As Norway’s Parliament launches its new session, voters don’t seem to be backing either the country’s Labour Party government or its longtime Conservatives-led opposition. Instead it’s the far right Progress Party that’s dominating the polls, along with two much smaller parties also recently branded as “populists.”
Norway’s Progress Party (Fremskrittspartiet, Frp) has been gaining steam for the past year, and the latest polls have been nothing short of stunning. Progress was favoured by 32.7 percent of those questioned in a poll by research firm Opinion for newspaper Dagsavisen and fully 33.99 percent in another conducted by Respons for Norway’s largest newspaper Aftenposten.
That was way ahead of the next largest blocs of voters who supported the ruling Labour Party (Arbeiderpartiet, Ap) and its Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre. Opinion’s poll showed 22.3 percent favouring Labour while Respons’ gave Labour 21 percent.
Trailing in third place, in both polls, was the Conservative Party (Høyre, H) with 14.4 percent of the vote in Respons’ poll for Aftenposten and just 12.8 percent in Opinion’s poll for Dagsavisen. Those were shockingly low numbers for the Conservatives, especially since they’ve often reigned as Norway’s largest party and have alternated with Labour in leading governments.
Now it’s Progress Party leader Sylvi Listhaug who’s in line to become Norway’s next prime minister, if Progress hangs on to its top spot after the next national election in 2029, and if she wants the job. She consistently responds to leadership questions by claiming that the leader of the party emerging as largest should have the prime minister’s post, but stops short of launching herself as a prime minister candidate.
Listhaug is also publicly known more as a trouble-maker and loud critic of government leaders (even in governments that included Progress) than as a potential government leader herself. “She lacks a plan for power,” read the recent headline on a commentary by Kjetil B Alstadheim, Aftenposten’s political editor. Like many others, he wonders whether Listhaug actually wants the responsibility of leading a government, or making the compromises necessary to lead a coalition government.
She recently formed an alliance with the Christian Democrats and the Center Party in an unsuccessful effort to retain last winter’s fuel tax cuts. She lacked a majority in Parliament without the Conservatives’ support, though, and she opted to reinforce their split instead of trying to bring Progress, the Conservatives and another non-socialist party, the Liberals, together.
Listhaug’s Progress Party now appears to have won around 103,000 voters away from the Conservatives. Progress could eventually form a majority in Parliament with the district-oriented Center Party (Senterpartiet, Sp) and even the far-left Reds (Rødt), if their poll results hold into the next election. While Progress and the Reds are generally on opposite ends of the political spectrum, Maria Rosness of research firm Opinion told Dagsavisen that all three parties often resort to “populist rhetoric,” pitting the people against government power or a perceived “elite,” and all three want to bring down the cost of living for “ordinary” people.
“If populism means listening to people and taking their concerns seriously, and using our strengths to stand up against an undemocratic elite, than I take it as a compliment,” Reds leader Marie Sneve Martinussen told Dagsavisen. She called the Reds’ record-high 9.2 percent of the vote in Opinion’s poll “legendary,” and a clear sign that her party is doing something right. The Reds are now around twice as big as other small parties in Parliament, with the Liberals, Christian Democrats and Greens around 4 percent or under and the Socialist Left just over 4 percent.
Center Party leader Trygve Slagsvold Vedum, with 4- to 5 percent of the vote in the latest polls, doesn’t like seeing his party characterized as “populist.” He prefers to stress that he’s just “mostly concerned about the people” and their concerns about a higher cost of living. Both the Reds and Center, meanwhile, have had an agreement with Labour’s minority government to support it.
‘Cold shower’ for Støre
Even newer poll numbers, meanwhile, are widely viewed as “a cold shower” for Labour’s current Prime Minister Støre. He’s kept Norway at the forefront of many international events lately and won wide respect abroad for his diplomatic skills, but only 35.2 percent of Norwegian voters think he’s doing a good job at home.
The lack of domestic support emerged in yet another new poll conducted by research firm Norstat for Norwegian Broadcasting (NRK) and newspapers Dagbladet and Vårt Land. Støre’s personal poll standing fell by 6.5 points from the September poll when 41.7 percent thought he was doing a good job.
The poll was taken before Støre hosted the US Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Oslo this week for important talks aimed at ending Russia’s war on Ukraine. Finland’s President Alexander Stubb attended as well. The poll suggests, however, that many Norwegian voters are more concerned with pocketbook issues than world affairs. NRK noted that Støre “is paying the price for higher interest rates” along with the higher cost of fuel and other forms of energy.
NewsinEnglish.no/Nina Berglund