Strong krone strangling export industry (Dagens Næringsliv)

The value of Norwegian exports fell by NOK 25 billion from January to May this year, compared with the same period last year. The strength of the Norwegian krone has played an important role in the decline. Exports of all types of goods and services, from oil and gas to traditional exports, continue to plummet. "These are worrying figures," said Trade and Industry Minister Ansgar Gabrielsen in response to the latest export figures. Mr Gabrielsen will now consider whether the Government should adjust its policies to help those industries faced with international competition.

Bondevik about-face on Petroleum Fund (Dagbladet)

Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik does not want to be the man who cared less about human rights than the Progress Party. The Government has therefore now decided to do a complete about-face and back ethical investment guidelines for the Government Petroleum Fund. As recently as last weekend the Government said it was not prepared to do anything about the Fund’s controversial investments. The Socialist Left Party has won the backing of the Labour Party and the Progress Party for its proposals to put an end to such investments. They will now ask an expert group to come up with a proposal for how the Petroleum Fund can avoid investments which violate human rights and environmental conventions.

Investing oil revenues in Norway means high risk and low returns (Aftenposten)

According to Knut N. Kjær, head of the Government Petroleum Fund, investing Norway’s oil revenues in the domestic economy would give low returns at a high risk. Mr Kjær has spoken out against the large number of business leaders who want to use Norway’s oil revenues to buy up selected Norwegian companies. In Mr Kjær’s opinion this would not only give a low return on investment but would represent a considerable risk for future pension payouts. He believes businesses should look to the ordinary capital market for investment funds.

Lies and broken promises over pre-school day care (NTB)

The temperature of Monday night’s debate in the Storting on the opposition parties’ proposal for a shake up of pre-school day care rose to fever pitch. Accusations of lies and broken promises prompted the President of the Storting to warn the Christian Democrats’ Jon Lilletun about his language. "It is a complete lie that the Christian Democrats do not intend to implement the pre-school day care programme that we presented during the election campaign," said Mr Lilletun, leader of the Christian Democrats’ parliamentary group in response to claims to that effect by the Labour Party and the Socialist Left Party. Labour’s spokesperson on the issue, Eirin Faldet, as well as fellow Labour MPs Hill-Marta Solberg and Trond Giske were strongly critical of the Christian Democrats and the other ruling coalition partners. They pointed to the Christian Democrats’ election campaign promises to lower the fees paid by parents for nursery places, and compared them with the Government’s negative attitude to the opposition parties’ pre-school day care proposal.

Jagland’s support for pre-school day care deal luke-warm (Verdens Gang)

Labour leader Thorbjørn Jagland appears hesitant, almost reluctant in his defence of the historic agreement between the Labour Party, the Socialist Left Party, the Progress Party and the Centre Party on pre-school day care. As recently as the party’s central committee meeting on 27 May, Mr Jagland had warned strongly – as a matter of principle – against entering into binding agreements with the Progress Party and allowing the Storting to usurp the executive powers of the Government. At the meeting Mr Jagland expanded on the warnings against cooperating with the Progress Party which he had launched in his ‘Jagland letter’ of 29 April.

Pre-school day care deal could lead to interest rate rise (Verdens Gang)

The Storting has assumed a heavy burden. If it decides to spend NOK 5-6 billion to cut the fees parents must pay for a nursery place, without also finding the money to cover the cost, it will push mortgage rates up. This is the blunt message from some of the country’s leading experts on interest rates following the decision by the Labour Party, the Socialist Left Party and the Progress Party to cut the maximum fee payable for a nursery place to NOK 2,500 next year and NOK 1,500 in 2004.

Linguistic convergence finally laid to rest (NTB)

Cultural Affairs Minister Valgerd Svarstad Haugland (Chr.Dem) has quietly laid to rest the policy designed to achieve the convergence of Norway’s two official versions of the Norwegian language. Last Friday a bill to repeal the so-called convergence clause in the Norwegian Language Council Act was approved by the Council of State. A long and difficult chapter in the at times acrimonious debate over the Norwegian language has now been formally brought to a close, more than 30 years after the convergence policy had been abandoned in practice.

