THE HAGUE, 09/11/10 - The Party for Freedom (PVV) is considering putting Lower House MPs forward as candidates for the Upper House elections on 2 March.

Provincial council elections take place on 2 March. These are better-known as the Upper House elections because the 564 provincial council members elected in March determine the distribution of seats in the Upper House in May.

The provinces have little political power, unlike the Upper House, which has already caused many coalitions to founder. It is very important for the conservatives (VVD), Christian democrats (CDA) and PVV to achieve a majority in the Upper House.

The PVV considers it would be an advantage if the many dozens of new entrants on the provincial councils already had some political experience. For this reason, the party is considering putting forward MPs like Sietse Fritsma, Richard de Mos, Raymond de Roon and Hero Brinkman as provincial council members, according to de Volkskrant newspaper.

They would then combine this function with their membership of the Lower House. Some of them are already municipal council members for the PVV. For example, Raymond de Roon leads the party within Almere local council and Sietse Fritsma, in The Hague.

In the past, rare examples have occurred of the combination of functions in parliament and province. Fleur Agema was still a member of Noord-Holland provincial council in 2006 when she became an MP for the PVV, but she left the council the following year. Cor van Dis of the Christian party SGP was an MP from 1971 to 1994 and a member of Zuid-Holland provincial council from 1970 to 1982.

Constitutional law expert Jan Vis confirms that such an accumulation of representative activities is unusual in the Netherlands. "We have more a culture of not piling up (such jobs); each representative body should have its own representatives. But the judgement is up to the political leadership of a party. PVV leader Geert Wilders apparently wants to keep control of his new crew in the province via cronies from the House."

The PVV is running in all provinces on 2 March. The party is not yet represented at all in the Upper House.