Jacob Christensen

2009-11-24: Please note that this was about the 2005 local elections! If you want a summary of the 2009 elections, you may want to take a look at this summary made by my colleague Flemming Juul Christiansen.

National trends
The turnout stayed on the level from 1997, which is slightly surprising given the lack-lustre campaign and uncertainties about the new administrative bodies. Turnout was reported as 69,4% against 70,1% in 1997 and 85% in 2001. The unusually high turnout in 2001 was due to the fact that local, regional and national elections were held on the same day.

The results on a national level have not been announced yet, but the Social Democrats may have won some votes compared to 2001 while Venstre also increased its share of the vote. On the other hand the Social Democrats can still claim to be Denmark�s largest party in local government. The movements for most of the other parties seem to be neglible on a national level.

Some interesting results
Copenhagen
The Social Democrats under Ritt Bjerregaard won a convincing victory with nearly 38% of the votes cast. This is a massive increase in the party�s share of the vote. The Social Liberal Party also increased its share even though their gains were smaller than expected.

On the other hand the Liberal Party under S�ren Pind lost votes and Pind announced that he would retire from local politics.

In a surprising move, Bjerregaard is expected to make an agreement on mayoral posts with the Social Liberal Party while not including the Socialist Party and the Socialist Unitary List.

�rhus
Even though the Liberals under Louise Gade recorded gains, it was not enough to keep her in office. Nicolai Wammen will be the new mayor supported by the left wing.

Odense
Incumbent Anker Boye suffered massive losses and will be replaced by Jens Boye despite a desperate late-night offer to the Social-Liberal Party where the Social Democrats offered the post of mayor to that party.

Vejle
Vejle is being merged with three minor suburban and rural communes. Here Socialist Flemming Christensen (no relative) who has been mayor since 1993 lost office to an unusual coalition of Social Democrats, Liberals and Danish People�s Party.

Leif Skov (SD) who is the incumbent mayor in the suburban commune of B�rkop will be the new mayor with Arne Sigtenbjerggaard (Liberal and mayor of Jelling) as Deputy Mayor and Kristian Thulesen Dahl (DPP and an MP and member of Give local council) as 2nd deputy.

Back in 1993 Flemming Christensen became mayor in this otherwise traditionally Social Democratic town by securing the support of Liberals and Conservatives. In 2001 local business magnate Olaf Haahr created his own Citizens� List to secure Christensen�s re-election.

Horsens
Horsens is another new commune where a town is being merged with a number of smaller rural communes. Here former minister Jan Tr�jborg (SD) somewhat surprisingly cruised to victory.

�benr�
�benr� is included for good measure. Here the incumbent mayor of R�dekro Tove Larsen (SD) won a convincing victory in all parts of the new �benr� commune and will command an own majority in the new local council.

Political Effects on the National Level
The effects on the national level are hard to gauge today. The Social Democrats may take some comfort in their relatively good results, which broke a string of blunders on the national level. On the other hand the Liberal Party cannot be said to have suffered significant losses.

Maybe the looser of these elections is the Conservative Party which is still feeling the competition from the Liberal Party in the major cities and which is finding it hard to maintain its share of the vote.

The results of the local elections with gains or losses compared to 2001. The results for the major parties are:

Social Democrats 34,2 (+2,0)
Social Liberals 5,2 (+1,3)
Conservatives 10,3 (-1,0)
Socialist People’s Party 7,5 (+0,1)
Danish People’s Party 5,9 (+0,5)
Liberals 27,5 (-0,8)
Unity List 2,7 (+1,0)
German Minority Party 0,1 (no change)
Others 6,6 (-2,8)

It may be worth noting that the Social Liberal Party and the Unity List only saw relatively small gains even though they in most communes at these elections.