resigned from parliament due to his involvement in the Agusta scandal. He acknowledged that he was confronted with two million francs which came as bribery money from the Italian helicopter builder Agusta. Refusing to have anything to do with the money, he advised to "have the money burned". Vandenbroucke was never prosecuted but took a voluntary sabbatical at Oxford (1996–99). After the 1999 Belgian general election Vandenbroucke returned to politics to become Minister of Social Affairs and Pensions (1999–2003). After the 2003 elections he became Minister for Employment and Pensions (2003–04). After the 2004 regional elections, Vandenbroucke left the federal government for the Flemish Government to become Vice-Minister-President of the Flemish Government and Flemish Minister for Work, Education and Training (2004–09). The 2009 regional elections was a sudden and unexpected turning point in his career. Although Vandenbroucke gained a large number of preference votes in his home province of Flemish Brabant, the president of his party, Caroline Gennez, chose not to give him the opportunity to continue his work as Minister, mentioning political as well as characterial dissimilarities. Instead, he was succeeded by Pascal Smet for Education and by Philippe Muyters for Work. At that time, Vandenbroucke remained member of the Flemish Parliament and accepted a teaching position at the University of Antwerp. In 2010, Vandenbroucke participated in the general elections, running for the Belgian Senate. During the campaign, Vandenbroucke outed his concerns about the social-institutional reforms that the pre-electorally dominating Flemish nationalist party New Flemish Alliance wanted to achieve. Although his party maintained its position with the outcome of the elections, Vandenbroucke gained a relatively large number of preference votes. He has been member of the Flemish Parliament (2009) and of the Belgian Senate (2010), and was awarded by King Albert II of Belgium of the title of Minister of State (2009). In October 2011 he left all political posts to focus on academic research. In April 2013 he became a member and president of Belgium's "Commission de réforme des pensions 2020–40" at the request of the federal ministers responsible for pensions, Alexander De Croo and Sabine Laruelle. Composed of twelve experts, this commission was tasked to prepare, independently and in a closed circle, future pension reforms, in order to further improve the social and financial sustainability of the Belgian pension system. After being ten years out of politics on 1 October 2020 on behalf of Conner Rousseau, Vandenbroucke