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The Center Party, under the leadership of Trygve Slagsvold Vedum, has over time been Norway’s third largest party in opinion polls. In various polls, they also breathe a sigh of relief to the Labor Party, challenging the position of the left’s older brother.
When Dagbladet asked red-green voters last week if they preferred Vedum or Labor leader Jonas Gahr Støre as prime minister, the SP leader was victorious.
– What is the first thing you want to do if you come to power, if you become prime minister?
– Heh-heh, if you remove the last sentence, says Vedum, who does not answer if he considers himself a candidate for prime minister.
– The project can be summarized by following a policy where the geographical and social differences are minor. That’s the project, says Vedum.
Wants Trygve as Prime Minister
Trygves Plan
In his speech to the party’s national government yesterday, Vedum was originally supposed to have laid out the broad lines of his plans for Norway.
The new corona measures forced the meeting to be transferred to digital channels.
Instead, Vedum elaborates his big project through this interview on Dagbladet. “Community safety” are the keywords that he himself has set in motion.
It is about stronger redistribution and better integration, of jobs in rural areas and greater elements of local services close to the majority of people.
– What gives us such a high degree of security in Norway? We have a very strong community. For generations, we have managed to build a sense of community that provides security in a life crisis. Plus, it greatly reduces conflict, says Vedum.
Warns: critical time
He points to the United States and the American election campaign as an example of the opposite of the Norwegian sense of community.
– Differences increase, both economically, between different groups and in integration. The community is getting smaller and smaller. It is the most conflictive thing that can be achieved in a society.
– Are we on the way to American conditions?
– I think this is a critical moment for Norway. There are small steps every day. We are still far away. In Norway, fortunately, we have a choice. We can still turn it around. But if you look at the United States 30 or 40 years ago, the differences there were much smaller, too, he says.
– Weaken the middle class
Vedum believes that the government’s proposal for the state budget shows that there is a weakening direction of the working and middle class also in Norway, as in the United States.
– They themselves write that a large part of the Norwegian population has had less purchasing power in recent years. When you see the sum of all the grips, then you are going in a direction of greater differences. That worries me, says Vedum.
– Do all parties say they want to limit inequality?
– Yes, but they only say it in slogans. If they believe so, then they cannot withdraw the widow’s pension, as the government has done. They cannot repeatedly increase the deductible for those who can afford it, eliminate schemes such as spectacle holder, eliminate jobs in small places, and allow the director cape in the state to earn 7-8-9 times more than those with a regular job. says Vedum, and continues:
– My strongest criticism of conservatives in government is that in one area after another there is a little less community and you leave a little more to yourself, he says.
It will reduce the salary of executives
Vedum says it will control the salaries of executives in the public sector, if SP enters the government.
– We are proud that we did not have such large salary differences. Now you see that the top leaders of the state are firing. It is presented as something that is needed to get the best leaders, but when it comes to reporting it does not make sense. I think it is limited how many of the top managers of government agencies had relocated to England or Sweden, he says.
He describes Dagbladet’s cases of rising wages and increasing numbers of bosses at the Oslo Education Agency as an example of horror.
– I think it has to do with how the state behaves. It will be a development that spreads, says Vedum and continues:
– We just have to turn it over. If we do get to government, we must dare to become a little unpopular. I think it is not enough to freeze wages, they must be reduced.
– It will also reduce the wage gap in the private sector, he believes.
– Can you do something about the differences without changing the taxes?
– We have been clear over time what we want to say. Every year we have wanted higher taxes for those who earn the most, but lower taxes because it affects those who earn the least, the hardest.
Unemployment is the biggest threat
– The biggest job for us at the Storting now, says Vedum of unemployment that has skyrocketed during the corona pandemic.
– Unfortunately I think the worst is in front of us and not behind us. Many companies in the industry and the tourism industry achieved the first round, but now they are starting to get very difficult. We have to put a lot of effort into it, especially in groups of healthy adults who are left unemployed, says Vedum. Advocates for schemes with training in companies.
– I think it’s extremely important with schemes that keep as few people as possible completely out of line.
– What do you want to do to reduce unemployment?
– There are many things you can do, for example using the bidding rounds. The state is the largest buyer of services in Norway today. If you consciously spend the 520 billion we spend on this each year and demand that more local and Norwegian products be used, it can create a lot of jobs, Vedum believes.
Will move government jobs
For Vedum, countering inequality also means guaranteeing greater access to public services.
– The politics of centralization that is happening is a recipe for differences, but then we are talking about geographical differences, he says.
Vedum wants it to be a goal that everyone has equal access to government services, regardless of place of residence.
– In Berlevåg, 1 percent of the posts are state-affiliated, in Oslo it is 11 percent. In many parts of the country now, the state is completely gone. When the public sector is only in a few places, so that a person never meets Nav or the tax authorities, it means they have less sense of community, says Vedum, who says government jobs should spread across the country. .
– We must create more positions within the basic public agencies and over time move the centralized units to smaller municipalities. It’s an important goal if we have a chance to take responsibility, says Vedum.
Silent centralization
The SP leader wants a clear plan on how public works will be provided to the smaller venues.
– The most dramatic has been the silent centralization. One workplace and another have been moved. It doesn’t create great overviews, but it does get scary over time, says Vedum.
When Dagbladet asked Ipsos last week to ask voters if they wanted Støre or Vedum as prime minister, 47 percent responded that Vedum is the most suitable. 43 percent pointed to Labor leader Støre.
Even among voters who say they want to vote for SV, Labor or the Center Party, 49 percent respond that Trygve Slagsvold Vedum should become prime minister, while a minority of 48 percent prefer Støre.
Kick Labor and Social Democrats
Vedum has not wanted an answer on whether he will demand the post of prime minister if the Center Party becomes the largest party in the country, but is referring to the party’s last prime minister, Per Borten, who was head of government from 1965. to 1971.
– Established the University of Tromsø, district colleges, small airports. It wasn’t a big move, but a lot of little ones that are important to these places to this day, Vedum says.
He says that public money in the future should be used to create industrial jobs across the country and concludes with a kick to Labor and Social Democratic partners:
– What is scary, and a symptom, is when a Social Democratic city council, like in Oslo, believes that spending 7.5 million crowns on studded tires on bicycles, which will only benefit the upper middle class, and raises the salaries of the director.
Well not impressed
– The most important thing a government can do to reduce differences and inequality is to make sure that as many people as possible have a job to go to. Employment is what generates life, growth and is the prerequisite for everything, both in cities and in the district of Norway, says the minister of digitization and district Linda Hofstad Helleland (H).
She is not impressed with Vedum’s plans.
– In this interview, Vedum summarizes the jobs in the districts as “one tax, one veivesen and one NAV.” They are all public offices, and the Conservatives in government have actually moved twice as many government posts out of Oslo as the Center Party when they were in government. But what really provides growth and livelihoods in the districts is the jobs in the private sector, and here Vedum is not much help, he says.
