The Great Nordic Thread

[Diouf]

Most of the parties are about to initiate the official process to name candidates for the European elections 2019. This has caused several candidates to announce that they are running, and there are quite a few relatively prominent persons among them.



Søren Gade, current MP and Liberal Group Leader and former Minister of Defence, is clearly the biggest name, and should give the Liberals a clear boost. He won 28.916 personal votes in the 2015 general election, the fifth heighest of all. He helped/was used by Lars Løkke as a shadow leadership candidate against Kristian Jensen in the 2014 leadership battle in the Liberals. That made him relatively unpopular among the Jensen-wing, and in the end, he wasn't offered a significant cabinet position after Løkke's win in 2015, so he opted to become group leader instead. Current MEP Morten Løkkegaard would like to be the lead candidate, but he belongs to the very pro-EU Liberal wing, which obviously has a narrower appeal. Liberals will be shooting themselves in the foot if Gade is not lead candidate.



Rasmus Nordquist, current Alternative MP and until recently political spokesperson. Although, he only narrowly won his party's seat in Zealand in the 2015 general election, he has become perhaps the most well-known Alternative MP, aside from party leader Uffe Elbæk. Until the eruption of the internal party battle in the fall of 2017, he was political spokesperson so he had a good platform and participated in many debates. He remains quite active, and his outspoken pro-EU and pro-immigration platform will likely reap significant benefits among young, urban, well-educated voters. Depending on the exact rivals, the electoral alliances and whether the Alternative stays afloat, he should stand a good chance of winning a seat.



The Red-Green Alliance is running for the first time; until now they have simply put their weight behind the People's Movement against the EU. MP Nikolaj Villumsen will try to win that first seat for them, but if he is to succeed, then that is more likely to be due to the party's strength than to his qualities. He is a blend boring speaker, who is quite poor at argumentation. As an incumbent MP and lead candidate in Eastern Jutland, i.e. including Aarhus, in the 2015 general election, he only won 2.338 personal votes despite the party doing very well (7.4%). However, the Red-Green brand is very strong, currently at 8.7% in the national polling average, so he certainly has a chance. But some of the Red-Green voters are pro-EU, and there is a lot of competition on the left wing with Nordquist, Kari and the SPP.


Current MEP for the People's Movement against the EU, Rina Ronja Kari, would like to run again. She started the 2014 European elections out as pretty unknown, but had a decent campaign and ended up being comfortably elected. She manages to get attention once in a while for criticism of austerity in the EU, and lavish EU-projects, but is not a household name. Still, the party is likely to be in an electoral alliance with the Red-Greens, and the far-left will probably be relatively strong. If both of the parties will not get an MEP, I think Kari has a better chance of winning the seat than Villumsen.

There are still a number of unknows. Will current Social Liberal Commissioner for Competition, Margrethe Vestager, run to be ALDE's candidate for Commission President, if so will she also run as a candidate in the EP elections? So far she has only said, she would like to be a commissioner again, but I think she is likely to run. This could turn things upside down. She would likely attract many of the pro-EU voters, and perhaps even broader than that if she is seen as having a good chance of becoming Commission President. That could give the Social Liberals a historically good election. If she does not run, current MEP Morten Helveg Petersen will likely run again, and it will be touch-and-go whether he would be re-elected.

DPP is still awaiting the OLAF case regarding fraud with EU money, so are laying relatively low. Morten Messerschmidt, who did amazingly in 2014, will not run again, so the lead candidate is likely to be the much less known MEP Anders Vistisen. Their policy positions means that they will ofc do pretty well again, but a 2014 repeat seems unlikely with him as leader. They could lose first place in that case.

The Social Democrats will likely lead with one of their two current MEPs, Jeppe Kofod or Christel Schaldemose, but neither are likely to make big waves. Perhaps a backbench MP will join them on the ticket, but with an upcoming general election they are confident of winning, many MPs would rather go for their chance to become ministers.

The Conservatives have yet to announce a candidate to replace the popular former party leader Bendt Bendtsen, and could get a tough time without another strong candidate. The SPP has not found fresh faces either, but 73-year old MEP Margrethe Auken, first elected in 2004, could perhaps run once again and still has a big personal vote. The Liberal Alliance has so many other problems at the moment. The New Right will likely only run if there is a general election before the campaign starts as they would be automatically eligble to run if elected, otherwise they likely won't be able to collect the signatures to run. The same applies for the Christian Democrats, who is of course much less likely to win seats in the general election.

[Diouf]

Historic increase in defence budget



For the first time since the Cold War, the Danish defence budget will increase in the years to come. The government has reached an agreement with the Social Democrats, the DPP and the Social Liberals to increase the budget gradually until 2023, where it will be 4.8 billion DKK/0,65 billion euro higher than today. This is an increase of around 20% compared to the current defence budget. The parties in the agreement largely agreed that the defence budget had to be increased, but there were clear differences between how much. DPP and particularly the Conservatives wanted a larger increase, where as the Social Liberals and probably the Liberal Alliance wanted less significant increases. There were also disagreements about how to spend the money. Social Democrats, Social Liberals and Liberal Alliance tended to favour cyber defence structures, while the other parties looked to get more "boots on the ground" and normal military equipment. Similarly, the two Red Bloc parties wanted more funds to peace and stabilization missions, while the Blue Bloc parties tended to focus on the ability to join heavier military missions.
Finally, DPP and Conservatives wanted to double the number of conscripts (currently 4200 a year) and double the term (currently 4 months), while the Liberal Alliance in particular has made clear its opposition to the idea of conscription. The compromise ended at an increase in conscripts of 500 with the same standard term, and an intensified promotion campaign to make sure it's still almost only volunteers (currently 98% are).

[Diouf]

Social Democrats want to stop asylum applications in Denmark....perhaps

Tomorrow, the Social Democrats will present their new asylum and refugee policies, but most of the policies have been leaked tonight, and party leader Mette Frederiksen has commented on it to several media as well. The most important new policy is a a proposal to stop the possibility to apply for asylum in Denmark. People who come here applying for asylum will be sent to a center in another country, and if their asylum application is valid, they will be sent on to UN refugee camps. While stopping the possibility for spontaneous asylum applications, the Social Democrats will then want to re-start the previous Danish practice of taking a fixed number of refugees through the UN system. This is of course the most logical and fair way to make a refugee system, but their new policy programme also include passages which means that the above measures in all likelyhood will never lead to anything. The party states that it will abide by international rules and conventions, which makes it all impossible to carry through, unless these rules and conventions are changed significantly, which is very unlikely.

