There is a resurrection in Norway major humanitarian organizations after the government removed $ 16 billion from its aid budget for 2023.
In 2023, the government moves away from the target of spending 1% of GNI on aid.
Dagbladet may Thursday report that a furious development minister Anne Beathe Tvinnereim (Sp) was reduced to tears during the August budget conference, when the cut became a fact.
Just a few weeks before, Dagbladet learns that the Minister of Development and his people have received exactly the opposite message from the Prime Minister: The aid budget should remain at the normal level of one percent of GNI, was Støre’s message.
After crying in the back room: – Hopeless
A requirement
KrF says it is now up to SV to save the stumps. SV will negotiate the state budget for 2023 with the governing parties Ap and Sp.
– SV is not expected to start any further negotiations until the government accepts that the 1 percent is fixed – even for 2023, Dag Inge Ulstein (KrF) tells Dagbladet.
He himself was Minister of Development from 2019 to 2021.
SV will not answer Dagbladet’s question as to whether the party will issue an ultimatum as Ulstein demands.
I was asked to go out
Gro: Poor extra money
It is traditional for Norway to spend one percent of GDP / GNI on aid.
The government is now moving away from this habit and Jonas Gahr Støre meets one of his great role models at the door:
“A rich nation that cannot spend a cent of every 100 bills it earns to share with people who have no food, medicine and a roof over their heads is poorer than money.»Said Gro Harlem Brundtland (Ap) as early as 1996.
The incredulous ministers wept in a closed-door meeting
Crazy extra income
KrF’s Dag Inge Ulstein is surprised that the Labor government wants to make Norway “poorer than money”.
– I know that SV does not want to support such poverty of international solidarity. But as it stands now, Støre is stuffing all the crazy extra income into our back pockets, she says.
The argument for cutting the aid budget is the general need to turn every penny in difficult economic times.
Government opponents point out that AS Norge collects billions from the sale of gas and electricity abroad.
INDIGNANT: Former Norwegian Development Minister, Dag Inge Ulstein. Photo: Stian Lysberg Solum / NTB
sea View
It does not win
But SV does not promise that it will “save” the aid budget. Increasing the aid budget by 16 billion will use much of the muscle SV has at the negotiating table.
Few in SV Dagbladet spoke to believe the party will get anything other than a token aid upgrade.
– International solidarity is more important than ever. In SV, we expect the government to see this too, says Ingrid Fiskå (SV) in Dagbladet.
She is the party’s foreign policy spokesperson.
Ulstein and KrF argue that there is no indication that the government sees the need for Fiskaa and SV to admit to being present.
– There is an argument and a way of thinking in the government that I cannot understand that SV will accept, says Ulstein.
Disappeared without a trace
Intelligent use of forces
SV asks KrF to start harassing the government, not them.
– Ulstein should direct his attacks where they can have effect – against the ruling parties. If he really wants to influence, then he shouldn’t use his energy to yell at those he agrees with, Fiskaa says.
– The question for Ulstein is whether SV really wants to prioritize aid in budget negotiations?
– I’m referring to the previous answers, Fiskaa replies.
