The Great Nordic Thread

[Diouf]

The evening ended in an almost farcical way. Enhedslisten has been able to move the case from the Financial Committee into the full Folketing by proposing a postponement of the sale. This will be voted on tomorrow morning before the vote in the Financial Committee confirming the sale. This means that it is no longer just interesting how SF's member of the Financial Committee will vote; all SF MPs have to make up their mind.

The extraordinary meeting today had lasted a long time, and for the last 1-2 hours there has been live television from the building where the meeting took place. We have watched all the Ministers, MPs and members of the Executive Committee leave the building, one by one and surrounded by journalists and cameras, and answering vaguely or doubtfully about how/whether they will vote on the Enhedslisten proposal, and whether the party will remain in the government. One of the last to leave was Minister of Transportation Pia Olsen Dyhr who stated that the party could not continue in government if anybody voted against the deal tomorrow; i.e. voting for Enhedslisten's proposal. I hope it all makes some sense, but it has been a quite chaotic meeting and process; a televised meltdown. To sum up, a few key figures in the party have already resigned from their posts and more will propably follow. Tomorrow, the main point of interest will probably be to see how many SF MPs attend the parliamentary session and how they vote. If too many abstain or if somebody votes yes to Enhedslisten's proposal, SF could very well end up leaving the government after all. If they don't make the decision themselves, their government partners might make it for them.

[Diouf]

Several media are now reporting that SF is leaving the government, party leader Annette Vilhelmsen is resigning and that an extraordinary conference will be called.

The parliamentary session at 10.00 with Enhedslisten's proposal can probably be followed here: http://www.ft.dk/webtv/video/20131/salen/47.aspx

I'm not sure it will be easy to follow, but the tense situation should be possible to sense.

[Diouf]

MP Uffe Elbæk, a former Radikal (Social Liberal) Minister in this government, who has started his own party Alternativet (Alternative), is speaking in favour of Enhedslisten's proposal of postponing the deal. A fitting sweater for today, when looking at SF.

Enhedslisten proposal was rejected. 30 votes in favour, 94 against, 2 neither for nor against. Five SF MPs do not want the sale to happen, which should be one of the main reasons why the SF leader is resigning. Press conference at 10.30 where more will be disclosed. I would think that the Social Democrats and the Social Liberals would prefer to continue with a new SR-government, and not an election as all polls are still predicting a heavy defeat for the left wing. 

[Diouf]

Most of the things above have now been confirmed. SF (SPP) leaves the government, party leader Annette Vilhelmsen resigns, and an extraordinary party conference will be held shortly. PM Helle Thorning-Schmidt has confirmed that the government will continue as a coalition between the Social Democrats and the Radikale (Social Liberals), and that there will not be an election now. In the next day or two, she is expected to present her new government as the two parties now need to fill up the vacant posts.

SF will still vote in favour of the sale in the Financial Committee later today in accordance with the decision made by the party's Executive Committee yesterday. It will be interesting to follow SF in the coming weeks. Party members might literally be leaving left and right. A number of left-leaning SF members might still leave the party as it accepted the sale, although a number of them might hope that things get better now that it has left the government. The remaining right-leaning SF members, and perhaps even some ministers, might defect to the Social Democrats as they are disappointed that the party has left the government and will probably not be able to enter another government for many years. MP Ole Sohn, the former Minister for Business and Growth, a close ally of former leader Villy Søvndal and one of the masterminds behind the plan to make SF enter the government, has said that that the will continue to support all of the government's decisions. That will probably bring him into the conflict with SF, so he could very well leave/be forced to leave at least the parliamentary group.
It will of course also be interesting to see who the new SF leader will be. Will one of the current ministers want to be a leader of a party where the members have been opposed to many of the government's decisions and where a new government participation looks unlikely for a long time? Will the members choose a new left-leaning backbecher, like Annette Vilhelmsen, after her less than impressive period as a leader?

