Friday, 7 November 2025 - 11:08

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The Electoral Council announced the final results of the 2025 parliamentary election on Friday. The official results correspond with the final exit polls. The D66 and PVV are the largest parties in the new Tweede Kamer with 26 seats each, followed by the VVD (22), GroenLinks-PvdA (20), and CDA (18), while the NSC will depart the lower house of Parliament without even a single one of their 19 MPs remaining in office. The municipality of Amsterdam was also criticized for delivering official results to the Council “extremely late,” said Electoral Council Chair Wim Kuijken.

The capital only delivered results on Thursday, more than a week after the election took place. Kuijken said he was concerned about several municipalities which are not releasing results as rapidly as the rest of the country, saying a main factor was a lack of knowledge in running an election.

While the PVV and D66 both now have 26 seats in parliament, Rob Jetten’s D66 received 29,668 more votes than Geert Wilders’ far-right party. The D66 is therefore considered the largest party for the purpose of coalition formation. As per tradition, Jetten will therefore get the first chance to try and negotiate a coalition government.

This election, a party needed 70,479 seats to gain one of the 150 seats in the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of the Dutch parliament. Seats were first allocated to parties for each set of 70,479 votes they received. That left a remainder of 11 residual seats, or restzetels, which are then allocated using the D’Hondt Method. Two went to the PVV and one each to BBB, JA21, CDA, D66, FvD, VVD, GroenLinks-PvdA, ChristenUnie, and SP.

The D’Hondt Method is considered controversial because it begins by proportionately allocating a seat based on the remaining ballots received, but the ratio used is recalculated after each restzetel is handed out. The method has been criticized for unfairly distributing seats in Parliament to larger parties, with smaller parties facing a greater hurdle.

This year, the PVV was the only party to receive two residual seats. During the last election, the PVV, the combined GL-PvdA faction, and the VVD each received two.

Additionally, four women from GroenLinks-PvdA were below spot 20 on the party’s candidate list, but secured a seat in the Tweede Kamer through preferential votes. They are Fatihya Abdi, Barbara Kathmann, Mikal Tseggai, and Lisa Vliegenthart. A fifth woman, Marieke Vellinga-Beemsterboer of D66, also landed one of the 150 spots in the Tweede Kamer.

Former GroenLinks-PvdA leader Frans Timmermans was elected, even though he said he would resign. He can leave his seat in a manner where his party chooses his replacement. The same is true for D66 party member Koen Castelein from D66, who will remain an alderman in Hattem.

Approximately 10.64 million of the 13,589,128 eligible voters cast their ballots in the election, for a turnout of 78.3 percent. Over 10.57 million ballots were valid. About 28,000 were invalid, and 40,000 were left blank.

Jetten selected Wouter Koolmees, a member of the D66 and current CEO of national railway NS, as the “verkenner,” the person to lead the first round of coalition talks. He has alreadymet with the leaders of all the parties to find out who is willing to work with whom, and under what conditions.

On Friday, he is scheduled to meet with the D66 and JA21 together, and then with the VVD and GroenLinks-PvdA. D66 is reluctant to work with right-wing JA21, and the VVD doesn’t want to work with GroenLinks-PvdA. The purpose of Friday’s meetings is to see if Koolmees can identify areas where parties can bridge those gaps.