The case in summary: Parliamentary politician Sandra Borch (Sp) The SP politician from Troms has signed up for a master’s degree at UiT – Norway’s Arctic University. In January, she resigned as minister after being caught for plagiarism. In March, she lost her master’s degree. Borch plans to deliver the thesis in December. She will write about national security and preparedness in public procurement. Borch still believes it was the right decision to resign as minister after the plagiarism accusations. The Center Party’s party leader Trygve Slagsvold Vedum believes there should be room in politics to stand up after making a mistake. He allows Borch to return to top politics. Borch denies that her motivation for resuming her master’s is re-election and top positions in politics. The summary is made by an AI service from OpenAi. The content is quality assured by news’s journalists before publication. – I reckon this is one of the few masters that will be read by a lot of people. I must be very careful with reference to sources, says Sandra Borch. news meets the SP politician from Troms in the reading room of the University Library in Oslo. Borch has now applied for a master’s degree at UiT – Norway’s Arctic University. It is only a few months since she lost her master’s degree in law from the same university. It happened after it was revealed that large parts of the master’s thesis from 2013 had been plagiarized. Close to a third of the thesis was plagiarized. In January, she resigned as Minister of Research and Higher Education after E24 had found textual similarities in her thesis. – Just by reading the first two excerpts, I realized that I can’t stand this, and neither can the government. I was very clear right away that I wanted to leave. It took me 2–3 minutes to decide on that, says Borch. Five hours later, she stood in front of the press corps and announced her resignation. Borch will be in the reading room a lot this summer. Photo: Gunnar Bratthammer / news Will submit the thesis in December Now the former minister is motivated to start a new master’s thesis, over ten years since the last time. And she doesn’t wait until autumn. – I will spend July here at the office in Oslo to get started. When the Storting starts again in the autumn, there will be weekdays for parliamentary work and weekends for master’s writing, says Borch. The goal is to submit the thesis in December so that she can get her degree back in January, one year after the first accusations of plagiarism came. Borch will write about national security and preparedness in public procurement, a topic she is passionate about. – I think it is relevant for the times we live in now, both in terms of the war in Europe but also what we experienced during the pandemic that certain areas of society that are covered by public procurement are very vulnerable, she says. Sandra Borch says she will spend a lot of time on source references. Photo: Gunnar Bratthammer / news Half a year after her resignation, Borch still believes it was the right decision to resign as a minister. – It was tough, but right. I thought that I must accept the consequences of that, and spare myself and the government from being plagued with the case until the decision from UiT came, says Borch. She points out that cases like this often end up with you having to resign as a minister at some point anyway. Vedum: Does not rule out top job for Borch Center Party’s party leader Trygve Slagsvold Vedum uses the summer holidays for completely different tasks than Borch. At the home farm in Stange, the wood machines are running at full capacity. Vedum says he is actually late in splitting wood when news meets him. Vedum opened up in a VG interview early on that Borch could return to top politics. The SP leader does not want to set a time frame for how quickly the Troms politician can get a top position in the party or government again. But he still believes there should be room in politics to stand up after making a mistake. – I think it should be possible to take responsibility, clean up after yourself and take the consequences of the mistakes you have made. Sandra did so right away. Then there should be an opportunity to come back. Trygve Slagsvold Vedum believes there should be room for forgiveness, and not just condemnation, when politicians make mistakes. Photo: Frode Fjerdingstad / news – Can Borch return as minister before the election in 2025? – I think we have a good cabinet of ministers. I have no plans that we need to replace anyone, says Vedum. He points out that Borch has made a political comeback as a Storting politician, a position that requires the people’s trust to continue in it. The SP leader is happy that Borch has signaled that she wants re-election to the Storting. At the same time, he emphasizes that it is up to Trom’s Center Party to decide whether to renew the trust. – Everyone has to earn positions, and you have to earn trust for that. Sandra has not only had access to life. She has shown that it is possible to defy opposition. The round she had this winter was tough, but she takes responsibility and cleaned up. The fact that she is taking her master’s degree again shows impressive courage. The SP leader is careful not to give any time aspects. But he believes Borch can make a comeback in top politics. Photo: Frode Fjerdingstad / news Borch’s name has come up in conversations about who could become the Center Party’s future deputy leaders. The party leader believes that the master fraud case does not need to be an obstacle to the post of deputy leader. – Borch is one of several who can fill that type of role. But it is not up to me to decide, it is up to the party organisation. I think we should be a party where it must be allowed to make some mistakes in life, says Vedum. Re-election not the motivation Back in the reading room, Borch denies that it is re-election and top positions in politics that are her motivation for resuming her master’s. – I think getting my degree back is important in order to have something to lean back on. We know that life in politics does not last forever, she says. She does not want to comment on whether she will aim for a cabinet post at the next election. At the moment, she thrives as an elected representative for Troms county and as a member of the justice committee. Borch writes about national security and preparedness in public procurement in his new master’s thesis in law. Photo: Gunnar Bratthammer / news – I am motivated and determined to stand for election and fight for a mandate in the Storting. And then it’s also very good to be able to feel being elected again for your own county, says Borch. Borch has previously been criticized for getting off too easily. In such cases, it is common to be banned from the university for one year. It has also been pointed out that the ministry she led has appealed the case where a student is accused of self-plagiarism to the Supreme Court. – I understand that there was a debate, and I think it is good and that you get a clearer set of regulations and legal practice in the area. I see that there are other aspects that become difficult in academia, with regard to AI, says Borch. Now she is looking forward to starting the writing of her new assignment, and says she has learned from her mistakes. Photo: Gunnar Bratthammer / news – It is, as many say, that writing the thesis is one thing. But almost half the time you spend on having references and correct source references. So it’s clear that it’s not a job you can do in the last week of the master’s, it’s something you have to start with at the start, says Borch. Published 01.07.2024, at 20.25
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Sandra Borch starts a new master’s thesis after a plagiarism verdict from UiT – news Troms and Finnmark
