175

News

Dansk Folkeparti: the election’s biggest winner

Pia Marsh
June 19th, 2015


This article is more than 9 years old.

The stage is set for complex negotiations, as Venstre’s leader attempts to get the blue bloc parties to agree

Thursday’s general election saw Dansk Folkeparti trump Venstre as the country’s main blue bloc party, with 21.1 percent of the votes.

However, despite its success, it will be Venstre’s chairman, Lars Løkke Rasmussen, who is faced with the difficult task of forming a new government.

A job well done
Dansk Folkeparti’s chairman, Kristian Thulesen Dahl, took a moment to bask in the glory of the party’s success.

“I just want to be allowed to rejoice that DF has received so much support,” he said when he met with other party leaders last night following the general election.

But Dahl was particularly taciturn when asked by DR about the upcoming negotiations with Løkke in regards to the new government.

“I expect it will be a good chat,” he said.

Success must be converted to influence
It is no secret that DF and the other blue bloc parties are far from agreement on many different points.

Whereas DF wants a growth in the public sector of 0.8 percent per year, Venstre wants zero. DF wants to spend more money on a new unemployment insurance system, but Venstre does not wish to spend so much as a single extra penny.

Despite the disagreements, Thulsesen predicts that the successful election will give DF “a new strength in parliament”.

“We will use our success to make the most out of our policy. For it must certainly be converted to influence, and we have great ambitions to get through,” he said.


Share

Most popular

Subscribe to our newsletter

Sign up to receive The Daily Post

















Latest Podcast

A survey carried out by Megafon for TV2 has found that 71 percent of parents have handed over children to daycare in spite of them being sick.

Moreover, 21 percent of those surveyed admitted to medicating their kids with paracetamol, such as Panodil, before sending them to school.

The FOLA parents’ organisation is shocked by the findings.

“I think it is absolutely crazy. It simply cannot be that a child goes to school sick and plays with lots of other children. Then we are faced with the fact that they will infect the whole institution,” said FOLA chair Signe Nielsen.

Pill pushers
At the Børnehuset daycare institution in Silkeborg a meeting was called where parents were implored not to bring their sick children to school.

At Børnehuset there are fears that parents prefer to pack their kids off with a pill without informing teachers.

“We occasionally have children who that they have had a pill for breakfast,” said headteacher Susanne Bødker. “You might think that it is a Panodil more than a vitamin pill, if it is a child who has just been sick, for example.”

Parents sick and tired
Parents, when confronted, often cite pressure at work as a reason for not being able to stay at home with their children.

Many declare that they simply cannot take another day off, as they are afraid of being fired.

Allan Randrup Thomsen, a professor of virology at KU, has heavily criticised the parents’ actions, describing the current situation as a “vicious circle”.

“It promotes the spread of viruses, and it adds momentum to a cycle where parents are pressured by high levels of sick-leave. If they then choose to send the children to daycare while they are still recovering, they keep the epidemic going in daycares, and this in turn puts a greater burden on the parents.”