Last Week in Denmark (13.08 - 20.08) Episode 31 Year 3
LWID merchandise; International Award; Fifth richest in the world
Editor HQ
You can listen to the latest podcast episode, “Last Week in Denmark," here. Thank you for your patience.
“New Denmark” merchandise collection: Fellow members of the Last Week in Denmark family, you are invited to browse our new merchandise collection created by Julie Smith-Belton, a South African artist from Roskilde.
We have chosen TPOP, a French print-on-demand platform, as the host for our designs because of the quality of their products and their green commitment. The textiles are made either from 100% organic cotton or from recycled textiles. They use water-based inks, are 100% eco-certified by OEKO-TEX® ECO PASSPORT and by the very serious GOTS 5.0 label, and are vegan.
We have decided to keep the price as low as possible (we earn 1 euro on each order) so that you can afford to buy the merchandise listed. The prices couldn’t go lower without compromising on quality.
There are six collections of “New Denmark” merchandise: “Searching for home”, “Moving forward”, “Irina”, “Vasil”, “Monika” and “Kifaax”
International Award North Denmark 2023: Do you know an individual or organization from North Denmark that contributed to the international community this year? If yes, you can nominate them for the “International Award North Denmark” until the 1st of September here.
Please do not nominate “Last Week in Denmark”. We already received the “International Award” in 2022.
The prize is awarded by “International House North Denmark”.
Svend Auken Prize 2023: The award celebrates initiatives or individuals who go the extra mile in caring for the environment, climate, or energy. This can be a national and/or local initiative. No initiative is too big or too small. You can nominate until August 21st here. The prize is awarded by Socialdemokratiet.
The Turkish Edition is seeking a Marketing Manager/Promoter and a Community Relationship Manager: As a Promoter you will craft campaigns that resonate with the readership. As a Community Relationship Manager, you will act as a bridge between various associations and initiatives, offering them a platform to expand their reach. You'll facilitate opportunities for these groups to engage with a larger audience through our newsletter, granting them shout-outs and a means to share their messages. This is a chance to contribute to the growth of the Turkish Edition while serving as a catalyst for broader community interactions. Language: Turkish (but all English speakers are encouraged to apply as well, since you can work in tandem with the Turkish language editor) Those who are interested can reach Turkish language edition editor via cicekeris@gmail.com.
The Romanian Edition is looking for a Marketing Manager: As we always try to improve and achieve higher growth, we need a new member in our team who will be in charge of our marketing and advertising. We are looking for a person who has some experience in this field or wants to gain some experience and is excited to be part of our team of volunteers. Our future marketing manager needs to be able to speak Romanian. If this sounds like something for you, send us an e-mail at gazetadanemarcei@gmail.com
Danish Politics HQ
New Laws and Regulations
Young people (under 18 years old) have the right to legal gender reassignment: Three years ago, the Ministry of Interior was notified that due to Denmark’s obligations towards international treaties, they had to allow transgender young people (under 18 years old) to receive legal documents stating their new gender. Now, the ministry has finally decided to react and implement this right.
According to the European Convention on Human Rights' article on the right to respect for private and family life, “if a transgender person under the age of 18 has been offered and has undergone gender reassignment treatment, the person in question will also have a right to change their legal gender.”
The minister will have the CPR legislation changed and reopen a total of 16 cases from the period of September 2014 to summer 2023.
Danish Citizenship, Integration and Immigration Laws
The EU Commission is looking into the “temporary” control at the Danish borders: In 2016, Denmark introduced the “temporary” border control. According to EU law, the decision must be exceptional, strictly limited in time and as a last resort. However, seven years have passed since then, and now the EU Commission has launched an official investigation into the legality of the “temporary” border control.
The starting point in the Schengen rules is that controls at the internal borders – that is, at the borders between the countries participating in the cooperation – are illegal.
In April 2022, the Court of Justice of the European Union issued a judgment that states that border controls cannot be extended time and time again with reference to the same threat.
