Reykjavík Grapevine - 10.02.2006, Blaðsíða 6
Árni Þór Sigurðsson began his career as a journal-
ist for RÚV, working as their Moscow correspond-
ent during the fall of communism. Upon returning
home in 1989, he embarked on a political career
that brought him into Reykjavík City Council
in 1994 for what would become the Leftist-
Green Party. Since that time, he’s witnessed the
numerous triumphs and upheavals that Reykjavík
has undergone, and he is now running for City
Council again.
/// Recently [city council member] Björk Vil-
helmsdóttir left the Leftist-Greens to join the
Social Democrats, but at the same time we’ve
seen the strongest rise in support with your
party and the Independence Party. Do you
think there is a polarisation happening in city
government? How do you account for that?
– Yes, I think so, especially when you look at
the polls and see the 18- to 25-year-old age
group. The Independence Party have support
from around 50% of them, and we have about
27%, whereas the Social Democrats have about
18% or 20%. Of course, I know that younger
people are more extreme in their political
views, so it might be quite natural that we are
bigger in this group, but this is also a potential
in the long run. This is an age when people are
starting to form their political views.
So, polarisation? Yes, I think that people want
politicians to have views, and not just swim like
a fish in the water and never tell exactly what
they mean. Some politicians, especially, as I see
it, in the centre, they like to first hear what the
people want to hear, and then they tell exactly
that. Instead of just telling the people what
they mean, and why they should elect them,
and if they agree, they will; if they disagree,
they won’t.
/// In terms of the needs of the city, what is
the first thing that comes to mind in terms of
what the city needs most that it doesn’t have
now?
– I think one of the issues we will need to
tackle in the near future is traffic. We have
seen some extreme changes in Reykjavík not
only in the last twelve years but in the last five
years concerning this issue, with all the particle
pollution, and the car traffic, which is getting
heavier and heavier – this is something that
we must do something about. But I would also
underline that Reykjavík has changed posi-
tively. The city centre, as I see it, is flourishing.
We have a lot of projects ongoing. I see a lot of
positive things that have been happening.
In terms of the service, look at the kinder-
gartens. Twelve years ago it was impossible to
get a place in the kindergartens unless you were
a single parent, but it is now much easier. Since
the city took over the primary schools, we
have a lot more classes and a lot more people
working in the schools. Also we are working
on the after-school programs. We see that the
children who are not using these programs are
coming from the lowest income families.
The same goes for the school meals. We
in the Leftist-Green Party have already said
that we think the school meals should be free
of charge. The same goes for the after-school
programs. If we are talking about equality, that
all children have the same rights, then this
must be free of charge.
/// These are all good ideas, but I guess the
question on my mind, as a taxpayer, would
be, where is the money to pay for this going to
come from?
– We’re already using the maximum of city
income tax, so we would have to cut funding
from other programs, or raise real estate tax.
But you should also understand that these
social welfare programs like school lunches and
after-school programs are not very expensive
for the city to take over.
/// So what programs would you say we can
afford to cut into?
– I would say the transportation sector – the
money that goes into building and maintaining
new roads. I think we are using far too much
money in that sector because we are always
building up for the private car. There’s a lot
of money there. But also take the sports and
leisure industry in Reykjavík. We are of course
supporting sports and leisure for our kids, but
we are also paying a lot of money to the more
professional sports clubs, professional play-
ers, and football teams, and I doubt that this
should be the role of the municipality. They
have been sponsored more and more by private
companies, and I think they should be spon-
sored more by them.
/// Getting back to cars. Given the fact that
there’s two to three cars for every household
in Reykjavík, do you worry that saying you
want to cut funding for serving private car
owners is going to hurt support for the Left-
ist-Greens?
– As I said initially, we must tell the people
what are our views, and not just tell them what
we think they want to hear. As we see it, it is
of great importance to reduce the impact of
the private car on the environment. We are
now using 50% of all land in Reykjavík for the
private car, with roads and parking spaces and
such. If this development continues over the
next twenty years, we will see a 30% increase in
car kilometres. Where are we going to take this
space from? Obviously, this is something that
we must face. The Independence Party says
that the citizens of Reykjavík have chosen the
private car, and that everything must be done
to serve the needs of the private car. And when
the Independence Party says that we have to
facilitate the private car, you have to under-
stand that this is impossible. They can say it,
but they won’t do it, because it’s impossible to
widen all the streets all the time. They won’t
have space. When they try to widen a street
in a certain neighbourhood, the inhabitants in
that neighbourhood will naturally oppose this.
