Lars Leijonborg

Lars Leijonborg

Lars Erik Ansgar Leijonborg (born November 21, 1949 in Täby , Stockholm County ) is a Swedish politician of Liberalerna , whose chairman he was between 1997 and 2007 . From October 6, 2006 to June 18, 2009 he was Minister for Higher Education and Research in the Swedish Government (2006-2007 Head of the Ministry of Education). From 1985 to 2009 he was a member of the Swedish parliament .

Life

Leijonborg grew up in Solna outside Stockholm . In 1971 he was elected chairman of the LUF youth association (then FPU). He finished his studies three years later. After graduating, he worked as a political official, journalist and advisor. Among other things, he was party secretary of the then Folkpartiet between 1980 and 83, editor-in-chief of the newspaper NU from 1983 to 1984 and between 1984 and 1990 advisor to the Svenska ManagementGruppen .

In 1985 he was elected to the Reichstag and five years later he was elected second vice-chairman of the Folkpartiet. After the election to the Reichstag in 1991, he was elected parliamentary group leader. On March 15, 1997, he was finally elected party chairman, succeeding Maria Leissner .

The success of the Folkpartiet in the 2002 Reichstag elections also meant a great personal success for Leijonborg, who then tried to bring about a minority coalition with three bourgeois parties and the Greens under his leadership. Although the Greens showed surprisingly great interest and regular negotiations continued for days, the attempt failed and the social democratic government under Göran Persson was ultimately able to continue to govern with the support of the Greens and the Left Party.

Leijonborg was married to party colleague Lotta Edholm between 1992 and 2004. He has two sons.

Reichstag election 2006

Together with Fredrik Reinfeldt, the top candidate of the civil alliance for Sweden ( Moderata samlingspartiet , Kristdemokraterna , Centerpartiet and Folkpartiet liberalerna ), he competed against Göran Persson . Despite considerable losses for Folkpartiet, not least due to the fact that individual Folkpartiet employees logged into the Social Democrats' intranet and spied on it, the alliance for Sweden achieved a narrow majority in the Reichstag. In the new Fredrik Reinfeldt government , Lars Leijonborg was appointed Minister of Education. During the first few months in this office, Leijonborg campaigned, among other things, to reform the Swedish teacher training program and adapt it to the Bologna Process .

In 2007, Leijonborg resigned as party leader and handed over to his successor, Jan Björklund , the formal management of the Ministry of Education and thus the title of Minister of Education. Leijonborg, however, remained in the government and retained his political tasks as Minister for Higher Education and Research.

On June 11, 2009, Lars Leijonborg announced that he was stepping down from his position as Minister of Education and Research and that he would no longer run in the 2010 Reichstag election. His successor in office as Minister of Education and Research is Tobias Krantz .

Web links

• Folkpartiet: Lars Leijonborg (Swedish)
• Swedish Parliament website: Lars Leijonborg (Swedish)