Four party leaders to hold first joint meeting at Lidingö retreat

Leaders of the Social Democrats, Left Party, Green Party and Centre Party will meet for the first time at party leader level on Friday, SVT reports. The meeting will take place at a conference centre on Lidingö.

Centre Party leader Elisabeth Thand Ringqvist has also invited several outside representatives to brief the parties on the challenges facing Sweden. The gathering is seen by many as a possible first step towards formal government negotiations.

Thand Ringqvist said the meeting was not intended to be government negotiations, but to establish whether the parties share “any common ground at all”. Left Party leader Nooshi Dadgostar told TT she planned to raise the question of government formation, even though it is not on the agenda.

The meeting is scheduled to run from 1pm to 5pm. The conference centre also has a sauna. Left Party figure Ida Gabrielsson has previously said she would like to use it with Centre Party representative Martin Ådahl. Visitor Johan Thulin joked that someone should lock them in and tell them they could not leave until they had settled the government question.

Those invited from outside the parties include Albin Kainelainen, director-general of the National Institute of Economic Research; Emelie Värja, chief economist of the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions; Jan-Olof Jacke, chief executive of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise; and the chairs of TCO, LO and Saco, Therese Svanström, Johan Lindholm and Sofia Rydgren Stal. Other invitees are deputy national police commissioner Stefan Hector, Swedish Institute of International Affairs director Jakob Hallgren and Fossil Free Sweden national coordinator Svante Axelson.

The Centre Party has invited the party leaders, party secretaries, parliamentary group leaders and economic policy spokespersons from the four parties.