Major boost to Norwegian foreign aid (Dagsavisen)

Norwegian foreign aid will get a substantial boost in the national budget to be announced today. Allocations for humanitarian aid and human rights will rise by more than NOK 200 million. Funding for nuclear safety projects on the other side of the border with Russia will also be increased to NOK 350 million. The Government will also invest NOK 575 million in a fund for companies located in regional areas. The Norwegian Industrial and Regional Development Fund (SND) will probably manage the fund.

Fewer Norwegians sick (Verdens Gang)

Labour and Government Administration Minister Victor D. Norman is working hard to reduce workplace absenteeism due to illness. It was revealed yesterday that the Minister’s own agencies are among those with the worst sick leave statistics. He is extremely keen to reach the target set in the agreement on an inclusive working life and reduce the numbers taking sick leave by 20 per cent by 2005. "Even if we do not reach the target of a 20 per cent reduction in the numbers taking sick leave by the end of the next four years, we would be just as firmly opposed to any cut in sickness benefits," said Gerd-Liv Valla, president of the Norwegian Confederation of Trade Unions (LO).

19,000 children living in poverty (Verdens Gang)

19,000 Norwegian children are living in poverty. New money and new measures will now be brought to bear in order to eradicate child poverty. Tomorrow Social Affairs Minister Ingjerd Schou (Con) will launch a ten-point plan to combat child poverty. The objective of the plan is clear – to eradicate poverty among children and teenagers by 2005. 19,000 poor children are 19,000 too many. No one should have to grow up in poverty, she said.

Christian Democrats on slippery slope (Nationen)

Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik can be thankful that today’s figures are simply the results of an opinion poll and do not represent an actual election result this autumn. If there had been an election now the PM’s party would have received a severe drubbing. According to a poll carried out by Sentio-Norsk Statistikk, support for the Christian Democrats stands at 8.3 percentage points. The Progress Party is the country’s most popular party on 27.8 per cent. The Labour Party has the backing of 19.8 per cent of the electorate, and the Conservatives 19.0 per cent. Mr Bondevik denies that the poor poll results have any impact on the Government’s policies. "The country is not run according to opinion polls," he said.

Hagen embraces railways plan (Dagsavisen)

Progress Party chairman Carl I. Hagen has embraced the Government’s proposals to put the majority of railway services out to tender. "The Progress Party manifesto has included proposals to put railway services out to tender since 1985. The media laughed at us when we first made the proposal, but now the Government has come round to our view," said Carl I. Hagen contentedly. The proposal to put the operation of railway services out to tender will be announced in the national budget today.

Sveaas forced to sell Orkla shares (Aftenposten)

Christen Sveaas arrived on the scene as an Orkla shareholder two and a half years ago. Yesterday Den norske Bank and Nordea forced the investor to sell the remains of his prestigious holding in Orkla. Purchasing the shares was Mr Sveaas’s friend Stein Erik Hagen. A growing number of people are now questioning whether the value of the assets in Mr Sveaas’s group of companies exceeds the billions they have in debts.

Hagen thinking of buying more (Dagens Næringsliv)

Stein Erik Hagen has not ruled out further purchases of Orkla shares after he yesterday bought 8.3 per cent of the company. Mr Hagen said he would not demand to be elected chairman of Orkla, but he declined to say how he feels Orkla should be run or whether he would prefer the company’s strategy to be changed. "Those are issues I will be discussing with the board of directors not the media," he said. Mr Hagen paid NOK 1.3 billion for Christen Sveaas’s almost 11 million shares.

Debate on Gjedrem’s role (Dagsavisen)

Svein Gjedrem, Governor of the Norwegian Central Bank, came in for much criticism when he put up interest rates this summer. The reverberations of Mr Gjedrem’s decision have now reached the Storting. The Centre Party has said it wants a thorough debate on the mandate which guides the Central Bank Governor’s management of interest rates. The situation today is that the Norwegian Central Bank has been given the task of ensuring that inflation does not rise above 2.5 per cent. The Bank also keeps a weather eye on the exchange rate, but the inflation target is its most important objective.

Divorce rate reaches record level (Vårt Land)

Today’s young people would very much like to marry a person they can spend the rest of their lives with, but the chances of that happening are smaller than ever before. "People’s ideals and way of life are out of step when it comes to living with someone else. If today’s pattern continues we are looking at almost 50 per cent of marriages ending in divorce," said Turid Noack, a researcher at Statistics Norway.

Worth Noting

• The Conservative Party’s Oslo branch has come under fire from the Progress Party because the Conservatives have refused to reveal the names of its financial supporters. The Progress Party itself receives anonymous donations through the foundation, The Friends of the Progress Party, something which party chairman Carl I. Hagen thinks is no problem at all.
  (Aftenposten)
• The Norwegian shipping industry looks set to grind to a complete halt on Monday. Seamen’s unions are joining forces for a two-hour political strike in protest against the budget. The shipowners will demonstrate outside the Storting.
  (Dagens Næringsliv)
• Constant delays, cancellations, substantial cuts in services, rusty trains and carriages without toilet facilities are real problems in European cities with private railway companies. Nevertheless, the Norwegian government has decided to put the Norwegian railway system out to tender.
  (Dagsavisen)
• The state-run railway company, NSB, has been hit by a major drop in passenger numbers. Since April the number of passengers travelling with NSB has plummeted, and is now 5-7 per cent lower than last year’s level. It has proved particularly difficult to win back passengers on inter-city routes out of the capital.
  (Dagsavisen)
• Stein Erik Hagen is still considered to be Norway’s richest man, despite a year of disastrous developments on the stock market. Mr Hagen was the only Norwegian to be included in Forbes magazine’s list of the world’s richest people.
  (Dagens Næringsliv)
• Princess Märtha Louise has refused to remove her royal title from the name of her private company. Experts believe it is impossible for her to separate her public and commercial roles.
  (Aftenposten)
• A businesswoman and a film director from China are in Oslo to ask for permission to erect a copy of Gustav Vigeland’s Monolith statue in the Olympic village in Beijing. "I have seen a lot of fabulous art, but nothing measures up to the Monolith and its symbolic representation of human life," said businesswoman Yan Wang.
  (Verdens Gang)

Today’s comment from Aftenposten

Yesterday’s Speech from the Throne did not offer any political surprises. The Speech from the Throne, read by King Harald at the official opening of the Storting yesterday, was almost entirely a catalogue of familiar measures. On the whole they are measures on which there is barely any disagreement. But the Government also warned of measures to come which will undoubtedly be a cause of conflict. Among those issues which will challenge the opposition is the proposal to put road building projects out to tender and reorganize the Public Roads Administration’s construction activities as a state-owned limited company. The opposition can be happy that the Government has said it will implement the necessary measures to follow up the Storting’s decision on pre-school day care reform – with the aim of ensuring nursery places for all who want one, lower fees for parents and equal treatment of private and local authority nurseries. Not that the Government had any choice on that particular matter. The Labour Party’s incoming leader, Jens Stoltenberg, is right in saying that the Speech from the Throne is not calculated to be a source of either outrage or enthusiasm. When it comes to political developments, it is not the Speech from the Throne which will be decisive, but the national budget.