Left and Centre parties clash over government talks

The Left Party and Centre Party remain divided over a future Swedish government, SVT reported after their representatives met in the broadcaster’s election studio on Monday evening.

Left Party deputy leader Ida Gabrielsson and Centre Party secretary Hannes Hervieu congratulated each other on the election result, but maintained their opposing positions on government cooperation.

“We have clearly said that the Left Party should not sit in the next government,” Hervieu said. The Centre Party has drawn a red line against including the Left Party in a future government.

The Left Party, meanwhile, is demanding ministerial posts and is prepared to negotiate with all four parties that have said they want Magdalena Andersson to become prime minister.

“We have to stop meeting like this. We have to sit down at the negotiating table and have these discussions,” Gabrielsson told Hervieu.

Gabrielsson said she was ready to negotiate directly with the Centre Party. “My door is wide open to you and your party. You cannot just stand in a television studio and discuss these issues,” she said.

Asked whether the Centre Party would prefer a new election to allowing the Left Party into government, Hervieu said a new election would “obviously be a major failure”. He added that the Centre Party had been rewarded by voters for not wanting the Left Party in government.

Gabrielsson said both parties now had to compromise because their preferred outcomes had not materialised. Her preferred coalition had been the Social Democrats, Left Party and Green Party, while Hervieu had wanted a centrist government.

She also argued that the Centre Party, rather than the Left Party, was currently the outlier among the opposition parties because its election promises were furthest from those of the Social Democrats, Green Party and Left Party.