After the 1972 general election Van Dam was appointed as State Secretary for Housing and Spatial Planning in the Den Uyl cabinet, taking office on 11 May 1973.

Van Dam remained active in the public sector for the VARA working as a television presenter and television producer for several political programs from January 1996 until January 2005 and occupied numerous seats as a nonprofit director on several boards of directors and supervisory boards (International Institute of Social History, Terre des hommes, International Fellowship of Reconciliation and the Institute for Multiparty Democracy) and as an advocate and activist for social justice, social integration, anti-war movement, multiculturalism, minority groups and housing reformer.

During World War II, Van Dam's family had to go into hiding, as a result of his father's refusal to arrest Jews, and his subsequent contribution to the resistance.

In 1965 he graduated with thesis on voter behaviour, before performing the first exit poll held in the Netherlands during parliamentary elections as per the methodology he had earlier developed.

The Prime Minister pushed for a compromise on the sensitive issue, advocating that Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld should escape legal prosecution.