Former PM to pay for smoking booth

The 154,000 kroner cost for a smoking booth was more expensive than he had realised, Lars Løkke Rasmussen wrote, though he did not divulge who would ultimately pay up

Lars Løkke Rasmussen, leader of opposition party Venstre, declared on Facebook yesterday that he was prepared to pay for the smoking booth that was installed in his office by his party while he was prime minister.

Rasmussen did not say whether he or the party would be paying, but he added that the booth, which allowed him to smoke in the otherwise smoke-free indoor environment, was “very expensive. Much more expensive than I had imagined and beyond what I find reasonable”.

He added that he did not want the issue of the smoking booth to fog over more important political questions.

“That’s why I am now ensuring that the Prime Minister’s Office is reimbursed for the costs,” he wrote.

The move arrives after his party, Venstre, insisted that the current Socialdemokrat food minister Mette Gjerskov pay for her own smoking cabinet in her office.

The smoking booths – telephone booth-like structures with ventilators to draw smoke away – were installed after rules came into effect preventing smoking in private office in the parliament's Christiansborg complex. But while Gjerskov’s both cost 34,000 kroner, Løkke’s cost 154,000 kroner.

According to Rasmussen, the smoking booth was installed on the initiative of the administration of the Prime Minister's Office and suggested that guidelines for their installation in ministerial offices be written in order to avoid problems in the future.

“It is my personal policy – and also the current Danish law – that people should be allowed to smoke in offices that are the workplace for only one person,” Rasmussen wrote. “That is why I could smoke in the private side room to the prime minster’s office where guests do not have access. That is what I did – and what I hope to do again in the future.”

But the mere fact that the 154,000 kroner bill would be covered was not enough for Socialdemokraterne, whose spokesperson, Magnus Heunicke, demanded to know whether Rasmussen or his party would be paying.

“Lars Løkke needs to be open on this issue. It’s a rather precise question he has to answer: who is paying?” Heunicke said to Berlingske newspaper.

If Rasmussen’s party ends up covering the bill, it might violate regulations on the use of party funds.

Gjerskov paid out of her own pocket for her smoking booth after Venstre’s health spokesperson Sophie Løhde accused Gjerskov of “arrogance” for spending 34,000 kroner to install one in her office in the food ministry, adding that it was “strange way to behave and use taxpayers’ money”.

But when quizzed at that time about Rasmussen’s own use of public funds to install a smoking booth, Løhde responded by saying she thought the situations were not the same.




  • Chinese wind turbine companies sign pact to end race-to-the-bottom price war

    Chinese wind turbine companies sign pact to end race-to-the-bottom price war

    China’s 12 leading wind turbine makers have signed a pact to end a domestic price war that has seen turbines sold at below cost price in a race to corner the market and which has compromised quality and earnings in the sector.

  • Watch Novo Nordisk’s billion-kroner musical TV ad for Wegovy

    Watch Novo Nordisk’s billion-kroner musical TV ad for Wegovy

    Novo Nordisk’s TV commercial for the slimming drug Wegovy has been shown roughly 32,000 times and reached 8.8 billion US viewers since June.

  • Retention is the new attraction

    Retention is the new attraction

    Many people every year choose to move to Denmark and Denmark in turn spends a lot of money to attract and retain this international talent. Are they staying though? If they leave, do they go home or elsewhere? Looking at raw figures, we can see that Denmark is gradually becoming more international but not everyone is staying. 

  • Defence Minister: Great international interest in Danish military technology

    Defence Minister: Great international interest in Danish military technology

    Denmark’s Defence Minister Troels Lund Poulsen attended the Association of the Unites States Army’s annual expo in Washington DC from 14 to 16 October, together with some 20 Danish leading defence companies, where he says Danish drone technology attracted significant attention.

  • Doctors request opioids in smaller packs as over-prescription wakes abuse concerns

    Doctors request opioids in smaller packs as over-prescription wakes abuse concerns

    Doctors, pharmacies and politicians have voiced concern that the pharmaceutical industry’s inability to supply opioid prescriptions in smaller packets, and the resulting over-prescription of addictive morphine pills, could spur levels of opioid abuse in Denmark.

  • Housing in Copenhagen – it runs in the family

    Housing in Copenhagen – it runs in the family

    Residents of cooperative housing associations in Copenhagen and in Frederiksberg distribute vacant housing to their own family members to a large extent. More than one in six residents have either parents, siblings, adult children or other close family living in the same cooperative housing association.


  • Come and join us at Citizens Days!

    Come and join us at Citizens Days!

    On Friday 27 and Saturday 28 of September, The Copenhagen Post will be at International Citizen Days in Øksnehallen on Vesterbro, Copenhagen. Admission is free and thousands of internationals are expected to attend

  • Diversifying the Nordics: How a Nigerian economist became a beacon for inclusivity in Scandinavia

    Diversifying the Nordics: How a Nigerian economist became a beacon for inclusivity in Scandinavia

    Chisom Udeze, the founder of Diversify – a global organization that works at the intersection of inclusion, democracy, freedom, climate sustainability, justice, and belonging – shares how struggling to find a community in Norway motivated her to build a Nordic-wide professional network. We also hear from Dr. Poornima Luthra, Associate Professor at CBS, about how to address bias in the workplace.

  • Lolland Municipality launches support package for accompanying spouses

    Lolland Municipality launches support package for accompanying spouses

    Lolland Municipality, home to Denmark’s largest infrastructure project – the Fehmarnbelt tunnel connection to Germany – has launched a new jobseeker support package for the accompanying partners of international employees in the area. The job-to-partner package offers free tailored sessions on finding a job and starting a personal business.