Turnout: 32.28%
About this election
On 6 April 2016 the Netherlands held an advisory referendum on whether to approve the European Union's Association Agreement with Ukraine — a wide-ranging political and free-trade treaty. It was the first national referendum held under the Advisory Referendum Act that had come into force in 2015, and it was forced onto the agenda by a citizens' campaign that gathered the required signatures. Voters rejected the agreement decisively, by 61.00% to 38.21%, in a result that became a significant moment both for Dutch democracy and for the EU's relations with Ukraine.
The 2015 Advisory Referendum Act allowed citizens to trigger a non-binding, consultative referendum on most newly adopted laws if 300,000 valid signatures were collected. For the result to be valid — that is, for the government to be formally obliged to reconsider — turnout had to reach at least 30% of the electorate. The referendum was advisory only: parliament and government retained the final say, but a clear "no" on a high enough turnout was politically difficult to ignore.
The petition was driven by Eurosceptic and anti-establishment groups, most prominently the satirical website GeenStijl through its "GeenPeil" initiative, who saw the vote less as a referendum on Ukraine than as a chance to register opposition to EU expansion and to the political establishment. Supporters of the agreement, including most mainstream parties and the government of Mark Rutte, argued it was a modest trade-and-cooperation deal and warned that rejection would hand a propaganda victory to Russia. The campaign was marked by low engagement and confusion over what, exactly, was being decided.
On a turnout of 32.28% — just clearing the validity threshold — 61.00% voted against approving the agreement and 38.21% in favour, with around 2.5 million "no" votes to 1.57 million "yes". The "no" camp won across almost the entire country; opposition was especially strong in conservative and religious municipalities, while the few pockets of "yes" majorities were in university towns such as Wageningen. The result was an unambiguous rejection on a turnout high enough to be binding in political terms.
The government could not simply ignore the vote. After months of negotiation, Rutte secured a legally binding "Decision" of the EU heads of government in December 2016, clarifying that the agreement did not grant Ukraine candidate status, collective security guarantees, free movement of workers or extra financial aid. On that basis the Dutch parliament approved the ratification act in 2017, and the agreement entered into force. The episode soured many on the referendum instrument: in 2018 the government abolished the Advisory Referendum Act altogether, making this one of only a handful of votes ever held under it.
Official results from the Electoral Council (Kiesraad) — kiesraad.nl.
Compiled and reviewed by Bartłomiej Paruzel, Election Data Analyst, from official results. See our data methodology.