[Diouf]

How will SF leaving the coalition affect the government? Will Social Democrats and Social Liberals continue a minority government, hoping for parliamentary support from SF in addition to Enhedslisten? Or will they now look for an additional partner, maybe DPP? While I understand that the government is not keen on new elections, will they really be able to avoid them?

It will probably make the internal workings in the coalition function better as they don't have to deal with SF. Also they will avoid that the noise in SF will overshadow most of the deals that the coalition makes.
SF has already guaranteed parliamentary support for the new SR-coalition. SF don't want an election right now with the party in complete disarray and without a new leader until at the earliest in the beginning of March where the extraordinary party conference will be held. If the government is to fall, it is because of Enhedslisten and that looks very unlikely as well. Enhedslisten will have a very hard time defending new elections, and in all likelyhood a new right-wing government. Enhedslisten have already put up with so many government decisions which they did not like that it is hard to imagine that something could make them tear down the government.
Therefore, there is no need for an additional partner. This will not change much for the government. The policies will probably be fairly similar and their strategic position is not much different. When they make a agreement with the left, the problem will still be to get Enhedslisten to agree, and it might be even easier to make agreements with Venstre (Liberals) and the Conservatives now that that SF is not in the government.
The situation regarding a new election has not changed either. The government can decide for themselves when to call new elections, as the polls are still bad this probably means as late as possible, unless the unlikely situation where Enhedslisten pulls them down occurs.

[Diouf]

The most recent polling average, composed 27 January by Berlingske (compared to 2011 election):

Social Democrats 21.1 % (-3.7 %) 37 seats (-7)
Social Liberals 8.3 % (-1.2%) 15 (-2)
Conservatives 4.5 % (-0.4%) 8 (=)
SF 4.1 % (-5.1%) 7 (-9)
Liberal Alliance 5.0 % (=) 9 (=)
Christian Democrats 0.6 % (-0.2%) 0 (=)
DF 18.1 % (+5.8 %) 32 (+10)
Liberals 27.6 % (+0.9%) 48 (+1)
Enhedslisten 10.7 % (+4.0%) 19 (+7)

Left wing 44.2 % (-6.0%) 78 (-11)
Right wing 55.8 % (+6.1 %) 97 (+11)

[Diouf]

Minister of Enviroment Ida Auken leaves SF and joins Radikale (Social Liberals). She was probably the most popular SFer currrently, and has been a constant in the top 5 of the most popular ministers. Perhaps the biggest surprise defection so far. Interesting to see whether her mom, SF MEP Margrethe Auken, follows her. I wouldn't think so, but you can hardly rule out anything in SF currently.
The move was announced on Facebook, and her reasoning for joining Radikale is this: "I'm changing to the Radikale because I've been agreeing with them on value politics* for a long time now, because they have an international outlook, and realize that the economy and the environment must play together, not against each other". Ida Auken has arguably never focused much on solidarity, equality etc, and instead focused on the environment, the climate and international cooperation, but still this is a rather surprising move. The Radikale has been seen as the main culprit by many in SF, and their economy polices are far away from that of SF.

* Normally used for referring to things like immigration, law and order etc.


EDIT: Mom is not too pleased. "I'm sad and angry" Margrethe Auken says to Ritzau.

[Diouf]

Another SF MP leaves the party. As expected, Ole Sohn moves to the Social Democrats as well. He was a long time member of the Communist Party, and led it from 1987 to 1991. The picture above is from a greeting with Erich Honecker during the celebrations of DDR's 40 year anniversary. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, he joined SF in 1992. He played a key role in Villy Søvndal's plan to make the party ready for government, and after the 2011 election he was made Minister for Business and Growth. When Villy Søvndal resigned as a party leader in 2012, he announced that he was not running at the next general election and that he would make his post as a minister available for the new SF leader. Since then, he hasn't been very active, but in the last couple of weeks, he has returned with a harsh criticism of the left wing of SF, who in the end made the party pull out of the government. As mentioned earlier, he announced that he was still going to support everything the government proposed, so this move was quite inevitable.