The new proposals are quite smart strategically, as it positions them to the right of the government on this crucial topic. It will be hard for the government to reject this proposal without seeming as soft on immigration. They might try to explain that it can't work if international conventions are to be kept, but that will raise further difficult questions about why the government insists on keeping international conventions instead of introducing a controllable refugee system. There can be some pitfalls about the internal cohesion on this in the Social Democrats, as there will definitely be some, who thinks this is far too right-wing, but maybe they can be placated by the line about international conventions and thereby knowing it will never materialize. Unless something changes radically on the international scene so the conventions can be changed, however, this proposal will in the long term lead to even more distrust in politicians on the immigration topic when promises are made of a new, fair logical system with control of incoming numbers, but it is not carried through.

[Diouf]

Government gives up on marquee tax/immigration deal - Liberal Alliance leader under fire

After months of negotiations, the government this week gave up on agreeing on a marquee tax/immigration deal with the DPP. The government's goal has been to pursue "historic tax cuts", while the DPP has demanded a "paradigm shift" in immigration policies. The failure to achieve a big deal on these two crucial right-wing policies illustrate the lack of cohesion in the "blue bloc" and scuppers PM Lars Løkke's hope of really delivering on his 2015 election slogan:"Make it pay to work".

Now that the marquee deal has been cancelled, the parties will try to agree on a minor deals instead on tax (cuts of around 1 billion DKK (0.13 billion euro))

This minor tax deal has now been agreed upon. The tax cut ended at arund 1.5 billion DKK, and was then combined with 3.5 billion in tax incentives to make it more worth it to save up for your pension. The picture below shows the consequences for four different income types. The first figure is the yearly tax cut, the second figure is the tax cut + the savings from the pension deal. The two figures below the pics are yearly income, and current income tax paid.



The burqa ban debate carries on, especially internally in many parties, now that a law proposal has been worked out by the Ministry of Justice. The Liberal Alliance has deemed this to be an ethical question, so will not tell their MPs how to vote. Their five ministers will vote for it to support the government, but 7 of 8 regular MPs will vote against it. One Liberal MP and one Social Democrat MP has already announced they will vote against, and a few more will probably join them. However, the proposal will still be approved with a decent majority.

[Diouf]

Most of the parties are about to initiate the official process to name candidates for the European elections 2019.
The SPP has not found fresh faces either, but 73-year old MEP Margrete Auken, first elected in 2004, could perhaps run once again and still has a big personal vote.

Auken is indeed running again. She has had a quite interesting journey on EU affairs, that probably mirrors many left wingers. She joined SPP on 3 October 1972, the day after Denmark had voted to join the EC, due to her strong Eurosceptic views. Like the party, she saw the EC as a capitalist project. However, she moved towards more positive feelings when the EC started to look like a place to solve transnational problems, particularly regarding environment. So after the Maastricht Treaty, she was heavily pro-EU in a divided party. She was a MP from 1979-1990 and 1994-2004. In 2004, she ran for the EP for the first time as SPP lead candidate, and was safely elected. However, hitherto SPP had been in the far-left GUE group, which includes many Eurosceptic parties, but she wanted to sit in the Green group. Despite a majority in the party's executive committee deciding that SPP should sit in GUE, she decided to join the Green group anyway. In 2009, at the height of SPP's popularity, she won more than 200.000 personal votes, the third-highest that year. The young Emilie Turunen was also elected for SPP, but she belonged to the group of young people around Villy Søvndal, who was hell-bent on influence and power, so when SPP left the government, she joined the Social Democrats and is now a director in Nykredit, a financial services company. Despite the SPP woes in 2014, Auken still safely retained her seat and won more than 150.000 personal votes. The SPP is now members of the European Green Party, and there is no doubt of their belonging in the Green group. The party is almost uniformly pro-EU, although Auken's embrace of the common currency is not yet official policy. She should stand good chances of another re-election. Particularly, if the recent EP proposal of distributing some of the leftover UK seats to other countries is adopted, and Denmark will go from 13 to 14 MEPs.





Most of the news in recent weeks have focused on the illness and then death of the Queen's husband, Prince Henrik. However, there are increasingly solid rumours of a cabinet reshuffle in the spring. The Conservatives are happy with their three ministers. The Liberal Alliance ministers are mostly very unpopular, but they are all the top figures of the party, so I don't really think it would make sense for them with big changes. It could end up "tainting" the whole party with government experience, instead of keeping some from the next generation out of the mess, but maybe they will take a punt. The Liberals will probably like to make a few changes; introduce some fresher faces, particularly political spokesperson Jacob Ellemann-Jensen. The next big policy discussion is likely to be in the media area. The main question is how much the state broadcaster DR will be cut down, and whether it will be a strictly Blue Bloc deal or whether it will be a broad deal with the Social Democrats. DR has been almost provocatively left-wing in some of their biggest programs in recent years, and combined with some expenses scandals, several Blue Bloc politicians want a 25% cut in their funding. However, the Conservatives are a bit hesitant towards making too big cuts as an old and "cultured" party, and some pragmatists in the other parties would also prefer a broad, sustainable deal with the Social Democrats, where the cuts are more like 10%. A recent poll showed that 33% of Danes wanted DR cut with 25% or more, 21% wanted it cut but with less than 25%, 31% did not want any cuts, 15% don't know.

[Diouf]

Historic increase in defence budget

For the first time since the Cold War, the Danish defence budget will increase in the years to come. The government has reached an agreement with the Social Democrats, the DPP and the Social Liberals to increase the budget gradually until 2023, where it will be 4.8 billion DKK/0,65 billion euro higher than today. This is an increase of around 20% compared to the current defence budget. The parties in the agreement largely agreed that the defence budget had to be increased, but there were clear differences between how much. DPP and particularly the Conservatives wanted a larger increase, where as the Social Liberals and probably the Liberal Alliance wanted less significant increases. There were also disagreements about how to spend the money. Social Democrats, Social Liberals and Liberal Alliance tended to favour cyber defence structures, while the other parties looked to get more "boots on the ground" and normal military equipment. Similarly, the two Red Bloc parties wanted more funds to peace and stabilization missions, while the Blue Bloc parties tended to focus on the ability to join heavier military missions.
Finally, DPP and Conservatives wanted to double the number of conscripts (currently 4200 a year) and double the term (currently 4 months), while the Liberal Alliance in particular has made clear its opposition to the idea of conscription. The compromise ended at an increase in conscripts of 500 with the same standard term, and an intensified promotion campaign to make sure it's still almost only volunteers (currently 98% are).

