By Charles Duxbury And Sven Grundberg
STOCKHOLM--Sweden's prime minister on Saturday canceled snap
elections planned for March after reaching a series of deals with
the country's main opposition parties to make it easier for
minority governments to function.
Stefan Löfven said his Social Democrats and junior coalition
partner the Green Party had reached agreements with four
center-right opposition parties to reduce the likelihood of a
minority government's budget being voted down, as was the case
earlier this month.
Speaking at a news conference in Stockholm, Mr. Löfven
identified three areas--pensions, defense and energy--where the
government and the opposition would seek common ground on policy.
Finding common ground would make it easier for the minority
government to push its economic policy through parliament and get
at least passive support from the opposition, potentially avoiding
a recurrence of the political turbulence Sweden has suffered this
fall.
Sweden's political instability began after a regular election in
September handed Mr. Löfven's center-left party a relatively narrow
victory and no majority in parliament.
The problems mounted when a combination of the four-party
center-right bloc and unaligned populist party the Sweden Democrats
in early December voted down Mr. Löfven's first budget. That
prompted the prime minister to call snap elections for March in the
hope of winning a stronger mandate for his policy from voters.
However, concerns were raised early that a new election could
merely prolong the uncertainty as the Sweden Democrats had said
they would continue to vote against budgets--center right or center
left--that didn't drastically cut spending on immigration, a
cornerstone of the populist party's manifesto.
In the event, Mr. Löfven stepped back from officially calling
fresh elections, something he had said he would formally do on Dec.
29.
Mr. Löfven said the government's agreement with the opposition
extended Sweden's "proud tradition" of being able to work together
to solve difficult problems.
The leaders of the four center-right parties said they would
continue to represent a strong opposition to the government despite
the agreement to seek common ground in certain policy areas.
Because of the way the voting went on the 2015 budget, Mr.
Löfven will have to stick many of the opposition's budget
plans--such as tax policy--until he can table a new budget next
fall.
Write to Charles Duxbury at charles.duxbury@wsj.com and Sven
Grundberg at sven.grundberg@wsj.com