[Diouf]

Wilke analysis of voter movement since the 2011 election. At the top it says which party did you vote for in the 2011 election, and at the left it says which party would you vote for tomorrow; i.e. 11.8 % of those who voted for the Social Democrats in 2011 would vote for DF tomorrow. The two columns to the right are don't remember, and didn't vote.

Unfortunately, the poll only includes 989 respondents which I believe is a bit too small for polls like this. This makes for a few weird results for the small parties; e.g. I sincerely doubt that 50 % of the 2011 Christian Democrats would now vote for the Liberal Alliance. However, in general the poll looks valid.

The Social Democrats and SF have both lost around 10 % of their voters to DF, which is the main reason why the right-wing parties have a big lead in the polls. Both parties, but especially SF, have also lost several voters to Enhedslisten. And then, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, SF has also lost a huge amount of voters (24 %) to the Social Democrats. Several politicians have made the same move since the election. Some of the voters probably share the "workerite"-sentiment of those politicians who felt that SF did not really want to be in government, but it is arguably also just due to a general feeling of incompetence and internal bickering in SF.

Venstre have continued eating the Conservatives; a process that also took place before the 2011 election, and accelerated during the campaign when the Conservatives made their now infamous pact with the Social Liberals. The other right-wing parties, the Liberal Alliance and DF, are also eating their part of the Conservative cake.   

[Diouf]

No child's play for the government

The issue of child benefits for EU workers continue to grow and might now threathen the government's existence. Enhedslisten is prepared to vote with the opposition on this issue, and says that if the government continues to administrate after EU rules and not the law approved in the Danish parliament, then there will be new elections.

This case is about when you should be entitled to child benefits in Denmark. The size of the child benefit depends on the age of the child; a parent of a 1-year old will get 4 404 kr (€590) every three months, while a parent of a 17-year old will get 2 745 kr (€368) every three months. A family can get a maximum of 35 000 (€4 690) a year in child benefits, and family with high incomes will get lower child benefits. In 2010, the government at the time tried to limit especially EU nationals' right to child benefits by demanding that the beneficiary have lived or worked in Denmark for at least two of the last ten years. However, last summer the EU Commission, after a complaint from a German citizen working in Denmark, notified the new Danish government that this law was not in accordance with EU law as it was discriminating against other EU citizens. The Danish Ministry of Justice agreed with this, and therefore the Danish government started to administrate according to EU law which has precedence. This has caused considerable criticism from the opposition.
A few days ago the government proposed a new law which removes the 2 out of 10 years rule for EU nationals, so that the law is consistent with EU law and with how things are actually being administrated. SF(SPP) supports the government, but the none of the other parties do. Instead the Conservatives have proposed a bill that says "the government should ensure that the payment of child benefits happens in accordance with the law that has been adopted in the Danish parliament". All the opposition parties and Enhedslisten have said that they will vote for the bill. Enhedslisten's spokesperson for Social Affairs, Finn Sørensen, said that "for us, it is deeply reprehensible that the government just bows down to the EU. A government has one job, which is to fight for what the Danish parliament decides. It is fundamentally contrary to the Danish constitution and principle of parlamentarism if a government will not follow the majority of the Folketing. If it does not want to do that, it has to call an election and see if it can get support for its policies." He does, however, add that Enhedslisten could be convinced to support the government's proposal, and thereby provide a majority, if substantial measures to fight social dumping are included in the government's bill.

It is hard to predict exactly how serious Enhedslisten are in its threats. On the one hand, an election will almost certainly provide a right-wing majority which the party could get blamed for. However, the relationship between the government and Enhedslisten is not rosy, and this would be a very popular case to take down the government on; fighting for the Danish welfare system and Danish sovereignty against the evil bureaucrats from Brussels and the Polish plumber. The Liberals and the Conservatives would probably not have acted much differently if in government, but they will of course use almost any case to bring down the government, and argue that the government should put up more of a fight against the Commission.
I think the most likely outcome is a deal with Enhedslisten with some measures against social dumping, but you could not rule out the possibility of the government's downfall. Especially some of the Social Liberal ministers are strongly opposed to measures that would restrict the rights of EU citizens and/or renege on the Danish obligation to follow international law.

