Party for the Animals


The Party for the Animals is a political party in the Netherlands. Among its main goals are animal rights and animal welfare, though it claims not to be a single-issue party. As of 2011, the party considered itself a testimonial party, one which does not seek to gain political power but to testify its beliefs and thereby influence other parties. Accordingly, the party campaigns and seeks votes in opposition to other parties, but without the intention of entering a governing coalition.
Since 2019, the PvdD's political leader is Esther Ouwehand. With 3.2% of the vote at the general election, 2017, the PvdD held five of the 150 House of Representatives's seats. In the Senate it has three of the 75 seats, and in the European Parliament it has one of the 26 seats allocated to the Netherlands constituency.

History

The Party for the Animals was founded on 28 October 2002 by Marianne Thieme, among others.
In the Dutch general election of 2003 it gained 50,000 votes, but not a seat in the House of Representatives.
In the 2004 European Parliament election the party gained 153,000 votes, three times as many as in the 2003 general election. However, the number of votes was not enough to obtain a seat in the European Parliament.
At the 2006 parliamentary election it gained 179,988 votes, enough for two seats in the Dutch parliament. In the run-up to that election the party was supported by several Dutch celebrities, such as writers Maarten 't Hart and Jan Wolkers.
In its first municipal council elections in 2010, the party gained one seat in each of the five places where it participated.
In its third parliamentary election, on June 9, 2010, the PvdD retained its two seats in the House of Representatives with 122,317 votes.
In the 2012 general election the party got 182,162 votes, an increase of 45%, but with just under 2% of the popular vote this did not secure a third seat in the House of Representatives.
In the March 2017 general election the party gained three more seats, resulting in a total of 5.

Miscellaneous

The PvdD is the first political party in the world to gain parliamentary seats with an agenda focused primarily on animal rights.
One of the results that the PvdD claims to have reached during its first four-year parliamentary period is the fact that the government has declared that it will prioritize further reduction of national meat consumption.
The Party for Animals welcomed its 10,000th member in late 2009.

Electoral results

Parliament

Senate

Provincial

European Parliament

Municipalities

Members of the States General

Members of the House of Representatives

Current members of the House of Representatives since the general election of 2017:
In July 2019 Femke Merel van Kooten announced that she had left the parliamentary faction of the party and that she was going to continue as an independent parliament member. This leaves the party with 4 representatives. In 2020, Van Kooten founded the Party for the Future, together with former 50PLUS-leader Henk Krol.

Members of the Senate

Current members of the Senate since the Senate election of 2019:
Current members of the European Parliament since the European Parliamentary election of 2019:
The MEPs of the Party for the Animals are part of the European United Left–Nordic Green Left Group in the European parliament.