Debate, Workplaces | Maybe the government should take a trip to Denmark?
Reader letter This is a debate post, written by an external contributor. The post expresses the writer’s attitudes.
Both before decentralization and energy policy, exciting things are happening in our neighboring country. Will the Norwegian government get inspiration, and can we learn anything?
In 2015, the Danish government decided that the state-owned workplaces should to a greater extent be distributed throughout the country. The goal was for them to get closer to residents and businesses. This led to the reform program “Better Balance”, where the then Liberal government led by Lars Løkke Rasmussen took the initiative to move approx. 3,900 jobs from the capital to the four other regions in Denmark. In 2018, one follows up “Better Balance II” the goal was to relocate 4,000 state-run jobs.
Mette Frederiksen and the new Danish government have followed up this work under the slogan “Closer”, where the goal is for Denmark to be better connected. In addition, she announced in her New Year’s speech at the transition from 2021 to 2022 at all municipalities now must be set free from the state’s rules and bureaucracy. It is an extension of the so-called free municipality experiment, where seven municipalities have our trial municipalities and received full freedom to run either primary school, daycare or elderly care.
Friday 18. March, it was the debate in the Storting about teleworking and decentralization of government jobs, which with another presentations from us in Initiative West received attention during the debate. In the debate, Minister Bjørn Arild Gram (Sp) stated that telework must come as a supplement to state location in the district, and not as a replacement. It is a good approach, which is noted and which they must follow up!
What if the Norwegian government, which has insisted that the whole country should be used to a greater extent, had done the same as the Danes when they do not have to carve out district policy through their work with a new district report? Set a large-scale goal of relocating government jobs, to get closer to residents and businesses and to ensure that the country is better connected. In the election campaign in 2021, both Jonas Gahr Støre and Trygve Slagsvold Vedum had meetings with a central Danish policy in this field, namely the current Minister of the Interior and Housing Kaare Dybvad Bek. Maybe there are good reasons why they should look more towards Denmark even now after the election campaign is over?
When they first look to Denmark, they can also draw inspiration from the Danes’ energy policy, which, among other things, has led to not building energy islands that must be completed by 2030, and deliver 5 GW of power. In comparison, the Norwegian initiative that was recently launched with the first phase of the Southern North Sea II will deliver 1.5 GW (an additional 1.5 GW will come in the second phase). It is also interesting to see that this gigantic Danish project has a broad political majority behind it, with 175 out of 179 representatives in the Folketing.
In Norway, we have not set up an energy commission to look at the long lines of Norwegian energy policy, and try to find the good solutions to a number of demanding entanglements. There one must balance different considerations. One of the challenges with the wind turbine development on land is that the processes have taken so long that decisions and completion have taken place in different election periods. Perhaps Norwegian energy policy would also have needed a large joint project, which one could gather around and which would thus have been realized and had political support despite a changing political wing in the Storting. Offshore wind can be such a common political project, but then I think we need to raise our ambitions and pace somewhat.