[Diouf]

The most recent polling average composed by Berlingske on 2 March (2011 election)

Social Democrats 19.5 % (-5.3 %) 34 seats (-10)
Social Liberals 9.4 % (-0.1%) 17 (0)
Conservatives 4.5 % (-0.4%) 8 (=)
SF 3.8 % (-5.4%) 7 (-9)
Liberal Alliance 5.3 % (+0.3%) 9 (=)
Christian Democrats 0.4 % (-0.4%) 0 (=)
DF 19.2 % (+6.9 %) 34 (+12)
Liberals 27.0 % (+0.3%) 47 (=)
Enhedslisten 10.9 % (+4.2%) 19 (+7)

Left wing 43.6 % (-6.6%) 77 (-12)
Right wing 56.4 % (+6.7 %) 98 (+12)

DF have increased further and are now neck and neck with the Social Democrats after the Goldman Sachs case and the current discussions about EU citizens and child benefits.

The Liberals are internally divided in the question about child benefits, and several MEPs, MEP candidates and MPs have been critical about the negative rhetoric used by the frontbenchers. Recent mail leaks also showed that at least one MP said that she would not vote for the Conservative proposal which claims that the Danish law on this issue should be superior to EU law. Perhaps that's why the Liberal leader wrote the PM and urged her to find a common solution together with the Liberals, and suggested that the Liberals would probably not support the Conservative proposal after all. A letter which infuriated the leaders of the three other right-wing parties which had apparently not even been informed.
Now both Enhedslisten and the Liberals have showed a willigness to negotiate with the government, so now it remains to see which of them it chooses. (At least some part of) the Social Democrats might prefer a deal with Enhedslisten which includes measures against social dumping, while the Social Liberals could very well find some of these measures too bureaucratic and anti-business and opt for a perhaps easier agreement with the divided Liberals.

[Diouf]

The most recent polling average composed by Berlingske on 2 March (2011 election)

Social Democrats 19.5 % (-5.3 %) 34 seats (-10)
Social Liberals 9.4 % (-0.1%) 17 (0)
Conservatives 4.5 % (-0.4%) 8 (=)
SF 3.8 % (-5.4%) 7 (-9)
Liberal Alliance 5.3 % (+0.3%) 9 (=)
Christian Democrats 0.4 % (-0.4%) 0 (=)
DF 19.2 % (+6.9 %) 34 (+12)
Liberals 27.0 % (+0.3%) 47 (=)
Enhedslisten 10.9 % (+4.2%) 19 (+7)

Left wing 43.6 % (-6.6%) 77 (-12)

Right wing 56.4 % (+6.7 %) 98 (+12)

Calling the Social Liberals left wing is highly inaccurate. The socioeconomic scale is after all still the important one. The genuine left wing is at 14,7% if you add 19,5% SDs that 34,2% left of centre (and thats only if you ignore Bjarne Corydons descrption of SD as a "centre party"). Less than SD polled alone back in 1990. So bad news for the left indeed.

Right wing, which I've seen you use as well, is then of course equally wrong with DF's economic polices, which are clearly more left-wing than the government, in mind. Red and blue bloc will give the same problems, and even writing just Thorning and Løkke would not be completely accurate as you couldn't 100 % count out that 1 or 2 of the parties chould change affiliation. Let's just assume that people understand that it doesn't mean that the Social Liberals are socialists economically.

[Diouf]

Government proposes tougher controls with EU citizens' use of welfare benefits

The government today proposed five measures to control EU citizens' access to welfare benefits further. The PM also stated that Denmark would support Finland in an upcoming case at the EU court where the European Commission accuses Finland of breaching EU law by forcing EU nationals to accrue the right to welfare benefits by working in Finland. The proposals come after weeks of discussions about child benefits for EU nationals which have seen DF siphon off even more voters from the other parties, especially the Social Democrats and the Liberals. Today the discussions between the parties on bringing the Danish law on child benefits in accordance with EU law continue.

