Danish bipartisan coalition to tackle growing crises

Denmark has shattered four decades of left-right politics – and minority coalition drama – with a new bipartisan government.

After six weeks of talks, the longest in modern history, Social Democratic prime minister Mette Frederiksen will return as head of a national unity three-way coalition with traditional political rivals.

As well as the liberal Venstre party, the new coalition brings back to power Lars Løkke Rasmussen, a former Venstre prime minister and head of the new Moderates party.

From a standing start, it finished third in the November 1st poll with nine per cent or 16 seats, splitting the centre-right vote. Venstre, which threw out Mr Rasmussen as leader, took 13 per cent and 23 seats while Ms Frederiksen’s party took 28 per cent and 50 seats – its best result in 20 years.

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Together the new coalition has 89 seats in the 179-seat parliament, with four additional seats pledged from the Danish territories of Greenland and the Faroe Islands.

“We are not joining forces because we couldn’t do otherwise, because we could have done something else”, said Ms Frederiksen, flanked by the other two party leaders. “We have made the decision, together, to join forces. We choose each other at this point in our history.”

With high energy prices and inflation at a four-decade high, the new coalition has pledged to cut taxes for top- and low-earners, introduce a new wealth tax and provide additional cost-of-living measures for vulnerable families.

Venstre leader Jakob Ellemann-Jensen, pressed why he was now joining an alliance led by Ms Frederiksen which he had previously spurned, said: “Should I let my pride get in the way ... of doing what is right for Denmark?”

In advance of cabinet appointments on Thursday, the new government announced plans to expedite defence spending to hit Nato targets by 2030, three years ahead of schedule.

In addition the Copenhagen coalition has vowed to be carbon neutral by 2045, five years earlier than planned.

After an election dominated by immigration, and plans to open offshore asylum reception centres in Rwanda, the new coalition has said it will pursue this policy only with other EU or European countries.

In addition the coalition is to raise civil servant salaries and, to boost productivity, eliminate a holiday dating back to the 17th century.

Ms Frederiksen called the snap election to avoid a vote of no confidence by political allies over the illegal cull in November 2020 of 15 million mink amid fears virus mutations could undermine the Covid-19 vaccination programme.

In June, a parliament-appointed commission said the drastic move, based on “grossly misleading” statements, was illegal. However the commission agreed with the prime minister that she had not broken the law intentionally. The new coalition now faces a multibillion kronor compensation bill for more than1,000 former mink farmers and their devastated industry.

Given the challenging economic environment, Danish analysts said they expect the new alliance to last longer than the country’s last left-right coalition in 1978, which collapsed after just eight months.