If you don't mind, would you be able to talk more about the background on this issue? Is the motivation both from the SDs and the conservative bloc just about participation in international interventions?

Well, there are different reasons for the parties, and there are significant differences in how much they want to spend.

The Conservatives are the most extreme. They basically want to spend as much money as possible on defence. They insist on Denmark reaching the NATO target of 2% GDP spending on defence, and before they entered the government, they stayed out of the 2016 deal to buy 27 new F-35 fighters because the number was too low. They are traditionally a defence-friendly party, has won many votes in the Defence Community and has had military personnel among their MPs (latest prominent one was Helge Adam Møller, MP from 1984-2011). However, they have embraced the topic even further in recent years. With their dramatic drop in support from 2010 to 2015, and a generel feeling that the party had lost its character and edge during the many government years, the party has increased focus on a few, traditional conservative causes like law and order and defense.

The DPP is also very willing to spend a lot of money on defence, and thinks the 2% target should be achieved, although more gradually than the Conservatives. The DPP is somewhat more focused on "defending the realm" and the more folksy parts of the military like the Home Guard and conscription. The party does not really agree with some of NATO's biggest objectives; their defence spokesperson Marie Krarup has repeatedly rejected the idea that there is any Russian threat and famously said that "the EU is a far bigger threat for Denmark than Russia". The party has also become a bit more weary on participation in missions in muslim countries with a "let the barbarians sort it out between them" type rhetoric, although in reality they have voted for basically all mandates. 

The Liberals and the Social Democrats have fairly similar attitudes. They are the two traditional prime minister parties, so on the one hand they represent Denmark on the biggest stage and want to be able to join international coalitions, but on the other hand they know defense investments are expensive and that the median voter is opposed to increased defence spending. They both refer a lot to the declaration from the 2014 Nato Wales Summit, where the countries agreed to reverse cuts in defense and instead move towards the 2% target. Neither party want to spend that much money on defence, the new agreement makes it 1.3% in 2023, but both parties want to show goodwill to international partners and ensure Denmark's ability to participate in international missions.

The Liberal Alliance does not care a lot about defence. It's major goal is generally to reduce the public sector and reduce taxes, so they will not want the defence budgets to run amok, but they accept the international commitment to an increase and that the issue is fairly important to the other Blue Bloc parties. Their main points has been liberal ideologoical ones like "abolish conscription". They are also critical of the idea of broad spendings on things like the Home Guard and military installations across the country; instead they want a narrow, focused, high-tech defense with few highly-trained units. The three big people parties are obviously big opponents of this idea of cutting a lot of jobs in thinly-populated areas, so their vision is unlikely to become reality anytime soon.

The Social Liberals are mainly in the deal due to their constant desire to be a "responsible party". They know no better than to stand with serious looks and explain just how important their party is for the continued functioning of Denmark, and the whole World. The party wants to cut defence spending, and transfer the spending towards foreign aid and development projects. In terms of the structure of the defence, they are probably fairly close to the Liberal Alliance vision, but focusing even more on peacekeeping, international cooperation, climate change etc. They did manage to diverge some funds to these areas, and perhaps to slightly rein in the ambitions of the most eager parties.

[Diouf]

What are the perspectives of the other Red Bloc parties towards the military?

SPP is, like in many other areas, moving gradually more left again after their government participation. In 2009, the party participated in a defence agreement for the first time in its history as one of many steps towards showing they were a responsible party ready for governing. Although it, like all previous agreements since the Cold War, included gradual cuts in the Defence Budget, it was still a big step for a traditionally pacifist party to enter an agreement that meant spending billions each year on tanks and guns. In 2013, they were also a part of the parties behind the defence agreement as part of the government. Similarly, they voted for the Libya bombings in 2011, and helped administrate the effort in Afghanistan as part of the government. Since leaving government, they have retracted back to a more natural spot. In the aforementioned 2016 deal to buy F-35 fighters, SPP were in negotiations as a part of the defence agreement, but left because the number of fighters was deemed to high. They weren't seriously a part of the negotiations of the 2018 defence agreement, and criticized the military build-up.

The Red-Green Alliance wants to abolish the Danish military, and replace it with a far smaller organization, that can potentially participate in UN peacekeeping missions. Previously, their party program even argued that the abolishment of the military (and police) was necessary because "they have too often showed to be the final, and far too effective, protector of capitalism", but that passage has been removed. They obviously want to leave NATO as well. They actually supported the bombings in Libya... for 4 days, before returning to their traditional position of strongly denouncing any use of military force.

The Alternative is still a quite new party, but, like in many areas, their policies will probably largely end up in the same place as the Red-Green Alliance, although from different ways of arguing and with a different rhetoric. They have their usual symbolic gestures: their spokesperson in the area is called a peace spokesperson, they want a "feminist foreign policy" etc. They are very happy about cooperation, and international cooperation in particular, so it does not seem like they want to leave NATO, but they are probably never gonna vote for military action, only peacekeeping in UN and EU (if the opt-out is ever removed). Found this comment from their spokesperson regarding the defence agreement: "The time is not for gunpowder and bullets or more conscripts. We need a new approach, where we invest in resolution of conflicts. Where we look at migration and climate change as important aspects. If we increase our military budget, we will not get any nearer to peace and stability."

[Diouf]

Blue Bloc parties agree 20% budget reduction for state broadcaster



The government and DPP today agreed to cut the Danish state broadcaster, DR, with 20% over the next five years. At the same time, they decided to abolish the license fee, and introduce it in a reduced form as a part of the general tax system. This is a quite big cut, and a significant win for DPP and the Liberal Alliance in particular. The Red Bloc parties are all opposed to the deal, even the Social Democrats that had been open to accept some cuts. However, the Blue Bloc parties clearly decided to make the biggest cut they could agree on and preferred a solo Blue agreement with a large cut (and the possibility that a new majority in the next parliament could reverse some of the cuts) instead of a broad agreement with the Social Democrats and a less significant cut.