The five proposals are as follows:
Quicker and better controls of whether EU nationals on welfare benefits are in fact workers/seeking work.
Establish a unit to control whether recipients of cash benefits in Denmark might have values in other EU countries that make them ineligible for cash benefits.
Persons on cash benefits with a short time of employment in Denmark and poor Danish skills must take Danish courses and attend more interviews at the job centres.
Persons on unemployment benefits with a short time of employment in Denmark and poor Danish skills must take Danish courses and attend more interviews at the job centres.
The unemployment funds should more systematically control whether EU nationals on unemployment benefits are in fact living in Denmark.

[Diouf]

In Finland the Left Alliance has announced that it will leave the government over disagreements on the new budget. Now only five parties are left in the government which still has a majority in parliament.
The Left Alliance could not accept lower child benefits and an index freeze of student grants and pensions.
Their leader and the Minister of Culture, Paavo Arhinmäki, has said that if these things are removed from the budget or if the party is allowed to vote against the budget, then it could stay in the government, but that doesn't look realistic.
The next Finnish election will be, at the latest, in April 2015

[Diouf]

The Finnish Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen has announced that he will resign in June where the Coalition Party will elect a new leader and PM. He says that he is interested European or other international positions, so perhaps European Commissioner.

http://www.kokoomus.fi/en/uncategorized-en/katainen-will-not-seek-new-term-as-party-leader-successor-to-become-new-prime-minister-in-summer/

[Diouf]

Government voted down but no resignation



Today was the final vote on the proposed resolution on child benefits. The resolution, proposed by DF, the Conservatives and the Liberal Alliance, says that the administration of the child benefits law should happen according to the Danish law from 2010. The law states that EU citizens must earn up the right to child benefits; i.e. they can't get the full amount of child benefits before they've worked here for two years. A year ago the government stopped administrating according to this law as they had been warned by the European Commission and later their own judicial service that this was not legal according to EU law. Therefore all EU citizens can get the full child benefits if they work at least nine hours a week.
There has been some doubt as to how the Liberals would vote as the party has been internally divided. In the end they voted for the resolution, expect for one rebel who, unlike the other liberal rebels, refused to be cleared from voting. This meant that there was a majority for the proposal with the three proposers, Enhedslisten and the Liberals voting for the resolution. The government and SF voted against the proposal.
In practice, the resolution will mean nothing; the government can keep administrating according to the EU rules. They argue that in order for the administration to be changes, the actual child benefits law should be changed and include a passage which states that the law is approved with the knowledge that it is breaching EU rules. This should ensure that the ministers can not be charged for acting against the law, which is this case is the EU law which ranks above Danish laws. Such a law change has not yet been proposed.

However, Enhedslisten has refused to support a no confidence motion against the government despite calls for just that by many members of the right-wing parties, especially DF. So in the end, this case will result in nothing more than a further EU-scepticism and more success for DF in the European elections.

[Diouf]

DF biggest party in a national poll for the first time ever. In a poll by YouGov for MetroExpress, DF is the biggest party. This is not very surprising days after they won the EP elections clearly and with the Liberals tormented by the expenses scandals of their leader, but nevertheless quite significant. No suprise that it's a YouGov poll either; they have consistenly been showing the highest DF results.

DF 23.9% 42 seats
Liberals 21.3% 38
Social Democrats 17.6% 31
Enhedslisten/Unity List 11.9% 21
Social Liberals 8.7% 15
Liberal Alliance 6.7% 12
SF 4.8% 9
Conservatives 4.2% 7
Christian Democrats 0.9% 0

Government + supporting parties = 76 seats
Opposition = 99 seats

[Diouf]

With other polls showing the Social Democrats back ahead, would Helle risk a snap election at all?

