Seven months after the election, the new Dutch cabinet has been sworn in. The negotiation talks between the different political parties lasted longer than expected, but, the work can finally begin.

Photo by Ferdi De Gier found on Flickr.com

On Thursday morning, the new cabinet, nicknamed Rutte III in the news, met with King Willem-Alexander. The new kabinet is comprised of 10 women and 14 men from four different parties which are VVD, CDA, D66 and ChristenUnie.

There has been some criticism that the cabinet is homogeen or homogeneous with a majority of men, only one MP who was born outside the Netherlands (in Croatia), and only one dual citizen MP who is also the only openly gay politician to be appointed.

This article from Business Insider gives you a list of the new MP’s in Dutch, and this one from DutchNews.nl gives you the list in English.

On Thursday, Premier Mark Rutte introduced each minister to the King. You can see the ceremony in this video.

After introductions, the ministers took the traditional bordesfoto outside the King’s offices in The Hague. The photo has been everywhere in the news with commentary about the experience of the politicians, the cost of the name changes of several positions, and even the shoes of minister De Jong.

Although there is already some division between the parties who were left out of the coalition, there is some hope that this year’s more politically diverse group will be more successful!

What do you think about the Rutte III cabinet?