Observing that:
The General Equal Treatment Act (Awgb) prohibits making distinctions in the
provision of social protection unless the difference in treatment is justified by a legitimate aim and the means of achieving that aim are appropriate and necessary;
The municipality of Groningen explicitly excludes students from various municipal schemes simply because they are students;
The basis for this is that students can borrow from DUO;
There is a (small) group of students who are no longer (or not) entitled to a student loan from DUO,
for example because someone takes longer than a set period to complete their studies;
The municipality of Groningen has little to no insight into this group;
Considering that:
It is undesirable when a small group of students is excluded from municipal schemes because they could supposedly apply for a student loan, whereas in practice this is not the case;
It is realistic that students from this group fall into or live in poverty because they are no longer
(or not) entitled to a student loan from DUO;
It is undesirable when a resident falls into or lives in poverty, but is excluded from the
municipal poverty policy;
It is therefore important that the municipality maps out this group and the possibilities of including this group in municipal allowances.
Requests the College:
- To investigate:
how large the group of students is that is no longer (or not) entitled to a student loan from DUO (and would be eligible for municipal allowances);
○ whether it is indeed realistic that this group (regularly) falls into or lives in poverty as a result, but is excluded from municipal poverty schemes;
○ from which schemes exactly this group is excluded;
whether it is possible to make this group of students eligible for these municipal schemes (for example, by adjusting the exclusion criterion 'you are not a student' to 'you are not a student with borrowing capacity at DUO');
to map out the pros and cons of this.
To report back to the council with the results of this investigation in Q1 2026.