Danish PM seeks second term in closely fought race

Copenhagen: Denmark heads for a nail-biting General Election on Thursday as opinion polls put the ruling centre-left bloc and the opposition in a dead heat after a remarkable comeback for Prime Minister Helle Thorning-Schmidt.

The three-week election campaign has been dominated by three main subjects: the economy, the future of the country`s cherished cradle-to-grave welfare state, and immigration and the rising cost of hosting asylum seekers.

On the eve of the vote, the Social Democratic premier who has been buoyed by an economic recovery, stuck to her strategy of questioning plans by her right-wing rival, Lars Lokke Rasmussen of the Venstre Party, to freeze public spending.

"We can afford to have a ... society where we take care of each other," she said at a press conference.

A weighted average of polls by the daily Berlingske on Wednesday showed the ruling bloc garnering 49.3 percent of the vote with 50.7 percent for the opposition coalition, which includes the anti-immigration Danish People`s Party (DPP) that is credited with around 18 percent of voter sympathies.

Most surveys have suggested that around one in five voters are undecided.

Rasmussen, the rightwing leader who headed the government between 2009 and 2011, has accused the premier of negative campaigning and of taking credit for reforms introduced by the former cabinet.

"The Social Democrats` campaign has been almost exclusively about me and Venstre," he told journalists.

Approval ratings for Thorning-Schmidt, in power since 2011, languished for most of her tenure as the Danish economy dipped in and out of recession and her centre-left coalition implemented policies viewed as right-wing, including welfare cuts and corporate tax reductions.

But she has rebounded in the opinion polls after calling the election three weeks ago as economic growth returned -- it is expected to reach 1.7 percent this year -- and after taking a tough stance on immigration to win back voters from the DPP.

Unusually for a Social Democrat, the 48-year-old leader has campaigned on the slogan: "If you come to Denmark you should work", and her government has introduced temporary residence permits for refugees as part of a package to stem the influx of asylum seekers.

Denmark received nearly 15,000 asylum seekers last year, almost twice the number from 2013 as more people fled to Europe from Syria`s civil war.

Rasmussen would need the support of the DPP in parliament to govern and has said he would prioritise cutting back the number of asylum seekers by slashing benefits for new immigrants and by making it harder to obtain permanent residency.

However, his popularity has suffered due to a string of minor scandals.

Political observers say the DPP is unlikely to join a future right-wing government, preferring instead to back a minority government in return for its support on some key issues.

More eurosceptic than its allies, the DPP agrees with the right-wing parties on backing British efforts in the EU to make it harder for other Europeans to claim benefits in nations other than their own across the bloc.

Voting stations open across Denmark at 9:00 am (0700 GMT) and close at 8:00 pm (1800 GMT).