Well, it would probably be seen as a bit too opportunist if she called an election right now when it's not completely clear what will happen leaderwise in the Liberals. Soon it will be summer holidays; normally not a time for general elections. So then an election will not be before September when much of the current Liberal problems could be over. I haven't seen a poll yet which shows a lead for the left-wing parties combined this time. There was one after the last expenses scandal, but after a few weeks it was pretty much back to normal with big leads for the opposition. The same will not neccessarily happen this time, but the government can't be sure that such cases will in the end decide how people vote at a general election.

Generally, I believe that she will still try to wait as a long as possible. The government's (only?) hope is that the economy improves so much that their voters will return as their reforms will be viewed in a more positive light. Although the economy has been improving during the last year or so, they will probably hope that the situation will be even better in a year's time.

[Diouf]

New leader of the Danish Conservatives



Søren Pape Poulsen, the 42-year old mayor of Viborg, is the new leader of the Danish Conservative Party. Lars Barfoed, who became leader in 2011, decided to resign after three years of stagnation or even decline. The Conservatives are still, as in 2011, hovering around the 5% mark. The local elections in 2013 and the European elections in 2014 were rather good for the party, but that didn't neccessarily help Barfoed as many interpreted the results as showing that their policies were fine and could be sold by their good local and european candidates, so what was lacking was a good "salesman" at the national level again. Some media claim that Barfoed was told to leave by a number of high-ranking Conservatives, but it is quite difficult to determine how much it was Barfoed's own choice.

Søren Pape Poulsen is not a MP currently, which is quite unprecendented. It will not last for too long though as he will run for parliament in the next election and resign as mayor. The main reason for choosing a non-MP was probably that there was no other really leader alternatives among the MPs which is mostly made up of has-beens.
He is educated within shipping at Grundfos, the world's largest pump manufacturer, and has worked a shipping agent, but has also worked in a couple of years as an uneducated teacher. He has been a member of the Council in Viborg since 2002, and became mayor after the 2009 local elections. He decided to seek an alliance with the red parties in the council so that he could become mayor despite the Conservatives only having 3 out of 31 seats. Furthermore, there actually was a right-wing majority in the Council, and the Liberals were the biggest party, so they were very angry with him. In the 2013 local elections, the Conservatives' and Søren Pape Poulsen's personal votes were doubled and he could continue as mayor; this time with support from all parties in the constitution of the council.

On his press conference today he mentioned three subjects that would be important for him. He wants to fight hard against the new school reform with longer days and compulsory "homework cafes". The main argument against it that it takes away time from the families, and makes it too difficult for kids to have a leisure time activity or a job. He repeated the well-known Conservative opposition to the top tax rate. Finally he declared himself a "typically conservative tough on crime" and especially wanted to reduce the number of break-ins. He is also known to be among the more eurosceptic parts of the party, but the repeated that he is completely behind the party's programme.

[Diouf]

Has there ever been any kind of serious discussion about a merger between the Conservatives and Venstre, in the parties themselves?

Erik Eriksen, leader of Venstre from 1950-1965 and PM 1950-1953, proposed a merger in 1965, but he couldn't gather a majority in his own party, so he had to resign and the plan never got any further. Since then I don't believe there have been any serious discussions about a merger

[Diouf]

Social Liberal leader and vice-PM becomes new Danish EU commissioner



While we got to keep Helle, it has just been announced that the leader of the Radikale Venstre (the Social Liberals) Margrethe Vestager will leave the government to become the new Danish commissioner. The 46-year old has been Minister of the Economy and Interior and Deputy Prime Minister since a new government was formed after the 2011 election. She has been known for her quite strict adherence to budget discipline, and has often been the main scapegoat for many leftwingers which had hoped for more leftwing economic policies. This great influence on especially economic policies has meant that she has been named the most powerful person in Denmark several times. In the last Nyrup Rasmussen regering (1998-2001) she was Minister of Education and Ecclesiastical Affairs, and she has led the Social Liberals since 2007.
The hierarchy seems pretty straight forward in the party. Morten Østergaard, the current Minister of Taxation, was recently given an unprecedented title as "stedfortrædende leder" (something like the substitute leader, i.e. leader when the leader is not there, but not just a regular deputy leader). Østergaard was also deputy leader of the party until he became minister. He is expected to take over Vestager's posts, and then perhaps a minor reshuffle will take place, maybe just for the Social Liberal ministers.