The current DR budget is 3.7 billion DKK (0.5 bln. euro) a year currently, and with this agreement it will be reduced to 3 billion DKK (0.4 bln. euro) in 2023 . Currently this is financed with a license fee paid by each household. It is not per se obligatory, but you must pay if you "have the possibility to watch/listen to DR", i.e. a TV, radio or an internet connection. So basically all households must pay the license fee, and inspectors can come on unannounced visits to non-payers to check whether they have the possibility to access DR content. The license fee will be gradually abolished, and then paid through the regular tax system instead. This will be a very good thing for singles, since the license fee is per household while the new payment will be through income tax. So for families, the total amount will stay around the same, while for singles the price will be cut in half from 2.350 DKK (315 euro) a year to 1.242 DKK (166 euro) a year.

As mentioned in a previous post, there is majority support in the population for significant cuts to DR. Some of that can be due to a general opposition to having such a dominant state-owned player in the media market (the Liberal Alliance argument), but DR has also faced significant criticism in recent years for a couple of expenses scandals and a too blatant left-wing bias (the DPP argument). The funniest expense example was when it was revealed that DR had spent 70.000 DKK to transport a correspondent's wife's horse to the US, but there were also cases of DR paying 1 million DKK in three years so a director could fly to and from work in Copenhagen as well as some very well-paid "diversity consultants", who were mostly former DR directors. Left-wing bias is probably unavoidable in an institution with so many journalists and academics, but if DR had just a bit of self-insight and political understanding, they had probably refrained themselves from blasting it out with big letters in their marquee programs. The biggest controversy was about the expensive "1864"; while historical accuracy and understanding were wanting, it had more than enough of far too obvious criticism of right-wing politics. To quote DR's drama director Ingolf Gabold: "Yes, this was a political drama. The dangers of nationalism as shown in 1864 shows the dangers of the neonationalism DPP espouses." and instructor Ole Bornedal said: "Yes of course 1864 is a rejection of nationalism, but I hardly find that a political point. I reject nationalism in the same way as I reject violence against women or children". Similarly, the ambitious history documentary series "The Story of Denmark" largely showcased achievements as the result of the left-wing, e.g. a significant focus on the communists in the resistance movements during WWII, but no mention of the, at least, equally important nationalconservative part of the resistance.

[Diouf]

No-confidence vote on Frp-star provides early test of majority cohesion



Frp's most controversial and most popular minister, Sylvi Listhaug, will face a no-confidence vote in parliament on Tuesday. Listhaug, who is minister of Justice and Immigration, has faced heavy criticism after a Facebook post a week ago, where she severely criticized Ap for not supporting a new proposal that would allow citizenship to be revoked for "persons who are a threat to the nation" without going through a traditional court case. The line that caught ire in particular was her statement that "Ap cares more about the right of terrorists than the security of the nation". Opposition parties were quick to denounce the comments and weave it into the context of the Utøya Massacre. Even Sp somewhat surprisingly has stated that they will vote for a no-confidence vote in Listhaug.

So now the main question is what KrF will vote? They are generally opposed to Frp's stance on migration, and, like Ap, voted against the citizenship proposal. However, voting to remove Listhaug will certainly cause chaos in the governing majority. Frp would not really be able to live with that, so they could very well leave the government. And Frp repeated throughout the election that they would not support a government, that they weren't a part of. A compromise could perhaps be found with a restructuring of Listhaug's portfolio, but with her prominence on the immigration topic, it is hard to see a satisfactory solution for Frp. Perhaps PM Solberg could make the choice easier for Krp by stating that the whole government will resign, if Listhaug receives a no-confidence motion. Even if the matter is resolved, it has already caused deep fractions inside the government between Venstre and Frp.

In the latest pollofpolls.no average, the governing majority leads 88-81 in seats despite KrF being just below the threshold. Ap is down on 23.6% (-3.8%) and Høyre up to 28.0% (+3.0). Solberg's personal popularity is quite high, so she has gained a bit from both swing voters and Frp voters, while Ap has been tormented by a #MeToo scandal with Trond Giske and internal divisions after the electoral defeat.

[Diouf]

Thanks for the praise!

I unfortunately don't know of any in-depth English coverage of Danish politics. thelocal has subsidaries in all scandinavian countries (.no .se .dk), but they are generally shorter news updates. Also they seem aimed at foreigners in these countries, so perhaps naturally they tend towards being skeptical of retrictions on immigration.

[Diouf]

KrF's national committee recommends no-confidence vote in Listhaug


Today, KrF's national committee met, and a majority of its members recommended that KrF's parliamentary group votes for the no-confidence motion against Sylvi Listhaug tomorrow. The comittee consists of the leaders of the different party regions, and its decision is not binding on the parliamentary group, although it is seen as quite influential. However, it is also clear that the party is split on how to handle this, as several members of the committee publicly expressed their opposition on taking down Listhaug.

Most media reports suggest that Erna Solberg will indeed make tomorrow's vote a cabinet question, so a no-confidence vote will take down the whole government. Can KrF stand for that pressure? An important thing to remember is that Norway cannot have early elections, so if the government falls, the same parliament will have to find a new government for the next 3.5 years. In the last days of the election campaign, Krf committed to Solberg as PM, so they can hardly let Ap and Gahr Støre take over the reins. Siding with the centre-left would certainly also upset a significart part of the party.

[Diouf]

Listhaug resigns - leaves with a barrel of attacks

Justice and Immigration Minister Sylvi Listhaug decided to resign this morning. This was quite surprising as there was no indication that neither PM Solberg or Frp leader Jensen had pushed her into this. Had this been about many other ministers, she would have perhaps quickly been told politely to step back, but this would be very unlikely with a so symbolic minister as Listhaug. Her own reasoning for resigning is that she did not want Frp to lose the power of government participation nor risk Gahr Støre taking over as PM "who would be a disaster for Norway". KrF is called a "clueless party". She also underlined the importance of being able to speak her mind, particularly on immigration, which she sees as the most important topic for decades to come. So it seems that Listhaug chose martyrdom, and will now be in a position to speak even freer on issues of immigration. That might help Frp, but will hardly lower tensions in the governing majority.