The Justice Minister acknowledged that the legality of border controls is "fraught with considerable uncertainty".
Law proposals and ideas
300 million DKK extra for vocational schools in 2024: Afterwards, the amount will increase every year until it triples in 2030. Why? More people must choose vocational training (to learn a trade / profession), and the quality of vocational training must increase. In 2030, Denmark will experience a shortage of 100.000 skilled workers.
The goal is that at least 25% of young people that choose an education every year take the vocational way. In 2023, 19.4% chose a vocational education.
Working group established to improve the conditions of the LGBT+ families: It is common for children in LGBT+ families to have three or four parents. However, you can only register two legal parents for a child. The Minister of Equality is not open to the idea of more than two legal parents, however she is open to explore how to improve the situation of the “social parents”.
Parents without legal rights, also called social parents, do not have, among other things, the same access to the child's medical records, Aula or the opportunity to create a passport for the child. This makes it more difficult for them to take their child to the doctor, dentist, school-home interviews or abroad.
Also, the social parents do not have the right to time off on the child's first sick day, just as there are also challenges in relation to inheritance, citizenship and passing on one's surname to the child.
The political arena
Wages, taxes, education and welfare: The four keywords that define the focus of the government next year. They want more people to choose work over social security / unemployment / retirement, so they want to reform the tax system so that you can keep more money from your salary. They want to reform the educational system so that fewer people choose a higher education (university degrees) and more people pursue a vocational education in order to become carpenters, welders, and so on. And lastly, they want welfare workers (nurses, health assistants, social assistants, etc.) to spend less time documenting and more time with patients.
With Jakob Ellemann-Jensen (Venstre) back from sick leave, the governmental power trio is back. Jakob, together with Mette Frederiksen (Socialdemokratiet) and Lars Løkke Rasmussen (Moderaterne) will have to build trust in the government and deliver in 2024, the year of reform.
Jakob Ellemann-Jensen said that Venstre will not return to the “blue block” of Danish politics. If you remember, the “blue block” used to represent the right-wing parties in Denmark.
The idea for own savings for elderly care has been dropped: Right before the summer vacation, a social democrat member of Parliament proposed the idea of paying extra from our salaries for our own elderly care. The idea made a lot of people very angry, and now the government says that they will not move forward with it.
The government must have a climate policy that 80% of the people can support, according to the Climate minister, Lars Aargaard. This statement has made waves around Denmark, and people are accusing the government of not being willing to take the unpopular, tough decisions that will allow Denmark to maintain their engagement to reduce CO2 emissions by 70% until 2030.
On the other side of the political spectrum, the leader of the far-right Nye Borgerlige, Pernille Vermund, is surprised that people want the “temperature to go down”, when in fact, we should look forward to warmer summers in Denmark.
51% of people in Denmark support a ban on burning religious books in public: Since the government announced that they want to ban the burning of religious books in front of embassies, there has been a lot of resistance to the idea in civil society. However, it seems that a slight majority of the population actually supports the idea. Why? One: they don’t want the export of Danish products to Muslim countries to be affected, and: Two: They don’t want a potential increase in religious terrorism in Denmark.
Danish Economy HQ
We are the fifth richest people in the world: According to the Global Wealth Report 2023, if you look at the mean wealth, Denmark ranks on the 5th place with 409,950 USD per person. Mean wealth is obtained by dividing the total aggregate wealth by the number of adults.
Top 5 richest people in the world: 1. Switzerland 685,230 USD/ person; 2. USA 551,350 USD / person; 3. Hong Kong 551,190 USD / person; 4. Australia 496,950 USD / person and on the 5th place Denmark.
The top 10 is completed with New Zeeland, Norway, Singapore, Canada and the Netherlands.
The mean wealth of a person in Denmark has declined from 2021 to 2022 by 30,390 USD.