[Diouf]

Greens leave Finnish Government

First they were 6, then they were 5, and now they are 4... parties in the Finnish government as the Vihreä liitto (Green League) decided to leave the government over its decision to press forwards with the plan of building a new nuclear power plant. The government now has a very slight majority, 102 seats out of 200. One of these seats is the Speaker who does not vote. The next election will take place at the latest at 19 April 2015.

http://www.elp.com/articles/2014/09/greens-leave-finnish-government-over-nuclear-energy.html

The Green ministers were not the only ones who voted against the decision. 4 of the 6 Social Democrats voted against as well, but their party leader and Minister of Finance Antti Rinne voted for. One of the Swedish People's Party ministers voted against as well.

[Diouf]

DR is running a story about the DPP bleeding members from their more traditional conservative wing - especially in Jutland.

Its not big names: local board members, ex-councillors and an ex- Youth League chairman, but still interesting that their conservative members seems to had enough of the party left wing turn. Normally the party is very disciplined (apart from racist cooks, who once in a wile mess up things), but with old SDs and union representatives drifting to DPP and party leadership trying to appeal to dissatisfied public employees and unemployed workers things seems to have gotten a tad too red for the genuine right wingers.

Its the leaderships policies on public spending, employment benefits, being against cuts in corporate taxes, flirting with the trade unions, that they are dissatisfied with.

As one of them says: "When they are to the left of the Social Democrats on distribution policies, then its simply too much".

This is indeed a quite interesting development. Most people will probably prefer to stay in the DPP since it's a way better career opportunity than leaving, but there must be quite some discussions internally. Someone like Morten Messerschmidt, their very popular MEP with a seat in the party's executive board, has often talked about cutting the number of people on benefits, reducing the possibilities for early retirement and so on. He probably sees himself as quite similar to a right-wing Tory, whom he has just allied with in the EP. He currently seems like the heir apparent in the party, so he might hope that he can be the next party leader and turn the party somewhat rightwards in economic policies, but he can't be happy about the policies they are currently proposing.

Morten Uhrskov Jensen, who is an author and comments in the prominent newspaper Jyllands-Posten, is currently the party leader of Dansk Samling (Danish Unity). He has been quite critical of DPP and their leftish turn. He is not that much focused on economic questions, but on value questions, especially the EU. His party wants complete withdrawal from the EU, and severely criticizes DPP for not wanting the same, and argues vehemently that DPP should have removed their confidence in the previous government when it signed the Lisbon Treaty. On immigration, he also argues that the DPP is too vague, and that it is obvious that Denmark must leave all international conventions on these issues, so there can be a complete stop for immigration from "third world countries" to Denmark. If DF gets a very influential power role after the next election, then Danish Unity might get some cases, like the Lisbon Treaty one or related to the increase of refugees from Syria, where it can argue against DF's leniency towards the government it's supporting. I wouldn't rule out that they could then get a breakthrough and get 3-4 % of the votes from hardcore DPPs and current non-voters.

[Diouf]

Today two new political actors emerged on the Danish political scene, one on either side of the political spectrum.