[Diouf]

This is only one poll and taken yesterday after Listhaug's decision to resign, but it shows a huge increase for Frp. +9.8% compared to the previous Kantar poll, and +5.4% compared to the 2017 election. Also a massive centre-right majority. Interesting how much of this bounce will stay.

[Diouf]

Poll by Gallup for Berlingske. The poll is only made with voters from the Copenhagen and the Copenhagen Environs multimember constituencies. The graphic below should be zoomable as a picture, and it shows four different things. The top picture is simply a map of the two constituencies to show which municipalities are covered. The second pictures show the Liberals' results in the two constituencies since 2005. The third picture shows the distribution between the blocs in 2015 and in the poll. Finally, the fourth picture shows the change since 2015 on a party basis. The Social Democrats are lower than in 2015, while the Social Liberals and SPP make strong progress and the Red-Green Alliance is the second-largest party. The Social Democrat decline in the capital area is likely due to their policy changes, particularly on immigration and law and order, but also in supporting moving state jobs from Copenhagen to the rest of the country. Were the Social Democrats to hit the same nationwide figures as in 2015 (currently they are 0.5% above it in the polling average), I would think that they would go back in Copenhagen (and Aarhus?) and make progress in mid-sized towns. Liberal Alliance is halved, and both the Liberals and DPP are below 12%. The Conservatives make slight progress, perhaps enough to win a seat in Frederiksberg which they lost for the first time ever in 2015, while the New Right is at around the same point as in Gallup's national polls.

[Diouf]

New Right leader takes on Thulesen Dahl at his home turf



New Right leader Pernille Vermund has decided to run in the Southern Jutland multi-member constituency at the next general election. This means she will face off directly against DPP leader Kristian Thulesen Dahl in a constituency, where Thulesen Dahl and DPP dominated in 2015. The party won 28.4% and Thulesen Dahl won 57.371 personal votes (the highest tally in the country). He has lived in the town of Thyregod (1.300 inhabitants) in the constituency for several years, while Vermund has lived most of her life in Northern Zealand, where she ran as a candidate for the Conservatives in 2015. So Vermund can obviously fall in the trap of being a cocky "foreigner" from the wealthy Whisky Belt coming to Southern Jutland, but this choice will also give her the possibility of several debates against Thulelsen Dahl and the media attention that will follow from these clashes.

It has been clear for a while that Vermund would not run in her native Northern Zealand. Mette Thiesen, who was the only New Right candidate to win a councillor seat in the 2017 local elections, is already a candidate in Northern Zealand, where she is a councillor in Hillerød. A small, new party needs to spread out its profiles, and if Vermund ran in Northern Zealand as well, Thiesen would basically have no chance of being elected. Also the constituency is not that big with 290.000 votes in 2015. So the question then was basically whether she would run in Zealand or Southern Jutland. Both are big constituencies, 530.000 and 450.000 votes in 2015 respectively, and both had a big DPP vote to eat into, 25.6% and 28.4% respectively. Zealand would have seen her up against among others, PM Løkke Rasmussen and Social Liberal MP Zenia Stampe, who due to her far-left position on immigration is a favoured hate symbol for the right. Also there are many DPP voters without Thulelsen Dahl or Kjærsgaard as a main vote getter. I thought, she would choose Zealand for those reasons, and because it's far closer to home, so she would have less of an outsider mark. But she chose to take on Thulelsen Dahl directly, which will certainly be interesting.

In Northern Zealand, we will likely see another hefty DPP-New Right battle in a younger version. The aforementioned Thiesen is running for the New Right, and there are strong rumours that MEP Morten Messerschmidt will return as a candidate for the DPP in the constituency. Messerschmidt won a record 465.758 personal votes in the 2014 European elections, where the whole country is one constituency, but has been plagued by scandals about misuse of EU funds and a long sick leave as a result.

[Diouf]

Analysis by Altinget based on Norstat polling:

The Liberal Alliance is on average polling 5.3% currently compared to 7.5% at the 2015 general election and 8.4% in August 2016. This means the party has lost around 77.000 voters net since the 2015 election. One seat is worth around 20.000 votes, so this means they have lost almost 4 seats out of the thirteen, they won in 2015. Below the net movements to other parties can be seen. The movements are fairly evenly spread across a number of parties. The New Right is the biggest beneficiary, and has won a seat worth of votes from LA so far, which is presumably mostly from the party's hard-right wing. The coalition partners in the Liberals and Conservatives have also taken a chunk each; presumably as similar, but more competent alternatives. The Social Liberals have also managed to claw a few votes across the bloc boundary; most likely some of the young, wealthy, urban voters, who are dissatisfied with the right-wing immigration policies it has helped carry through.

[Diouf]

Fynd/Portalin poll in Faroe Islands for the next Danish general election.

It looks like another tight four way race for the two seats. In 2015, Javnaðarflokkurin (Social Democrats) and Tjóðveldi (Green-Left Republicans) finished first and second, which meant both Faroese MPs are supporters of the Red Bloc. However, it looks like Sambandsflokkurin (agrarian, Unionist) will win back a seat for the Blue Bloc, and Fólkaflokkurin (Conservative, pro-independence) is so close in 3rd place, that two Blue seats are certainly possible. Framsókn (Liberal, pro-independence), which is a part of the Faroese government with Social Democrats and Republicans, has made progress to 5%.

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Agreement on public sector labour conditions



For the last two months, the main topic in Denmark has been the negotiations on working conditions between the trade unions and the state, the regions and the municipalities. Failure to reach an outcome would have resulted in a major strike and lockout, which would have grinded Denmark to a halt. With more than 800.000 public sector workers in the country, many voters are directly affected by the outcome and many more have sympathy with the public sector workers (with the trade unions succesfully getting attention towards lowly paid care workers instead of evil highly paid academics). In recent days, there have been agreements on the municipial and regional level, and today, there was an agreement on the state level. The three main topics for the workers have been salaries,  securing the paid lunch break (30 minutes) and a new deal on teachers' working time. The final deals give a salary increase of 8.1% over the next three years, the paid lunch break for academics was agreed upon by them giving up 0.35% of that salary increase, and a fudge was made on teachers' working conditions (a common working group will look at it). The trade union members will now have to vote on the deals, and most are expected to accept it, with the possible exception of the teachers. The teachers are still bitter after 2013, when the Thorning government (with broad support from centre-right and DPP) made a new school reform with longer days, and then lockouted the teachers for several weeks before setting their working conditons by law (more hours spend teaching, less flexible planning of own schedule for teachers, while school leaders can make more decisions). The teachers really hoped to get a better deal this time, but instead it ended in a fudge. The question is whether the teachers wants another expensive strike/lockout with no guarantee that it will result in better conditions.