So they will have more problems.
We say that we must accept that the space
is limited, and we want to use the space for the
people, and not for the cars. This means that
we will have to strengthen the public transport
system, and put more money in it. Also, to
facilitate walking and cycling. Right now you
have bike paths along Sundbraut and other
places, where you might go for a Sunday ride,
but there are no bike paths along the main
streets, and there need to be, so people can use
their bikes and walking to make short trips.
30% of all car rides are within one kilometre. If
you’re just going down to the bakery, why on
earth would you take your car?
/// Say I’m a car owner in Reykjavík. Why
should I stop using my car in the city? How
would it benefit me?
– First of all, it’s much cheaper. Many families
in Reykjavík have two cars or more. If you sell
one of your cars and use more public trans-
portation, you save a lot of money because it’s
much cheaper. Second of all, in the long run
it will be easier to get to work if we facilitate
public transport. Third, you will gain a better
environment, less pollution.
/// Regarding housing. [Independence
Party mayoral candidate] Vilhjálmur Þ. Vil-
hjálmsson has said that we need to have more
single-family homes in Reykjavík because
people are moving into the suburbs to live in
them. How do you respond?
– I think you must offer a good mixture. The
trend in Reykjavík in the last decades has been
on private homes. This is good for the people
who want this, but we haven’t offered people
other possibilities. Take an example like Skúla-
gata or other areas where you have apartments
close to the city centre. This wasn’t the empha-
sis before, but we’re putting more emphasis on
this now. And I think we must continue to put
more emphasis on a more dense city centre,
but I reckon we also need to offer something to
those who want to live in private homes, and
I can agree with Vilhjálmur that Geldingarnes
is a good place for this. But I don’t think this
is something that needs to be done in the next
two to four years, so we could disagree on that.
(Laughs.)
/// In looking at the campaign platforms of
the candidates running for mayor, you were
the only one who put emphasis on multicul-
turalism. Why is this important to you?
– Well this maybe has something to do with
my political views in general. Twenty years
ago, equality was something that was only
applied to men and women. But now we have
seen all these changes in our society. People are
coming here from other countries, some stay-
ing for a long time, some a short time. They
come from very different backgrounds, and I
think this is something that is just flourishing
in our society. We should benefit from it, all
of us. And I also think this is important if we
want to live in peace together. I see children of
different backgrounds in school with my chil-
dren. You see how important it is that they can
live together, work together, play together and
be in school together, without any prejudice.
Therefore, I think we as a city should make
all the conditions for a good multicultural
society. You will have to give people who come
here the opportunity to learn not just Icelan-
dic but also their own mother tongue. This
is a problem when you have kids of different
backgrounds who have parents who don’t speak
good Icelandic, and kids who can’t speak their
own mother tongue. We need to teach these
children their mother tongue in school and
teach the parents Icelandic.
/// Language is a pretty big issue with for-
eigners in this country. In particular, there’ve
been concerns that while the law requires
that a foreigner take 150 hours of Icelandic
courses in order to get permanent residence
status, the costs of the classes keep rising. Do
you think the cost of Icelandic classes should
be reduced?
– Absolutely, and I don’t think it should be
just the state or the municipalities but also the
employers who should contribute to this. Let’s
say you’re working for Eimskip. Why shouldn’t
they pay for your Icelandic courses? I would say
that this a common task for the partners in the
labour market. It could be the unions, or the
employers, or the state. This is something that
we should do something about.
No Apologies to the Centre
An Interview with Leftist-Green City Councilman Árni Þór Sigurðsson
by Paul F. Nikolov
“We are now using
50% of all land in
Reykjavík for the
private car, with
roads and parking
spaces and such.”
Árni Þór Sigurðsson,
mayoral candidate
from the Leftist-
Green Party.”
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