Parties deadlocked ahead of September Swedish election: Poll

STOCKHOLM: Sweden’s main centre-left and centre-right political blocs are running virtually neckand-neck just 10 days ahead of an election dominated by worries over immigration, and surging support for the populist Sweden Democrats, a poll shows.

The ruling Social Democrats are the biggest party and the centre-left bloc, which includes coalition partner the Greens, and the Left Party hold a slim lead over the four-party Alliance bloc, the poll by Novus for Swedish Television showed.

Neither grouping looks like commanding anything close to a majority with the centre-left on 40.2 per cent and the Alliance on 38.9 per cent.

Minority governments are not unusual in Sweden, but the make-up of the next administration remains in huge doubt because of the unaligned, anti-immigration Sweden Democrats who got 18.2 per cent in the Novus poll.

In 2014, they got 13 per cent, and their support was consistently underestimated by polls in the run up to the vote. Some online surveys suggest the Sweden Democrats could now become the biggest party.

It burst onto the political scene in 2010, gaining seats in parliament for the first time. Since 2014, the party, which wants a full stop to immigration, has held the balance of power.

A deal with Sweden Democrat leader Jimmie Akesson would solve the political impasse, but he remains a pariah because of his party’s past. It was founded in part by activists with white supremacist links.

Moderate Party leader Ulf Kristersson is bookies’ favourite to take over from Prime Minister Stefan Lofven of the Social Democrats. But he has ruled out a formal deal with