Politically, the focus on the workers' conditions have caused some voter movements, mostly among the Red Bloc parties. The Red-Green Alliance and the SPP are traditional class war parties, and have clearly and loudly cheered on the trade unions, and since the end of February, they have increased in the polling average (from 8.4% and 4.9% to 9.6 and 5.8%). The Social Liberals have tried to make up for the 2013 conflict by calling for better conditions for the teachers, traditionally Social Liberal voters, which can have helped them move from 5 to 5.7%. Labour conflict is a terrible topic for a post-modern project like the Alternative, who has seen their share eroded further from 4.5% to 3.9%. The Social Democrats have mainly stayed silent (along with the government) due to the traditional habit that the responsible parties don't interfere in negotiations between workers and employers unless a strike/lockout is in place (the so-called Danish model). The party has declined from 28.8% to 26.9%. For the centre-right, the most important development is perhaps that Sophie Løhde (in the picture), Minister for (Innovation in) the Public Sector, as the leading state negotiator has managed to get a deal in a difficult area. She was quite popular as Health Minister, where she could mostly announce more money for good things, but she has done reasonably well in her biggest test in this new position, where she plays the role as the evil employer. This should help her chances to become Liberal deputy leader when Løkke is replaced as leader by current deputy leader Kristian Jensen (which is likely to happen after after a general election defeat).

Other news

It seems very likely that there will be a government reshuffle soon. Minister of Higher Education and Research, Søren Pind, has been clearly disappointed after no longer being Minister of Justice. His main focus in recent months has been his campaign on increasing the water pressure in Copenhagen, and in the last week it became known that he had applied to become Director of the Royal Theatre (but was rejected shortly before the goalline due to opposition from the left-winged employees and artists). Additionally, it was revealed that he as Minister of Justice (unsuccesfully) tried to push Copenhagen Mayor Frank Jensen into erecting a Ronald Reagan statue in Copenhagen as a reward for Pind helping Jensen with easier rules for surveillance in public housing areas. So Pind clearly wants to move on, which would prompt a reshuffle. The question is how large it will be and whether the Conservatives (unlikely) and Liberal Alliance (perhaps) will make changes as well.

Social Democrat rebel MP, Mette Gjerskov, who won the 179th and final seat in the 2015 election, has faced considerable headwind in recent weeks after her repeated opposition to the party's tougher immigration policies. First, she was challenged as candidate in her Roskilde district by Niels Jespersen, who was supported openly by the local mayor and trade union and (tacitly) by the party leadership. However, Gjerskov won the vote in the local party clearly by 120-33 and stays as a candidate. There is some discussion about whether this mostly reflects a party membership that is still soft on immigration or simply that it is very hard to come in and challenge an incumbent MP who have done nothing to offend her local members. A few weeks after, the party decided to remove her from her role as Spokesperson on Development Aid, so she can no longer speak on behalf of the party.

Finally, the emergence of wolves in Jutland has caused heavy opposition locally and one local is now charged for killing a wolf, while others cheer on the increased diversity in the Danish nature. The Blue Bloc is trying to find ways to make it easier to kill the wolves legally (which is currently protected by an EU directive), while most of the Red Bloc parties want to keep the wolves. The Social Democrats seem in doubt about what to do.

[Diouf]

It seems very likely that there will be a government reshuffle soon. Minister of Higher Education and Research, Søren Pind, has been clearly disappointed after no longer being Minister of Justice. His main focus in recent months has been his campaign on increasing the water pressure in Copenhagen, and in the last week it became known that he had applied to become Director of the Royal Theatre (but was rejected shortly before the goalline due to opposition from the left-winged employees and artists). Additionally, it was revealed that he as Minister of Justice (unsuccesfully) tried to push Copenhagen Mayor Frank Jensen into erecting a Ronald Reagan statue in Copenhagen as a reward for Pind helping Jensen with easier rules for surveillance in public housing areas. So Pind clearly wants to move on, which would prompt a reshuffle. The question is how large it will be and whether the Conservatives (unlikely) and Liberal Alliance (perhaps) will make changes as well.

Søren Pind announced today that he is resigning from politics, both as a Minister and as an MP. Suprisingly, the Liberal Minister of Environment and Food, Esben Lunde Larsen, announced that he would leave as minister as well and not run in the next general election. Løkke has announced that the government reshuffle will be tomorrow morning.

Søren Pind has been a prominent figure in the Liberals for decades. In many years, he played a central role in Copenhagen politics. He was elected to the City Council in 1994, and already in 1998 he became Mayor for Buildings and Technics, the most important post after the Lord Mayor, as the youngest mayor ever in Denmark (28 years old). With support from the Social Liberals and a Liberal wave in 2001, he was the best bid for a Liberal Lord Mayor in Copenhagen in recent history, but despite a great personal election for Pind, the Red parties still won a 30-25 majority. He was an outspoken opponent of Liberal leader and PM Anders Fogh, and wanted the party to stay on a more liberal line with his publication of 10 liberal theses (lower taxes, competition in the public sector, lower benefits etc.). He has often blamed the rise of the Liberal Alliance on Fogh's response to him and his theses. So despite being elected MP in 2005, he didn't have much influence nationally until Lars Løkke Rasmussen became PM in 2009. He was Minister of Development Aid and then Minister of Immigration until the election defeat in 2011. He was Foreign Policy spokesperson while in opposition, and seen as a potential Foreign Minister in 2015. Instead he got another big role, as Minister of Justice; a role the self-proclaimed "Sheriff" really enjoyed. However, when the Conservatives and Liberal Alliance entered the government in 2016, he was demoted to Minister of Higher Education and Research.

