Swedish search for a prime minister continues amid budget debate
Swedish efforts to find a new prime minister and workable government continue on Thursday after a centre-right government was voted down by parliament.
Parliamentary speaker Andreas Norlén begins a new round of talks with party leaders after a majority rejected a government made up of the centre-right Moderate and Christian Democrat parties.
After these talks, Norlén will announce the next step in the search for a government.
"It might be giving someone a new mandate to carry out exploratory talks, or putting forward a prime ministerial candidate to the chamber," he said on Wednesday.
Leader of the Centre Party Annie Lööf has said she is keen to carry out talks with other party leaders, and the parliamentary group leader of the centre-left Social Democrats, Anders Ygeman, said his party was open to this idea.
FOR MEMBERS: Who's running the country? Your questions about the Swedish election
Parliament is also set to debate a budget on Thursday.
The budget proposal being put forward by the current caretaker government doesn't contain any major changes or many of the investments discussed during the election campaign.
This is because caretaker governments are supposed to avoid partisan decisions, so the budget needs to be as politically neutral as possible. The finance ministry has agreed with the opposition Alliance and the Left Party about certain principles of the budget, which will more or less be an extension of last year's without any new major proposals.
But it is still not certain to be accepted, since opposition parties can also put forward their own budget proposals, something the Moderates has said it will do.
SWEDEN IN FOCUS: How did the political situation get to where it is today?
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Parliamentary speaker Andreas Norlén begins a new round of talks with party leaders after a majority rejected a government made up of the centre-right Moderate and Christian Democrat parties.
After these talks, Norlén will announce the next step in the search for a government.
"It might be giving someone a new mandate to carry out exploratory talks, or putting forward a prime ministerial candidate to the chamber," he said on Wednesday.
Leader of the Centre Party Annie Lööf has said she is keen to carry out talks with other party leaders, and the parliamentary group leader of the centre-left Social Democrats, Anders Ygeman, said his party was open to this idea.
FOR MEMBERS: Who's running the country? Your questions about the Swedish election
Parliament is also set to debate a budget on Thursday.
The budget proposal being put forward by the current caretaker government doesn't contain any major changes or many of the investments discussed during the election campaign.
This is because caretaker governments are supposed to avoid partisan decisions, so the budget needs to be as politically neutral as possible. The finance ministry has agreed with the opposition Alliance and the Left Party about certain principles of the budget, which will more or less be an extension of last year's without any new major proposals.
But it is still not certain to be accepted, since opposition parties can also put forward their own budget proposals, something the Moderates has said it will do.
SWEDEN IN FOCUS: How did the political situation get to where it is today?
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