A PAIR of Bills cracking down on asylum-seekers wishing to settle in the Netherlands, which could criminalise anyone helping undocumented migrants, have been passed by the Dutch parliament.

The legislation cuts temporary asylum residency from five to three years, indefinitely suspends the issuing of new asylum residency permits and puts further restrictions on family reunions for people who have been granted asylum.

It passed in the lower house on Thursday night but could still be rejected in the upper house after the summer recess.

Slashing migration was the focus of the four-party coalition led by the far-right Party for Freedom of Islamophobic poster boy Geert Wilders before it collapsed last month. A snap election is due on October 29.

Mr Wilders’s party currently holds a narrow lead in opinion polls over a centre-left bloc that recently agreed to a formal merger.

The opposition Christian Democrats withdrew their support for the legislation on Thursday over a late amendment that would criminalise people living in the Netherlands without a visa and would also criminalise people and organisations that help such undocumented migrants.

The amendment was introduced by a member of Mr Wilders’s party and passed narrowly because a small number of opposition MPs were absent.