In his resignation interview, Pind says that the reverberations of the 2014 leadership battle were that Kristian Jensen is locked in as the next Liberal leader, which means that Pind can't really aim higher, and that if he stayed, the future would most likely be a fifth or a sixth new Ministry, but the top role could not be reached. But while Pind has consistenly been among the most popular ministers, this has mostly been because he has not been intensely disliked among the left wing voters. He has not been the the most popular minister among Liberal voters or Blue Bloc voters in general. Despite being both Minister of Immigration and Justice, where he used some tough rhetoric and make adjustments in that direction, he has been on the internationalist/liberal side in the party on immigration debates. Also he is a quite elitist culturally, located in Copenhagen and has been loudly opposed to "populism/social media mobs etc.". He can be charismatic, funny and a creative thinker, but (at least) equally often a course, banal and almost ridiculous figure.

Esben Lunde Larsen is a theologian, son of a farmer in Western Jutland. Like Pind, he participated actively in the Liberal Youth before entering local politics. He entered Ringkøbing council in 2006 before becoming Deputy Mayor in 2010. In 2011, he was elected to Parliament and became a well-respected spokesperson on Education. Therefore, he was a logical choice as Minister of Higher Education and Research in 2015, before becoming Minister of Environment and Food in 2016. In this position, he has become the symbol of Løkke and the Liberals' concerted effort to win back voters in rural areas with a bigger focus on good conditions for farmers and fishers than on the environment. There he has become extremely unpopular in urban circles, and severely criticized in much of the media (who has been helped by constant leaks to undermine him from his pro-environmental civil servants). Out west, however, he has always been extremely popular. In 2015, he personally received 24.2% of the votes (8.622 out of 35.568) in his Ringkøbing nomination district, while DPP as the 2nd largest party in the district won 22.4%. We don't know yet why Lunde Larsen left, but there will certainly be a void to fill in Western Jutland.

It will be interesting to see how big the reshuffle will be tomorrow. I don't think the Conservatives will want to make any changes. Most of the Liberal Alliance ministers are in the bottom of the Minister rankings in terms of popularity, but a significant part of that is explained by their radical economic messages. Their ministers are mostly all the top figures in the party, so a change could be controversial. Minister for the Elderly, Thyra Frank, is perhaps the only exception, but she is Samuelsen's own invention, so perhaps he will hesitate to throw her under the bus. The arguments for changing is the classic story of fresh faces etc, but I don't think it would be wise for them to make their popular, younger MPs "tainted" by government participation as well. The Liberals could make more changes. Group leader Søren Gade is running in the 2019 European elections and political spokesperson Jacob Ellemann-Jensen is likely to become minister, so the party has the two biggest internal party roles in play as well.

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Limited reshuffle



PM Lars Løkke Rasmussen opted for a limited cabinet reshuffle after yesterday's two resignations. The surprise addition was Tommy Ahlers (left in picture), a business man who is primarily known from his role in TV series "Dragons' Den" where he advices and invests in new companies. Ahlers will become Minister of Higher Education and Research. Political Spokesperson' Jacob Ellemann-Jensen (in the middle), who is one of the most charismatic and popular MPs, becomes Minister of Environment and Food. Eva Kjer Hansen (right in picture) becomes Minister again, this time as Minister of Equality, Nordic Cooperation and Fisheries.

Ahlers was a member of the Conservative Youth previously, and even ran in the 1998 General Election as a no-hoper, where he received 436 personal votes. Since then, he has not been actively involved in politics, and revealed that he joined the Liberals yesterday. The most prominent part of his business career has been in mobile industry, where has has been a part of two succesful start-ups, one of which was sold to Vodafone.

Kjer Hansen was removed as Minister of Environment and Food in 2016 when the Conservatives declared that they had lost confidence in her due to alleged misinformation to parliament regarding the environmental consequences of an agriculture bill. However, she is very experienced, has been minister two times before, and it does not seem like the Conservatives mind her return. She replaces Karen Ellemann, who will instead become Group Leader (Chief Whipish) for the Liberals. Not a bad move for Ellemann to go from the smallest Minister post to an important, internal role.

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A very informative paper on the Social Democrats' new immigration policies from Peter Nedergaard, PolSci professor from Copenhagen University.

https://www.academia.edu/36536231/Back_to_the_roots_Why_has_the_Danish_Social_Democratic_Party_changed_course_back_to_a_more_restrictive_immigration_policy

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So basically not two Ellemans in same government. Is this closest thing to political dynasty in Denmark these days.

Yeah, the Ellemanns are probably those with the most influence right now. Jens Peter Jensen became an MP for the Liberals in 1964, and ended up being elected for more than 20 years. His son Uffe Ellemann-Jensen became an MP in 1977, Liberal leader from 1984-1998 and Foreign Minister from 1982-1993. He is still quite active in the public debate on foreign policy as a strong advocate of internationalism. His daughter Karen Ellemann became an MP in 2007, has already held four different Minister posts, and is now Liberal Group Leader. Jakob Ellemann-Jensen became an MP in 2011, and after a succesful stint as Political Spokesperson for the Liberals, he just became Minister of Environment and Food.

The biggest contender is probably the Auken family. Svend Auken became an MP in 1971 and stayed until 2009. He lead the Social Democrats from 1987-1992. He was Minister of Labour 1977-1982, and Minister for Environment and Energy 1994-2001. His sister Margrethe Auken became an MP for SPP in 1979, sat until 1990, and again from 1994-2004. She has been a MEP since 2004 and is running again in 2019. Her daughter Ida Auken became an MP for SPP in 2007, became Minister of the Environment in 2011-2014. She moved to the Social Liberals in 2014, whom she now represents as a MP.

