Tax returns released, no clear lead in polls before tomorrow’s election and spring sunshine set to turn into rain for the rest of the week. Here’s Denmark’s news on Monday.
Danish tax returns released
The majority of Denmark’s tax returns, årsopgørelser, are released today, meaning you’ll be able to log in and find out whether the Tax Authority (Skattestyrelsen) owes you money or whether you have unpaid taxes.
It’s important to check whether any information on your tax return is inaccurate, in which case you have until May to let the Tax Authority know.
Some tax returns were already released on Friday, but the majority of people will only be able to see their statement from today. Be prepared that there may be long queues to get into the skat.dk website throughout the day (although the wait time was only around three minutes when The Local checked at about 7:30am this morning).
Danish vocabulary: skat ‒ tax (or confusingly, a term of endearment like ‘darling’ or ‘love’)
Advertisement
No clear leader in election with one day to go
Danes go to the polls in just 24 hours and so far there’s still no clear signs of who is likely to come out on top.
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said on Sunday that she does not want to “go back go bloc politics”, calling instead for “collaboration and strong leadership”.
Frederiksen, leader of the Social Democrats, currently leads a cross-bloc government made up of her own party, the Liberals (historically the Social Democrats’ largest rivals and the largest party in the ‘blue bloc’), and the Moderates, a relatively new party led by former Liberal prime minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen.
“Denmark has this habit of splitting itself up roughly equally between red and blue, so it’s perhaps not that crazy to have a prime minister who wants us to work with each other,” Frederiksen said in a speech on Sunday.
Her choice to court both sides of the political divide has led to frustration on the left from Pia Olsen Dyhr, the leader of Green Left (Socialistisk Folkeparti).
“The Social Democrats’ campaign has been full of policy that can only become a reality in collaboration with us. But still all doors, cat flaps, cracks and shortcuts are being left open for her to keep working with the right wing,” Olsen Dyhr said. (Ritzau)
Danish vocabulary: kattelem ‒ cat flap
Advertisement
One in five Danish cars now running on electricity
As much as a fifth of cars on Denmark’s roads are electric, according to Mobility Denmark, based on new figures from bilstatistik.dk.
“The fact that one in five cars is now running on electricity shows that the green transition isn’t just clear when it comes to new registrations, but also that the whole fleet of cars on Danish roads is undergoing a transformation,” Mobility Denmark’s CEO Mads Rørvig said in a press statement.
There are a total of 583,320 electric cars registered in Denmark, and the most popular electric car is the Tesla Model Y, followed by the Volkswagen ID.4 and the Tesla Model 3.
Last year was also the third year in a row where electricity was the most popular ‘fuel’ for new cars. Rørvig said that the increased popularity of electric cars is “closely linked” to policies promoting them over cars running on traditional fuel types, such as a reduction in registration fees for electric cars.
In 2024, just over half of newly-registered cars were electric. Last year, that figure was two thirds, according to Mobility Denmark. The latest figures from February showed that a whopping 94.4 percent of cars registered that month were electric. (Ritzau)
Danish vocabulary: elbil ‒ electric car
Rain and wind set to take over from the weekend’s spring sun
The spring sunshine in many parts of Denmark this weekend doesn’t look set to last, with rain, wind, and classic spring showers forecast for Denmark from Tuesday onwards.
Today is more or less expected to be the last dry day of the week, with Danish newswire Ritzau predicting that many people will need an umbrella at polling stations tomorrow.
“Autumnal weather is paying us a short visit,” on-duty meteorologist Jesper Eriksen, from Danish weather agency DMI, told Ritzau.
Temperatures are expected to be around 5-10 degrees on Tuesday, with wind and more rain expected from Wednesday onwards. Nights are expected to be colder, with DMI saying to expect temperatures to dip below freezing.
“There could be the occasional hail shower,” Eriksen said.
Things are expected to improve somewhat on Friday, with more sun possible over the weekend.
Danish vocabulary: hegl ‒ hail