Former figure skater and Olympic champion Sjoukje Dijkstra has died at age 82 at her home in Someren, her daughter Katja Kossmayer announced on Facebook. Dijkstra, born in Akkrum in Friesland, became a sporting legend for earning the Netherlands its first ever Winter Olympics gold in 1964. Sjoukje Dijkstra’s great competitor in the sport was Joan Haanappel who had gained four national titles in a row. But Dijkstra won in 1959 and continued to come into her own, going on
Thursday is the first official summer’s day of the year because the temperature has topped 25° at the Bilt weather station near Utrecht, where all weather records are set. But it was warmer in other places – reaching over 26° in Eindhoven and in parts of Gelderland, weather forecaster Weeronline said. There are normally 29 days on which the Bilt weather station records a temperature of more than 25°, Weeronline said, after looking at the past 30 years. The warm weather is set to
The Belgian public prosecution department is demanding PostNL pay a €24 million fine for failing to deal properly with subcontractors’ staff, the Telegraaf said on Thursday. Although they are not officially PostNL workers, the company treated them as such and had the most say about the way they worked, the Belgian authorities say. The case, currently being heard in Antwerp, centres on the PostNL Cargo and PostNL Pakketten units, and the contract they had agreed with 220 subcontractors. Both...
Ticket touts have been trying to make money out of tickets for the national Remembrance Day ceremony in central Amsterdam, following the decision by city officials to require attendees to register in advance. The measure is one of a string of security steps being taken to offset the risk that the ceremony and the two-minutes silence will be disturbed. Only 10,000 people will be allowed onto the Dam for the event, rather than the 20,000 who usually attend. Now online trading platform
The bike storage park in Amsterdam’s harbour area, where abandoned and wrongly-parked bikes await collection, is so full that the city is being forced to take new measures, the Parool reported on Thursday. The fietsdepot has space for 75,000 bikes a year, but city officials say the total number of bikes taken to the storage is heading for 100,000. In 2023, some 48,000 bikes were not picked up within the allotted six weeks, of which 75% were in a bad
Spring and warmer weather may be with us but that does not mean we should stop thinking about energy efficiency, particularly when it comes to buying a new home, says financial advisor José de Boer. From the beginning of this year, people wishing to buy a home with a higher energy label have been able to borrow more than those at the bottom end of the housing spectrum with a G or F for energy efficiency. The family spending institute
Cherry growers will be allowed to use two insecticides to combat an invasive fruitfly for another year following pressure from MPs. The fruit fly (Drosophila suzukii ) has been around for a decade in the Netherlands and farmers have been given special dispensation for the insecticides Exirel and Tracer. Agriculture minister Piet Adema decided to withdraw the dispensation based on a report in which food safety watchdog NVWA warned that around a third of growers did not keep to the
The four parties currently in talks on forming a new government are not displaying the “urgency” needed to get the Netherlands back on track and should think about giving up, former GroenLinks leader Jesse Klaver said in a speech to mark Labour Day on May 1. If they continue to “muddle along” it is time to say “Let us pass it on, because we are not getting anywhere,” Klaver said. “We are watching frantic efforts to put something together which
It is still relatively easy for criminals to gain access to Instagram, Facebook and email accounts despite measures taken by platforms to deter hackers, research by NOS has shown. The broadcaster followed the activities of a Nigerian phishing gang and identified 3,200 victims, including 1,000 in the Netherlands. The numbers are likely to be “just a fraction” of the real number of duped account holders, NOS said. The gang works by presenting potential victims with a false page on which
The value of goods imported to the Netherlands from China has fallen for the first time in seven years, national statistics agency CBS said on Thursday. In 2023, the Netherlands imported goods worth €104.3 billion from China, a drop of almost 17% on the previous year. In particular, the Dutch imported fewer computers, laptops and tablets, which are now more likely to come from Taiwan, the CBS said. The import of Chinese cars, however, soared from €100 million to €1.1
The introduction of the “coronavirus pass”, a digital certificate that enabled people who had been vaccinated or recovered from Covid to go to museums and events, did not infringe on fundamental rights, judges in The Hague said on Wednesday. Three opponents of the “test for entry” system went to court at the end of 2022, arguing that the use of the pass was a way to force people to get vaccinated and demanded compensation. The system was introduced in September 2021 and phased
The sale of heat pumps, meant to replace traditional gas-fired central heating boilers, has collapsed this year, due to political uncertainty, low gas prices, and consumer questions, the AD said on Wednesday afternoon. Heat pump makers association DVW says that sales have halved year on year. In the first quarter of 2023, consumers bought 42,000 heat pumps, but in the same period this year, they have only bought 20,000. There is, the DVW told the AD, “a continual brake” on sales growth.