Norway starts voting in tight election race

Norway's Prime Minister voted yesterday as the world's third largest oil exporter began to choose between his tax-cutting centre-right government and a "Red-Green" opposition that wants more welfare spending.

Record high oil prices have boosted non-European Union Norway's income and the parliamentary election campaign has focused on how best to spend the extra cash.

Flanked by two bodyguards, a tie-less Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik voted at a school near his home in Kolbotn, south of Oslo. "I'm very excited. The latest polls show it will be a close race," he said after casting his vote.

Today is the official national voting day but a few polling centres opened yesterday afternoon to make life easier for people with work commitments the next day.

Mr Bondevik, a 58-year-old tee-total Lutheran priest from the Christian People's party, and his allies argue tax cuts are best while his Labour-led opponents accuse him of under-funding public services.

"This vote is about Norway's direction for the next four years and I'm optimistic," Labour leader Jens Stoltenberg, 46, told Norway's NTB news agency as he handed out oranges from crates to voters out walking in the forest near Oslo.

About a tenth of voters, from reindeer herders in the Arctic to workers on offshore oil platforms, pick their party at the last moment. Stoltenberg was prime minister from 2000-01. Two of three opinion polls on Sunday showed a slim majority for the "Red-Green" alliance led by the Labour party while the other showed Mr Bondevik's three-party coalition could survive after a surge in the past week.

Mr Bondevik, in power since 2001, has won little credit for an economic upturn or UN plaudits rating Norway as the world's best country in which to live. Many voters link Norway's wealth to record oil prices.

Labour accuses him of handing tax cuts to the rich in a country proud of Nordic traditions of equality while doing too little for jobs, care for the elderly and education.

Mr Bondevik says the opposition would spend too much on a welfare system that may already be the world's most generous.

Among welfare schemes, couples expecting a first child are offered marriage guidance courses. Snorers can usually get a free operation to fix the problem.

"This is the first year I really have not made up my mind already. Previously I have voted for left-wing parties but this year I will probably vote for the government because of the good living and low tax rates," said Gerd Gronland, 54.

"I'm going to vote for the (opposition) Socialists," said Marianne, 26, wheeling her infant daughter in a pram through an Oslo street. "They have the best policies on education."