Samenvatting

On January 1, 2013 an amendment entered into force, increasing the administrative fines in social security legislation and labor laws. The amendment also redesigned the way these fines were calculated. In this article these new fines are assessed for consistency. On the one hand consistency with the dominant tendency of localization of welfare states and on the other hand consistency with other penalties. Based on this assessments it is concluded that the new fines do not match the tendency of localization of the welfare state. Compared to other fines the increase itself suites the type of violation, but not with the type of offender. Moreover the amendment deviates with regard to the doubling of the fine, since the fine is based on the amount of the unduly paid benefits that have to be recovered as well. Finally the amendment deviates since the legislator obliges the administration to impose the fine: the administration has no discretion whatsoever.