HOLE (VG) She has had three children in three and a half years. Now Sandra Bruflot (31) wants to make it easier for others to have more children.
Many know her as a parliamentary representative and former leader of the Young Conservative Party.
Bruflot is now, by all accounts, elected as the new leader of the Conservative Women’s Forum.
Then she becomes part of the party leadership and gains even more influence in what is currently the country’s most popular party:
A group that is still characterized by men (60) mostly concerned with defense and business policy.
Bruflot comes walking behind the pram with little Ingeborg (4 months) at a dangerously high speed on the snow- and ice-covered pavement.
The trolley ride between the home up in the hillside and the meeting place in the bar (!) at Sundvolden Hotel does not take long. The mother of three and politician is just as effective in conveying messages as she is with dressing the children in the morning.
As incoming leader of the Conservative Party’s women’s forum, it is only right and reasonable that she wants to make the conditions even better for the production of the country’s most important and forward-looking natural resource: children.
– We must raise child benefit further, initially by an extra NOK 3,000 a year, Bruflot begins.
Child benefit = redistribution
– Why should even wealthy families be awarded child benefit?
– It will always be more expensive to have children than not to have children. I think that child benefit is really a redistribution from everyone to those who choose to have children. After all, Norway is completely dependent on people having children. Child benefit must apply to everyone, so people tax according to their means. But child benefit is among the things that should be universal, replies Bruflot.
She does not believe that child benefit in itself is the tipping point in the assessment of whether people want to have children or not. But it makes having children a little easier, she believes.
Then comes the next item on the agenda for Høyre’s new women’s policy leader – several weeks before she is formally elected. In fact:
15 weeks’ parental leave for father or co-mother with independent earning rights.
– Until now, it has been the case that the mother gets her weeks of maternity leave regardless of what the father does. But the father only gets leave if the mother is at work or studying. It is very strange from an equality perspective. Father and baby should have time together regardless of what mother is doing. Therefore, the father should be given independent withdrawal rights – also because the child needs it. We should prioritize this, says Bruflot.
Missing ladies blanket
She believes the entire Conservative Party should concretize this goal for the good of equality, fathers and future babies.
But the starting blocks are now in Høyre’s women’s forum. The party’s minority actually sits there.
In the Conservative Party’s own party poll in July 2022, the Conservative Party received a support of 16 percent among women under 40.
28 per cent of the population would otherwise have voted Conservative then.
In comparison, SV left 29 percent of women under 40 in the same survey.
– How is the Conservative Party going to attract more young ladies of your own age, Bruflot?’
– It is nothing new that we struggle a bit to get women under forty to vote Conservative. We must make it easier for the families with children – also make it easier to get a nursery place. We must invest more in better women’s health – by advocating for a national women’s health center – especially with expertise in endometriosis and adenomyosis. We must also invest more heavily in mental health and care for the elderly.
Women’s health
– But which issue should you really take ownership of?
– We initiated the women’s health committee, which will deliver its report soon. Women’s health is an issue we really need to follow up. It is indeed a paradox that an enormous amount more money is spent on research into men’s erectile dysfunction than on women’s diagnoses such as endometriosis and adenomyosis.
– Several ladies who stick their heads forward experience harassment. Have you experienced this and how do you deal with it?
– I think I got more when I was leader of Unge Høyre. Now I don’t get very much. It is a bit of a question what topics are being talked about. When I was a leader in Unge Høyre, I talked about immigration, windmills and the taxi alternative Uber in the course of a week. Then I thought that now I have rounded up quite a few reactions online, Bruflot remembers.
Avoiding Twitter
– Then it is actually necessary to avoid entering the comment field, she adds.
For example, she has avoided Twitter for four years, since 2018.
– It’s like a comment field you haven’t chosen to visit. They tag you, they seek you out even if you don’t seek them out, she describes.
As a local politician, on the other hand, she has not experienced harassment at all.
– We know that some people are more prone to incitement because of their orientation or skin colour, but my experience is that there is little incitement in local politics and that people are good at cheering each other on.