Watch the housing market: From the 1st January of 2024, new property taxes will be introduced. Most likely, apartments in the larger cities will have a higher tax than today. However, if you owned the apartment before January 2024, you will get a tax discount so that you don’t pay more than the 2020 tax level. Therefore, there is a huge interest in buying apartments before the end of the year.
According to a housing economist, it is more important to secure the tax discount now than to wait for prices and interest rates to fall next year. Housing prices have increased by 3.7% since February this year.
43,000 young people (15-24 years old) are neither in education, nor employed: 6.4% of young people (15-24) in Denmark are not going to school or a workplace. The percentage increased compared with 2021. The Ministry for Children and Education announced measures to reduce the number in the following years.
Daily Life in Denmark HQ
91% of the population in Denmark is on social media: An increase of 6% compared to 2022. This is the highest percentage in the European Union. Hungary and Cyprus are in 2nd and 3rd place in Europe, at 79% and 78%. France is in last place with 44%.
58% of the population in the European Union is on social media.
84% of the people in Denmark are on Facebook. 56% are on Instagram. 45% on Snapchat. 33% on Linkedin. 21% on Pinterest and 19% on TikTok.
100% of the 16-19 year olds in Denmark are on social media. 50% are on at least five different social media channels.
Eurovision for people in the Arctic Regions: For the first time in history, the Arctic regions competed in a song competition similar to Eurovision. The host for the first edition was the town of Vadsø (Northern Norway) and it was won by Greenland. Under the name “Pan Artic Vision”, the new initiative wants to bring together people across the arctic, both indigenous and non-indigenous, to sing together and build Pan-Arctic identity and community together.
10 Arctic communities participated in the first edition. Sápmi / Northern Finland; Alaska, USA; Yukon, Canada; Greenland; Island; Faroe Islands; Sápmi / Troms,Finnmark, Norway and artists from the Russian Arctic in exile.
You can watch the whole competition here. It’s worth it.
The world’s largest airline is coming to Copenhagen Airport: From June 2024, American Airlines will open a direct route between Philadelphia and Copenhagen. There will be daily departures between the two cities. Philadelphia is a major hub in the USA and American Airlines has more than 70 onward routes from Philadelphia to most of North America.
SAS has flights from Copenhagen to JFK-New York, Newark-New York, Washington DC, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, Miami and Toronto.
Delta Airlines flies from Copenhagen to JFK-New York.
Air Canada has flights from Copenhagen to the Canadian cities of Toronto and Montreal.
Healthcare with Punitha Kumar
500 million DKK will be set aside for the usage of artificial intelligence (AI) in hospitals, Minister of Health Sophie Løhde recently said. As Denmark continues to grapple with insufficient staffing at hospitals, Sophie told Berlingske that the solution may be to use AI. She said, “If we do not see technology as one of the most important ways to strengthen our healthcare system, then patients will only continue to receive poor treatment and employees will drown in workload.” In the first hospital in Denmark to use AI, Køge’s Zealand University Hospital doctors have been using a supercomputer to suggest gastrointestinal cancer treatment plans since February. To date, there have been fewer complications, shorter hospitalizations, and only one out of 112 patients has been readmitted. Prior to using AI, the hospital saw between 10 and 12 patients readmitted.
Allow gay men to donate blood without the rules, politicians say. In the Altinget, Linea Søgaard-Lidell (V), Monika Rubin (M) and Flemming Møller Mortensen (S) said it does not make sense that gay men do not get the same opportunities as heterosexuals to donate blood. Danish laws currently state that gay men can only donate blood if they have not had sex with another man within four months before a donation. The rule was implemented in 2020 to prevent HIV transmission. However, the screening method used today is, according to experts, safer because the risk of allowing gay men to donate blood is minimal. Minister of Health Sophie Løhde has asked the Danish Patient Safety Authority to look into how the rules can be relaxed. There are no rules in place for gay blood donors in Germany, the Netherlands, France or the United Kingdom.
