Norway’s Head of Delegation, Stig Karlsen, denies that a proposal to change the voting format of the Eurovision Song Contest has been agreed.
Karlsen has been outspoken in his view that the voting at Eurovision should change. While he has said that he believes juries should not be scrapped, he has advocated for reducing the weight of their votes to 40% or even 30% of the overall score.
Earlier this summer, it was reported that Norway would propose a new voting system to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU). In recent years, Norwegian entries have often performed better in the public vote than with the national juries.
Speaking to The Euro Trip podcast, though, Karlsen denies that any voting changes have been agreed. He also says that if the current voting system – where votes from national juries and the public have an equal 50/50 weighting – remained, then he would accept it.
But Karlsen claims that the weight of the jury votes should be looked at to ensure fans still “believe in the competition”:
The problem now is the gap between the public votes and the jury votes is so big and it happens again and again.
If the people are going to feel strongly about the competition and believe in the competition, we should look at the 50/50 thing.
Although he would like to see their power reduced, Karlsen does maintain that the national juries have an important role in the contest:
I totally like the concept of having a jury and the public because it makes for much more exciting voting. It makes sense in terms of making sure that there is someone who is caring about the musical craft.
In his interview with The Euro Trip, Karlsen continues to advocate for public votes to matter more in the overall score than jury votes. He says that it would ensure that the televote is “more important” than the votes of the juries:
Maybe it should be 60/40 and make a statement that the public votes are more important than the jury votes. It’s not a drastic change but I think that would be a good thing.
But if no changes end up being made, then Karlsen confirms he would have “total confidence” in the EBU and Eurovision 2024 host broadcaster SVT in their decision.
Eurovision’s voting system has been strongly debated since the controversial result of the 2023 contest in Liverpool, United Kingdom. At the contest, Käärijä’s “Cha Cha Cha” was the clear winner in the public vote with 376 points.
But Loreen won the contest overall for Sweden – her song “Tattoo” received the most points from the juries, with 340, while “Cha Cha Cha” only scored 150 points. “Tattoo” failed to earn a single ‘douze points’ – the top score available – from any country’s televote.
If Norway, or any other country, do propose voting system changes for Eurovision 2024, they must be approved by the Eurovision Song Contest Reference Group. The group, which agrees on the regulations of the contest, is expected to confirm the rules of the 2024 competition in January.
Eurovision 2024
Loreen won the 67th edition of the Eurovision Song Contest for Sweden with “Tattoo”. She is the first female two-time winner of the competition, having previously won the 2012 contest with “Euphoria”.
Malmö has hosted the Eurovision Song Contest twice previously. The first time was in 1992 while the most recent edition was in 2013. Eurovision 2024 will be held on May 7, 9 and 11.
The venue where Eurovision Song Contest 2024 will take place is the Malmö Arena, the second-largest indoor arena in Sweden.
Image Source: EBU / Corinne Cumming | Source: The Euro Trip