Bondevik put an end to dispute over sick pay (NTB)

Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik (Chr.Dem) stepped in personally to put a rapid end to the dispute over the future of the sick pay scheme. "The Government is standing by the agreement which preserves the sick pay scheme unchanged until the autumn of 2003," said Mr Bondevik to NTB yesterday morning. He refused categorically to review the sick pay scheme in the light of rising absenteeism in the workplace, despite calls to that effect from Mr Bondevik’s coalition partners, the Conservatives and the Liberals.

Leading Labour figures to seek re-election (Dagsavisen)

Labour’s deputy leader, Hill-Marta Solberg, and party secretary, Martin Kolberg, would both like to keep their seats on the party’s central committee. The deadline for the members of the Labour Party’s powerful central committee to indicate to the selection committee whether they will be seeking re-election expired on Saturday. After last winter’s power struggle between Thorbjørn Jagland and Jens Stoltenberg there has been considerable tension over the composition of the party’s central committee. Speculation surrounding the choice of deputy leaders has been particularly intense. Gerd-Liv Valla, president of the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions (LO) and leader of the Labour Party selection committee, now has two important figures in place, but filling the remaining positions will not be easy. Candidates have been jockeying for positions at the top of the Labour Party for quite some time. In addition to a dispute over who should be take the deputy leader slots, there is also disagreement over how many deputy leaders there should be – one or two.

Worth Noting

• The Storting voted on Monday night to approve a binding budget framework of NOK 3.3 billion for the new opera house in Oslo. The resolution was adopted against the Progress Party’s votes. Ola T. Lånke (Chr.Dem), who was responsible for piloting the bill through the Storting, congratulated the Norwegian people on what he called an important milestone on the road towards the realization of this important centre of culture. "Now is the time for action. We can finally give the go-ahead for the actual construction work to begin," said Mr Lånke. (NTB)
• In 1993 brothers Farhad and Mansour Muhammadi Injeh hijacked a plane in Azerbaijan. They threatened to blow it up and forced it to land at Gardermoen airport. 12 days ago the brothers were granted permanent residence in Norway on humanitarian grounds. The move comes despite assurances from the then Justice Minister, Grete Faremo, that no one would be able to use hijacking as a means to achieve permanent residence in this country. (Aftenposten)
• Hotel and restaurant workers were on strike for five weeks – and gained NOK 1,000. "It will take the people who were on strike from day one 21 years and six months to recover what they lost in earnings during the strike. Is that a sensible strike?" asked Finn Bergesen, chief executive of the Confederation of Norwegian Business and Industry (NHO). (Verdens Gang)
• Today 62,000 small investors will receive Statoil shares to the tune of NOK 163 million. In just one year the company’s small investors have received a return of 17.1 per cent. (Dagens Næringsliv)
• Rolf Utgård, Kværner’s controversial union boss, will probably not be elected senior union representative in newly merged Aker Kværner. Mr Utgård is a victim of his own implacable battle against Kjell Inge Røkke and the Aker corporation. (Dagbladet)
• Individuals who commit crimes against property have little to fear in this country. Only one in ten of those who are responsible for theft, robbery or burglary are brought to justice. Over half of all reported crimes relate to theft or burglary. Statistics Norway has examined all reported criminal offences in 1997 and analysed what happened to the 430,000 cases over the next four years. (Aftenposten)

Today’s comment from Dagbladet

The Storting has just voted its approval for a specific proposal regarding the construction of a new national opera house in Oslo. The Storting has decided that the opera house will go ahead independently of any road construction or urban development projects in the surrounding area, and that it will cost no more than NOK 3.3 billion to build. With this in mind all political skirmishing and game-playing should now be brought to an end. Opponents of the opera house should accept the Storting’s decision and stop their relentless efforts to throw a spanner in the works of this much needed cultural building project. But it is unlikely that we have seen the last battle fought over this issue. Up ahead there will undoubtedly be budget overruns, complications and gloating of the ‘I told you so’ variety. The powers that be – both political and administrative – therefore have a unique opportunity to prove that they are capable of bringing this complex and controversial project to a successful conclusion. Now they can prove that it is possible to build an opera house on time, on budget and without endless bickering.