– I think we have worked well over the past year with the dialogue between us and the government, says Peggy Hessen Følsvik. news meets the LO leader and the Prime Minister in Helsinki, during a break during the meeting of the labor movement’s Nordic cooperation committee Samak. Now the mood is good. But the LO leader acknowledges that the collaboration with the government has not worked smoothly all along. There is open conflict about unemployment benefit cuts, holiday pay and wage support. – It has been a bit new for many. Many of us are new to the LO leadership. There are new people in the government apparatus. So it has taken some time to put structures in place that enable us to cooperate well enough. Now I feel that we are in a different place than when the government took office, says Følsvik. – Does that apply to you and Jonas as well? – Me and Jonas have had good contact throughout. So there has been no problem. But it is clear that I, too, was new to my role not so long ago. And when Jonas took over as prime minister, we got a different form of communication than what we had previously. GOOD TONE: The mood is good between the LO leader and the Ap leader in Helsinki. But the relationship between the government and LO has not worked so well all along. Photo: Kristian Skårdalsmo / news Looking towards LO Samarbeidskomiteen Samak was set up in 1913, but has roots as far back as 1886. It embraces the Nordic social democratic parties and the LO organized trade organisations. And it is precisely the professional political cooperation between LO and Ap that will help give Støre’s party a much-needed boost in the run-up to the autumn local elections. – I tend to say that the easiest part of it is the cooperation between the LO leader and me, because we live in the same city and work full-time on this, says Støre to news. – But where professional political cooperation seems to be important is out in the municipalities. When this collaboration works, we get mobilisation, he continues. CLOSE: Peggy Hessen Følsvik and Jonas Gahr Støre in close conversation during the SAMAK meeting in Helsinki. Photo: Mats Rønning / news The Prime Minister also has hopes for help from LO in what he describes as the most important task going forward: To keep interest rates low and price inflation down. – We have a front subject, which is the export industry’s competitiveness, which sets an important tone for that settlement. I have great confidence in the parties’ accountability in that context, he says. Want to renew the team Peggy Følsvik has been given the responsible job of leading the election committee that will find Ap’s new party leadership at the national meeting in May. She has already announced a need for renewal. – The election committee is keen to propose a central board which contributes to renewal, and which also represents the entire breadth of the party organization in a good way, she says. But the question is how extensive the renewal will actually be. On Monday, party secretary Kjersti Stenseng announced that she wants re-election. Deputy chairman Bjørnar Skjæran did the same before Christmas. In addition to Støre, all three who currently make up Ap’s top management have thus said that they will continue to be involved. When asked by news, Støre confirms that he believes the party must renew itself when the national meeting in May elects a new central board. – My message is that we should think about renewal. We should think about politicians who can raise their eyes and look towards 2030. And we must think about people who are committed and unifying, says the Prime Minister. He continues: – We are a party that needs us to come together now. I think the voters expect that when we all have to contribute to get through a difficult time. So gathering with those who have political leadership is of great importance. Crisis polls The Labor Party leader has not wanted to use the word “crisis” about the state of affairs in the Labor Party. But the reality is that Ap has plummeted in the opinion polls after the election victory a year and a half ago. The Labor Party has not since September last year been above 20 per cent on average in the national surveys, according to the website pollofpolls.no. And after a slight improvement in January, Ap has fallen back to 18.5 per cent on average nationally in February. – What is the reason why things are going so badly? – It is that we live in an uncertain time. Many voters feel that electricity, food and interest will become more expensive. They turn around and hold those in charge accountable. – There is no excuse for us not to take the feedback very seriously. But I am confident that the policy we are now implementing has been thoroughly thought out, continues Støre. The Prime Minister says he does not want to let the measurements from month to month “direct politics in a flash”. Instead, he gives a clear signal to those who had to expect completely new political crisis measures from Ap in the run-up to the election: – Responsible economic management is about you actually putting some limits on how much new you come up with. We must keep inflation low, cover expenses for strengthened Defense and accept Ukrainian refugees. Then we have to put a number of election promises on hold in order to do what is important here and now, he says. On a collision course LO has three representatives in the Labor Party’s central board. There sits Følsvik and the leaders of the two largest LO unions, the Trade Union’s Mette Nord and the Union’s Jørn Eggum. The three-leaf clover played a central role when Hadia Tajik ended up resigning as minister and deputy leader last year. They did this by going out in VG in a way that testified to a lack of trust in Tajik, from whom they demanded clear answers in the so-called commuter housing case. But also in purely political matters, Ap and LO have been on a collision course after the change of government in 2021. This happened not least in the conflicts that arose after the government’s proposed cut in unemployment benefit and holiday pay for the unemployed, which was admittedly rectified in a budget settlement with SV. Also in the past, there have been some heated exchanges between the two giants on either side of Youngstorget. Frequent contact and good dialogue between the top managers have in many cases been the solution to the problems. TRIO: NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg flanked by LO leader Peggy Hessen Følsvik and Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre during the closed part of the summit in Helsinki. Photo: Geir Solaas Moen / LO Before the relationship broke down completely, then Labor leader Jens Stoltenberg went for regular walks around Sognsvann with LO leader Gerd-Liv Valla. Støre himself went on a hot dog walk along Akerselva with Følsvik’s predecessor, Hans-Christian Gabrielsen. – Do you have such common arenas? – We have some fixed meeting points like this, where we like to talk to each other. And otherwise the lines are open both ways, and I’m very happy about that, says Følsvik, who suddenly had to take over the leadership position when Gabrielsen died suddenly in March two years ago. Big favorite At the same time that the rest of the management wants re-election, Minister of Knowledge Tonje Brenna from Akershus is the big favorite to become the new deputy leader of Ap. If she is elected, the party leadership will be expanded by one person. The management numbered four people until Hadia Tajik resigned last year. And it is precisely from Tajik and Rogaland Ap that there may be a battle for the position of deputy leader as well. Because Hadia Tajik wants her old position back, and has the county party behind her. FAVORITE: Many in Ap want Tonje Brenna as deputy leader of the party. Photo: Ole Berg-Rusten / NTB There will also be changes in the central board as a whole. Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt from Akershus is not seeking re-election, nor is Hilmar Høl from Vestland, as news was able to tell yesterday. But in Labor circles, there is concern that the central government has become too top-heavy. Terje Lien Aasland, Marte Mjøs Persen, Ingvild Kjerkol, Bjørnar Skjæran, Anette Trettebergstuen, Jon Ivar Nygård and the aforementioned Huitfeldt all have in common that they are both ministers and sit on the central board. There they represent their counties. The expectation is clear in the organization that the new central government will not be as top-heavy and government-dominated as it is today.
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