Despite its name, Nationalpartiet (the National Party) is a new left-wing party founded by three Pakistani immigrant brothers and their friends. Their main policy is "to defend the Danish values of tolerance, respect and openness". They argue that those values, which were so prominent when their parents immigrated to the country, are now under attack. The concrete policy proposals include removing some of the tight immigration policies like the rules regarding family reunification. In addition to that they have adopted a couple of classic welfare lines like "a higher quality in the schools" and "less bureaucracy, more warm hands".
The leader of the party is the 35-year old teacher Kashif Ahmad. He was surprisingly elected to the city council in Hvidovre municipality for a local list in 2013 which he had joined a few months before. 8 months after being elected he left the party and was criticized heavily by the remaining members.
The party will have a very hard time entering parliament. Practically they have to collect 20 000 signatures via a quite cumbersome process to even be on the ballot, and politically they have to fight not only the four existing centre-left/left-wing parties, but also the other new leftish party Alternativet, which have already collected 10 000 signatures and is led by the former Social Liberal Minister of Culture, and still MP, Uffe Elbæk


At the complete opposite end of the spectrum, Lars Hedegaard has decided to run as an independent. The 72-year old was originally a marxist historian, journalist and editor; he was a member of Socialistisk Arbejderparti (Socialist Workers Party) until 1982. However, in the last 10-15 years, he has been known as a quite prominent and radical islam-critic. Until recently he led the Trykkefrihedsselskabet (Free Press Society), which have focused mainly, but not exclusively, on the the perceived negative effects of islam on free speech in Denmark.
In 2009, he was charged with racism after being taped while making very offensive statements about what he called the ingrained role of rape, paedophilia and the oppression of women in islamic culture. He was acquitted as his statements were not intended to be made public.
In 2013, he survived an assasination attempt outside his home. The suspected assailant was caught in Turkey earlier this year, but last week it was declared that the suspect had been released again by the Turkish authorities, perhaps in a prisoner exchange with ISIS. This has received some attention, and caused a minor diplomatic problem between Denmark and Turkey, which is probably why he is making his candidature public now.
His proposed policies include a ban on muslim immigration and mosque building, re-introduce border controls, leave the EU and the undesirable UN conventions, privatize the national broadcaster DR, re-introduce discipline in the schools, and strict law and order laws.
Although Lars Hedegaard is a relatively famous face, it will be almost as hard for him to be elected. As an independent it is easier to run as he only needs about 200 signatures in the electoral region in which he is running. But he will need around 20 000 votes in an electoral region of around 600 000 voters to be elected, which will be difficult to achieve. He is supported by the small party Dansk Samling (Danish Unity), which is mentioned on the previous page, but his main problem is of course that most of his policies can be found (in a slightly less radical version) in DF who are set to have a very good election.

[Diouf]

Another profile leaves Danish Parliament for private job



The former Conservative leader Lene Espersen has decided to leave the Danish Parliament to become the CEO of the interest group Danish Architectural Companies. She has been an MP since 1994, and quickly became one of the most popular MPs. In 2007 and in the last election in 2011, she was the Conservative MP with the highest number of personal votes, and in the 2001, 2005, 2007 elections she ranked 7, 8, and 6 respectively on the overall list of personal votes.

In 2001 she became Minister of Justice, and it was no surprise when she succeded Bendt Bendtsen as leader of the Conservatives, as Deputy PM and as Minister of Economic and Business Affairs in 2008. In the first years of her reign the party increased its popularity slightly, but then in 2010 she became Minister of Foreign Affairs after a major reshuffle. One of her first actions, or rather inactions, was to go a on a family holiday to Mallorca instead of participating in an Arctic 5 meeting in Canada. She was heavily criticized for this decision and her lack of an apology, and at the same time the Liberal Alliance, who was widely predicted to die off in silence, started a well-funded campaign to attack the government, and especially the Conservatives, for the absence of tax cuts and reductions in the public sector during their reign. This caused the party to drop from 11 to 6.5 % in the polls in a few months. By early 2011, the majority of the Conservative MPs had turned against her and she resigned as Conservative leader, but continued as Foreign Minister until the defeat in the 2011 election. As the Conservative group was reduced to 8 MPs, she has obviously still played a key role in the group. When the non-MP Søren Pape Poulsen became the new Conservative leader a few months ago, she became the party's politicial spokesperson, and thereby participated in the debates with the other party leaders.
With her resignation, half (4) of the current Conservative group will not be running at the next election which will lead to the long-awaited generational change in the party.