Hækkerup is probably the most significant historic dynasty. Lars Andersen Hækkerup became an MP in the first parliament in 1849 for the loose association of Farmers' Friends. His nephew Hans Kristen Hækkerup was a MP for the Social Democrats 1920-1929. His son Hans Hækkerup was a Social Democrat MP from 1945-1971 and Minister of Justice on/off in around ten years. His brother Per Hækkerup was a Social Democrat MP from 1950 to his death in 1979. He also had several important stints as Foreign Minister and Minister of Economic Affairs. His wife Grete Hækkerup was a Social Democrat MP from 1964-1966 and 1970-1981. Two of their children also joined politics. Klaus Hækkerup was Social Democrat mayor of Fredensborg from 1978-1988 before becoming a MP from 1988-2011, while Hans Hækkerup was a Social Democrat MP from 1979-1981 and 1984-2001 and Minister of Defence from 1994-2000. Hans' wife Lise Hækkerup was a Social Democrat MP 1990-1994 and 1998-2001. Klaus' had two children who joined politics as well. Nick Hækkerup was Social Democrat Mayor in Hillerød from 2000-2007, and a MP since 2007. He has been Minister of Defence, Minister of Europe and Trade as well as Minister of Health. Ole Hækkerup was a Social Democrat MP 1998-2001 and 2007-2015. His wife Karen Hækkerup was a Social Democrat MP from 2004-2014, and has been Minister of Integration, Minister of Food and Minister of Justice. In 2014, she left politics to chair the powerful Liberal-leaning association the Agriculture and Food Council, which represents the farming and food industry. So the circle has finally ended

Lastly, the Helveg Petersens has been influential as well. Kristen Helveg Petersen was a Social Liberal MP from 1964-1975, and had the roles as Minister of Education and Minister of Culture. His son Niels Helveg Petersen was a Social Liberal MP with short interruptions from 1960-2011. He was Social Liberal leader from 1978-1990, and influential posts as Minister of Economy and Minister of Foreign Affairs. His son Morten Helveg Petersen was a Social Liberal MP from 1997-2009, and has been a MEP since 2014. His little brother Rasmus Helveg Petersen became a Social Liberal MP in 2011, Minister of Climate and Energy in 2014, but lost his seat in 2015. He is running again in the next general election.

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Two MEPs return to national politics



The two MEPs Jens Rohde (Social Liberals) and Morten Messerschmidt (DPP) have both announced that they are running at the next general election. The above picture is from when they co-hosted the radio show Europe in Flames, where Danish MEPs interchange in hosting the show for a few months at a time. Both of them have been MEPs since 2009.

Rohde, who was MP 1998-2006, was elected as a Liberal, but was increasingly at odds with the party line. He was front runner in 2009, where he won 171 205 personal votes, but was dumped as lead candidate in 2014 for being too federalist, although he was still elected with 48 882 personal votes. He has been increasingly critical of the Liberals' tough attitude on immigration and their tepid EU-support. Additionally, he is a tough personal opponent of Lars Løkke and was one of the lead rebels in the 2014 leadership crisis. In late 2015, he joined the Social Liberals. He will run in Western Jutland, where the party won one seat in 2015 for Andreas Steenberg. Rohde is probably favourite to win that seat due to his national profile (two seats are unlikely), but this will be Rohde's first election as a Social Liberal, so it's hard to gauge how many of his previous personal votes he can keep. He used to be a quite popular councillor in Viborg, one of the biggest towns in the constituency, but he did not run in 2017 (and his campaigning was not enough to get any Social Liberal councillors elected in Viborg despite the Rohde-name (his wife) being on top of the list).

Messerschmidt, who was MP 2005-2009, is the most well-known Eurosceptic, and probably among the 5 most well-known politicians in Denmark. He won 284 500 personal votes as lead candidate in 2009, and a massive 465 758 personal votes in 2014. In 2015-16, he became embroiled in a large case about misuse of EU funds. He had spend 3 million DKK from his European party illegally for DPP's general election campaign. The party has paid back the funds, but OLAF is still looking into whether he should be personally charged. Furthermore, his arrogance has meant that two female MEPs has left the DPP during his term as leader, both citing his leadership, which he responded to by calling them "twisted girls". Messerschmidt started out as an atheist and quite right-wing on economics, but has since "fallen into line" in the DPP as a Christian which favours ever-increasing welfare spending. He will run in Northern Zealand, where the party probably also hopes he can clip the wings of the New Right's Mette Thiesen. The EU funds scandal has hurt him, but he will likely do very well anyhow and play a significant part in the DPP campaign. He still has a significant public profile, e.g. he often participates in the most popular satirical radio show etc.

[Diouf]

Agreement on Ghetto Plan. Red Bloc hold on to (narrowish) polling lead

All the bills in the government's Ghetto Plan have now been agreed upon. Some of the measures: 1-year olds in ghetto areas must go to a nursery for at least 25 hours a week. If children in ghetto areas do not pass a Danish test at the end of their first year of school, their advancement to the next grade will be postponed by a year. Parents will lose their child benefit for three months if their child is absent without reason for 15% or more of its classes. The share of children from ghetto areas in the yearly intake must not be higher than 30% for any nursery/kindergarten. Ghetto areas must make plans for how to reduce the share of council flats to 40% in 2030, to which they will then get financial support. Persons, who have been unemployed within the last six months, should not be offered housing in ghetto areas. Convicted criminals can be refused a council flat in these areas. Community boards shall communicate in Danish and follow democratic guidelines.

Most of these deals were made with DPP and the Social Democrats, but the Social Liberals and SPP voted for some of the less controversial ones.

Today, the final debate of this parliamentary year takes place. A poll today by Norstat for Altinget and Jyllands-Posten showed that 28% prefers Mette Frederiksen as PM, 22% favours Lars Løkke Rasmussen, while 32% prefer someone else. 18% are undecided.

The current polling average by Ritzau:

Social Democrats 26.5%
Red-Green Alliance 9.6%
SPP 5.5%
Social Liberals 5.4%
Alternative 3.8%
Red Bloc combined 50.8%

Liberals 19.5%
DPP 17.6%
Liberal Alliance 4.9%
Conservatives 4.4%
New Right 1.6%
Christian Democrats 0.9%
Blue Bloc combined 48.9%

With the New Right below the threshold, the Red Bloc has a quite clear 91-84 lead in terms of seats. Four of five major pollsters have the New Right between 2.0-3.3%, while the most recent poll from Voxmeter has them at 1.0%.

[Diouf]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-44319921

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In favour: DPP, Liberals, Conservatives, Social Democrats (-1), LA ministers + 1 LA MP (Henrik Dahl, by far the most right-wing on cultural issues in the party).

Against: Red-Green Alliance, Alternative, Social Liberals, SPP, remaining LA MPs, Mette Gjerskov (Social Democrat rebel)