When it slipped out of former Prime Minister Gro Harlem Brundtland that she did not understand what “fantastic” Erna Solberg has done to deserve the good opinion polls, she said out loud what people in Ap and Sp mumble about. While the government has its hands full dealing with crises and putting together a budget that is predicted to be a necessary disappointment, the Conservatives believe they are just sitting quietly in the boat. With polls of up to 30 per cent, they are obviously a favorite haven for disappointed voters. Whether Høyre’s strong progress is deserved or not, Erna Solberg in any case does not spend her time sitting quietly at home on the sofa and watching TV. After the summer holidays, she and the blue-painted Høyre bus (in the north with some green elements of Widerøefly) have visited 74 places from Lindesnes in the south to Tromsø in the north. While Støre and Vedum put the finishing touches on the demanding power subsidy negotiations, Solberg made sausages together with eager schoolchildren in Lofoten, interspersed with a bit of politics. Erna Solberg makes sausages together with students at a private vocational school in Leknes, and does not like the way the Støre government makes policy for the private schools. Photo: Tone Sofie Aglen / news With a camera and local party leaders in tow, she listened to the concerns of a disabled man in Vesterålen, marked the beach clean-up day in sunny Svolvær, visited disgruntled industrial companies in Fauske and dropped in on apprentices on the Hurtigruten while the ship was docked in Bodø. The right has recently lost an election, but is already starting a new election campaign. For the government, which has its hands full dealing with crises, a critical opposition in Parliament and dissatisfied local politicians, it must feel like an ever-so-small ambush. Continued Erna effect “There is the prime minister” is whispered expectantly when Erna Solberg appears. Many people want to take a selfie with her. At the reception she gets, you wouldn’t think it was only a Conservative Party leader who came. Except at the airport. There, all you have to do is stand neatly in line, pull out your tablet and the toiletry folder with toothpaste and strip off everything that can be thought of as beeping at the security check. While Ap and Sp mayors fear for their mayoral chains, Høyre’s shop stewards get a vitamin injection into the long election campaign. In the wake of the party leader’s visit, there are excited local politicians and notices in the local newspapers. It is much easier to get people to stand on the lists when the sun is shining on the party. The wild boars at the Lofotr Viking Museum did not pose for Erna Solberg. Usually it is the leader of the Conservative Party who is a favorite photo object. Photo: Tone Sofie Aglen / news Endangered species Things have been bad for the blue ones. While the Conservatives ruled the country, they lost three out of four mayors. North of Dovre, right-wing mayors are an endangered species. One of the few exceptions is Bø mayor Sture Sivertsen, who tried to make the small municipality in Vesterålen the Switzerland of Norway. If he did not get Røkke as a resident, he at least put his municipality on the map and became very popular locally. Not least it stings that they lost power in all the big cities. Both Oslo, Bergen, Trondheim, Stavanger, Tromsø and Kristiansand are Labor-controlled. Nor do KrF, Venstre and Frp have many local positions of power to boast of. In the municipalities, the red-green dominance has been total. The explanation has been that being in government eats away at the local teams. Mayoral poverty has a great cost to the bourgeois. Visible and committed local politicians are the very foundations of a party. They are both ambassadors and election campaign machinery, listening posts and critical correctives and not least a recruitment arena for national politics. In many places, the mayor is the only politician people know. It is often a sign of illness for a party when they struggle locally. Sp decline and toll collapse Now the Conservative Party sees the opportunity to make a proper comeback in the local elections. After taking voters from the bourgeois parties for many years, it may look like someone has punctured the SP balloon. A great many of those who chose Vedum now go to the Right. In Nordland, a recent poll showed that Sp fell by 13 per cent, while the Conservative Party and Frp rose by a similar amount. In the big cities, the toll list (FNB) seems to implode. In both Bergen and Stavanger, the party has almost disappeared after making a snap election last time. Although the protest party also took many voters from the Labor Party, it is now the Conservative Party that is surging forward. This means that power may fall for Ap. In Bergen, for example, Ap received a disaster assessment of 14.9 per cent, and Ap’s city council leader believes they are being “hard hit” by national currents. In Kristiansand, too, they feel that voters are fleeing from Ap to Høyre, and here the government is also blamed for “trampling on its own” with the Søgne case. Erna Solberg shines a light on the Conservative Party’s mayoral candidate in Bodø, Odd Emil Ingebrigtsen Photo: Sondre Skjelvik / news Hard roof in the big cities A problem for the Conservative Party in the big cities has been the lack of top candidates with broad appeal. There have also been “problems within the Conservative Party” in both Oslo and Bergen. It is a nightmare when the Conservative Party otherwise does well in the polls. Both in Oslo, Bergen and Trondheim, they have gone to work hard. Here they have in reality demolished the incumbent top candidates and put new candidates at the top. Cooperation is another hard nut for the party. A key to Ap ruling so many big cities is that the cooperative parties on the left have won elections for them. Ap’s decline is saved by voters going to SV, Rødt and MDG. With a few exceptions, Høyre’s natural partner parties have little to contribute. The FRP has not broken the big city code and the KrF has almost been eradicated. That is why they have now turned their attention to the Center Party and the Green Party in particular. And there has emerged a realization that if the Conservative Party is to win power, they must become more skilled at cooperation. Therefore, cooperation skills and light blue-Right and green values are also emphasized more strongly when they put their teams together. People, people, people Politicians in election campaign mode like to talk about all the ordinary people they have met around the country. Erna Solberg’s list of people and companies who have something on her mind is already getting long. However, something is different this time. Classic recurring themes in Northern Norway have been a lack of money and jobs, too much bureaucracy and government over-management, too bad roads, non-existent public transport and a state they believe has withdrawn. But no matter who you talk to in the north of the country today, there is one concern that comes first on everyone’s list: The lack of people. And that can change both the tone and content of the debate. Rolling with the bus A cloud in the Høre-blue horizon is that Erna Solberg and co. has reached the peak of form too early. There are three years until the next general election, and most things can happen. But the party has gained a better position in the upcoming local elections than anyone had dreamed of after the election defeat last autumn. And the Conservative Party must have that. They may be sitting quietly in the boat, but the Erna bus is rolling.
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Erna Solberg’s ambush – Statement
