On Thursday, the municipalities will meet with the government for negotiations on an economic agreement ahead of next week’s final sprint. The country’s municipalities acknowledge that the government is working to reduce bureaucracy but believe that the process is happening too slowly. For example, the chairman of the Danish Local Government Association (KL), Martin Damm (V), points out that the number of words in the laws and regulations that municipalities must follow has increased by 145 percent in 30 years. This is shown in a new report from KL.
“You just have to remember that new rules keep coming all the time. I don’t know if Margrethe Vestager stole her quote from someone else, but she said, ‘you remove rules with tweezers and add them with a shovel,'” he says. Damm will meet with the government on Thursday evening to discuss the economic agreement, which allocates funds to schools, elderly care, and daycare centers operated by the country’s 98 municipalities.
Specifically, the number of words in the municipalities’ laws and regulations has increased from approximately 2.8 million words in 1990 to 6.8 million words in 2022, which corresponds to a 145 percent increase. The government has made streamlining a top priority, after successive governments have tried the same without success for decades. Municipalities acknowledge the effort but believe it is progressing too slowly and, therefore, have made it a focus point in the negotiations.
“It keeps growing and growing. Our clear signal is, let’s make a project that reverses the trend, so we get rid of bureaucracy and spend money on prioritizing local welfare,” says Damm. KL has previously made similar descriptions, to which the government has responded that politicians in Christiansborg (the Danish Parliament) need to do a better job of stopping themselves from creating new rules.
The government has entered into agreements in areas such as the use of force and the elderly sector to reduce bureaucracy. The question is whether the municipalities are stating the obvious. “As far as we can see, the trends are still going upward, so it’s becoming more and more. There are strong forces in the bureaucracy that we’re up against. There’s still a lot to tackle; we need to step up our efforts,” says Damm. Damm describes the negotiations as “difficult,” and a final sprint is expected next week before the EU election.
The negotiations will determine the economic framework for 2025, while municipal elections are scheduled for November. The Social Democrats and Venstre (Liberal Party) are the largest parties in terms of mayors and are likely to be positive in the negotiations. Additionally, a significant increase in the economic leeway, which is the state’s expected surplus in the future, is expected shortly.