The DPP over took Lars Loekke Rasmussen's Liberal Party to become Denmark's second largest political party. Rasmussen will now have to convince DPP party leader Kirstian Thulsen to make him Prime Minister — despite the DPP receiving more votes.
Congratulations to the Danish People's Party, whose opposition to the euro & Schengen has been vindicated by events. pic.twitter.com/lRs4neOkZJ
— Daniel Hannan (@DanHannanMEP) June 18, 2015
Making huge gains in Thursday's elections, DPP party leader Kirstian Thulsen Dahl told members that "this election campaign has shown that we are a party that the others just can't avoid."
"We are a party to be taken seriously here in this country."
Talks are expected to start today between Rasmussen's right leaning party and Thulsen. Rasmussen needs to include the Danish People's Party in order to form a government.
Anti-immigration rhetoric is said to have led to the party's election success. The DPP wants to remove Denmark from the Schengen Area of free movement inside Europe.
.@JunckerEU marks 30th anniversary of the #Schengen Agreement http://t.co/kCYf2ZOZ12 pic.twitter.com/u3RKaubPpq
— European Commission (@EU_Commission) June 12, 2015
The Schengen Area is the area of 26 European countries that have removed passport and border control at their common borders. Twenty two of the 28 EU countries participate in the Schengen Area. Ireland and the United Kingdom have opted out. The DPP wants to reduce the number of refugees in Denmark.
The migrant crisis facing Europe following the thousands of drownings in the Mediterranean Sea remains politically divisive issue across Europe. The European Commission is calling for a quota system that all European Union members sign up to equally distribute the number of asylum seekers and refuges across EU member states.
"Far-right parties form group in EU parliament, France refused to let in 250 African migrants" and more #EUTweets http://t.co/PSSn97Jye6
— Arjan Tupan (@arjantupan) June 19, 2015
Italy, Greece and Malta currently bear the brunt of the numbers of migrants arriving on their shores. Italy which has received 54,000 so far this year is said to be at breaking point.
France, which is refusing to allow the migrants across the French/Italian border has caused a war of words to erupt. Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera reported that Prime Minister Matteo Renzi intends to send migrants on to other countries without their consent, if EU countries do not take their fair share of asylum seekers.
On Med migrant crisis, HRW calls on EU to address "upstream" problems in sending countries: http://t.co/qPbRKJqTDG pic.twitter.com/MDUqc9hHeS
— Roland Paris (@rolandparis) June 19, 2015
Britain, along with other Eastern European countries has refused to sign up to the proposed quota system.
And it appears Denmark's People Party shares some common ground with Britain and it's Prime Minister's ever increasing Eurosceptic rhetoric. Morten Messerschmidt, senior leader of the Danish People's Party recently expressed enthusiasm for David Cameron's proposed Euroepan Union reforms.
"It would be greatly beneficial to do it together, since in this size does matter."
But as to who will form the new right wing coalition government in Denmark, size doesn't matter.
Social Democrat leader Thorning-Schmidt remains the largest party in parliament — but failed to retain a majority of the votes to form a government, leading to the resignation of Thorning-Schmidt.
