass the vote in the First Chamber. The Football Law, if passed in the
First Chamber, could enter into force before the end of 2009.
The Football Law has been included in a broader proposed law to
counteract public disorder. The law is, in a broad sense, supposed to
counteract all sorts of different structural nuisances. This law specifically
targets violations of public order by groups of people (for example
youths or football supporters), who through their often times
criminal behavior, create an unsafe environment in the areas or neighborhoods
where they hang around. The current legal array of measures
in the Netherlands, according to the drafters of the proposed law,
does not suffice to deal with this problem. The problem with the
behavior of such groups currently is that the police have to wait until
an actual criminal act happens until they can deal with this group. A
further problem in such a case is that the police have to be able to pinpoint
the crime to a specific, individual perpetrator. And even if the
police are able to pinpoint a criminal act to a certain person and punish
that person for that act, they might still not actually be doing anything
about the overall unsafe environment created by the group.
Such a group in a lot of cases consist of leaders and followers. To really
deal with the problems caused by a certain group, the police will
need to deal with these leaders. However, these leaders will often
times not engage in any criminal acts directly, but direct their followers
into doing these acts. Under the current array of legal measures, it
is therefore very difficult for the authorities to directly take measures
against such a group that causes disorder and their leaders.
The behavior that is specifically targeted by this law is structural
and often times criminal behavior through which public order is violated.
Specific examples of such behavior are intimidation, threatening
behavior and vandalism. The person targeted by this law engages
in such behavior individually or within the group he or she forms a
part of. However, there has to be a pattern of possibly criminal behavior
that structurally violates public order.
Even though this law targets offences against public disorder in a
broader sense, one of the specific aims of this law is to deal with the
problem of football hooliganism. This law is specifically intended to
provide a zero tolerance policy for the small core group of hooligans
that structurally misbehaves around football matches. According to a
number of surveys studied in preparation for this law, hooligan
groups are loosely structured groups with a dynamic membership.
However, these surveys also show that at the core of these hooligan
groups are a small number of people, who have been members of the
group for a while and who have clear, hierarchical roles within the
group. It is these hooligans, who are at the core of their respective
groups and who are able to direct the behavior of the group, which
this law specifically intends to target.
In the current array of measures, there are some possibilities for the
mayor to respond to the behavior targeted. However, these measures
are more designed to respond to immediate outbreaks that violate
public order, rather than the structural violations against public order
targeted in the new law. There are also some possibilities to deal with
these structural violations of public order through criminal law.
However, these possibilities are also rather limited due to the difficulties
in finding the actual perpetrators within a group and dealing with
the leaders of a group (as discussed above). The new instruments created
by this law, therefore are specifically designed to counteract structural
violations of public order, like football hooliganism. This means
that these new measures need to be capable of stopping this behavior
at an early stage, have a preventive effect, and directly interfere with
the group dynamics of the violating group. To accomplish this goal,
under this new law the competencies of the mayor and the prosecutor
will be enhanced to deal with this behavior.
The Municipalities Law
Under this law the competences of the mayor under the
Municipalities Law are strengthened to deal with these structural violations
of public order. The mayor can hand out the following measures:
an area ban, a group ban (which means that no more than three
people are allowed to group together at certain designated public
spaces within a municipality) and/or a reporting duty. The mayor can
hand out such a measure to a person who has repeatedly violated public
order individually or in a group; or to a person who played a leading
role in such a group that has repeatedly violated public order. The
fact that a mayor can hand out such a measure also to a person who
individually repeatedly violates public order is one of the amendments
made by the Second Chamber of Parliament. Originally, the proposed
law was only designed to deal with public order violations committed
in a group setting. However, by including the possibility of measures
against individual violators, the scope of the law has been drastically
widened.
The mayor can hand out such a measure for a maximum of three
months at a time. A measure can be extended three times with another
three month period, to a maximum of twelve months. A mayor can
hand out a reporting duty to a person who lives in another municipality,
but the mayor in this case has to discuss this measure with the
mayor of the municipality of residence of the person (the municipality
of residence is also the municipality where a person would have to
report). This power is especially valid for football hooligans, since in
this way a mayor can act against hooligans of the visiting team that
violate public order in another municipality than where they live.
If a measure is handed out to a person by a prosecutor, the mayor cannot
then also hand out a measure to that person. If new facts and cir-
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