The Directorate of Integration and Diversity (Integrerings- og mangfoldsdirektoratet, IMDi) is requesting that the municipalities settle 13,000 asylum seekers in 2026. Only half have responded by the deadline of 10 February, and several of them say no. They point to finances and problems with integration and the capacity of public services: school, health services, housing.
Jens Stoltenberg once said that nurses did not gush out of the oil wells in the North Sea. The same applies to many municipalities after years of settling refugees: capacity is exhausted.
In Asker, the Progress Party (Fremskrittspartiet, Frp) wanted to say zero refugees – and largely prevailed.
– We proposed a complete halt to settlement in 2026, that is to receive zero refugees in the municipality, says Frp’s group leader Tonje Lavik Pedersen in Asker.
The compromise was 28, but the recommendation was to settle 103 refugees this year.
– We have said that now we must put it on pause, a stop. We must take care of those who have already come to our municipality, and focus on that before we receive even more whom we do not have the funds to integrate in a sufficiently good manner.
The NRK journalist asks: – Will you not take part in the collective effort (dugnaden)?
In fact, half say that they will settle 6,778 refugees. But the difference between the municipalities has grown larger.
A number of municipalities say bluntly no to receiving more. The boat is full, capacity exhausted.
Among them are Sarpsborg, Fredrikstad, Nord-Odal, Åsnes, Våler in Innlandet, Midt-Telemark and Evje og Hornnes.
Nor will Lyngdal, Ullensvang, Birkenes, Ulvik, Ås or Lørenskog settle any refugees in 2026, according to KS’s overview.
In Southern Norway (Sørlandet), the Mayor of Bykle, Hans Blattmann (Ap), and his colleague in Lillesand, Einar Holmer Hoven (H), say no to settling refugees this year.
In Bykle, the civil service (embetsverket) has notified that the tolerance limit for receiving refugees has been reached, according to Blattmann.
But when NRK asks IMDi Director Libe Rieber-Mohn, she is not concerned with municipalities operating within exhausted frameworks and strained finances. That capacity is exhausted and that this is a signal the Government must take on board.
The signals run from the top downwards, not from the bottom upwards.
The asylum seekers reside in the municipalities of settlement for five years on integration benefit (integreringsstønad). Thereafter the expenses are shifted onto the municipalities. Many asylum seekers choose to move to more central areas when the five years are over. This is called secondary migration (sekundærflytting). Sarpsborg and Fredrikstad in particular have experienced this. They wish to prohibit secondary migration, but the Minister of Local Government and Regional Development (kommunalminister) Kjersti Stenseng will not agree to this. She calls it discrimination.
Dagsrevyen carried a report from Ullensaker where 40 per cent of children and young people are now multicultural.
The Progress Party (FrP) has had calculations made showing that Norwegians will be in a minority in their own country in 2065. But this is a thought crime to say aloud.
Three cities with many immigrants still say yes: Oslo, Trondheim and Stavanger.
The media write that the number of asylum seekers is declining, but with high levels of family immigration the total remains high.
Estimate by the head of UDI: 12,000 family immigrants this year
Before Christmas, Jonas Gahr Støre announced a tightening of family immigration. But UDI expects to grant as many applications as last year.
https://www.nrk.no/norge/null_-null_-null_-fleire-kommunar-vil-ikkje-busette-ein-einaste-flyktning-i-ar-1.17776359