More 15-year-olds are drinking alcohol at least once a week, a recent survey found. The National Institute of Public Health’s survey also said there is an increased number of Danish children who get drunk. While non-profit Alkohol & Samfund is pushing for the age to purchase alcohol to be raised to 18 and the Danish Health Authority stressing that children below 18 should not consume alcohol, Minister of Health Sophie Løhde has said the government will not ban alcohol for those under 18. She said, “The government does not have a total ban up its sleeve. And I actually think it's a little naive to think we can ban ourselves out of all problems.” Sophie has instead suggested better control over the sale of alcohol and reducing the alcohol percentage that minors are allowed to buy. In Denmark, if you are 16 years old or older, you can purchase alcoholic drinks with an alcohol percentage of 16.5 or below.
Culture, Religion and Royals with Cicek Eris
Denmark's first drag school, established by the educator Michael Bjerring a year ago, showcased their first performance during Copenhagen Pride, with a team of 12 children and adults. The Drag School is a welcoming community for individuals aged 12 to 30 seeking to explore the world of drag, and the school emphasizes inclusivity, welcoming participants regardless of gender, background, or sexuality.
The combination of children and drag has encountered opposition in some places. In the US, certain states have introduced bills to restrict or ban public drag shows, citing child protection. Sweden’s right-wing party also criticized drag queens, and a similar debate arose in Denmark when a library event encouraged children to explore drag.
Historian Peter Edelberg, who also researches LGBT history, notes that opposition to drag shows often stems from baseless fears about children becoming transgender. He points out that historical performances involving heterosexual attraction did not face such controversies.
European Union HQ
This category covers interesting happenings from other EU member states, EU candidate countries and EFTA countries (Norway, Iceland, Switzerland)
10 months remain until the European Parliament elections (6-9 June 2024). If you are a European Union citizen living in Denmark, you have the right to either vote for Danish candidates or for candidates from your native country. However, to vote for candidates from your native country, you need to either travel there or hope that your embassy organizes a voting section. In that direction, I will use this space to present relevant information to help you make a decision.
The leadership of Konservative (Conservatives) proposed a new leading candidate (spidskandidat) called Niels Flemming Hansen. The leading candidate occupies the first position on the list of candidates. The members will decide on 23-24 September at the party congress if they will approve the leadership proposal.
There is drama around the current conservative member of the European Parliament, Pernille Weiss. The leadership of the party asked her to resign after it was revealed that she was bullying her employees. However, contrary to the leadership decision, two local party organizations decided to nominate Pernille to stand as a candidate again. Clearly, the party congress in September will be interesting to watch.
Cannabis will be legal in Germany before the end of 2023: Once the law is implemented, adults will be allowed to possess up to 25 grams of hash; to have three cannabis plants at home, and to grow and buy cannabis in special “hash clubs”. The governments hopes that the new law can help reduce sales on the black market, reduce the number of drug-related crimes and provide better protection for consumers.
As you can imagine, there is a huge resistance to the new law among lawmakers from the opposition parties and various opinion leaders. The German police union is also opposed to the government's proposal to legalize cannabis.
Announcement Board
This section is curated by Cicek Eris. If you have events you want us to include here please send an e-mail to denmarkhappenings@gmail.com. You can check out her newsletter about cultural events in Denmark here.
Aarhus, 24th Aug, 17:00: Are you new in Aarhus? Looking to find practical information about life in Aarhus and Denmark or how to build a social network? Join a Newcomers' Info Evening specially tailored to all international professionals and accompanying partners new to Aarhus.
Aalborg, 7th Sep, 16:45 - 19:45: Free entrance at Aalborg Zoo for internationals. Join the “Diversity Evening” event organized by International House North Denmark and Integration Council Aalborg. It is possible to buy food & beverages in the Zoo’s restaurants or you can BBQ your own food at the picnic areas, where BBQs are available for everyone to use.
International media about Denmark HQ
Britain warns of possible attacks in Denmark (Reuters)