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BIRTHDAY

School handed dunce’s cap over birthday invitation saga

A primary school in southern Sweden has been given a stern talking to by parliament for confiscating an eight-year-old's birthday invitations after he failed to invite everybody in his class.

“The teachers had no right to collect the invitations against the students’ will,” the office of the Swedish parliamentary ombudsman said in its ruling on Thursday, adding however that the school would not be sanctioned for its actions.

Parliamentary ombudsmen are elected by the Swedish parliament to ensure that public authorities and their staff comply with the laws and other statutes governing their actions.

The Munspelets primary school in the southern Swedish town of Lund was reported to the parliamentary mediator after teachers there in May demanded that children return their invitations to a birthday party, since two boys had been left off the guest list.

The birthday boy’s father, who filed the complaint, told Swedish media at the time that the two boys who had not been invited should not have been surprised.

“One of them did not invite my son to his birthday and the other has bullied my son for six months. You don’t invite your antagonists to a birthday party,” he told the Sydsvenskan daily.

The school however argued that it had an unwritten policy that either all children, or all the boys, or all the girls in a class, had to be invited to parties when invitations were handed out at school.

BIRTHDAY

Over 100,000 Danes sing for Queen on her birthday

Over 100,000 Danes sung the country's birthday song for Queen Margrethe II at midday on Thursday, after her 80th birthday celebrations were cancelled as a result of the coronavirus lockdown.

Over 100,000 Danes sing for Queen on her birthday
Danish singer Thomas Buttenschøn sings alongside others in the Facebook broadcast. Photo: Facebook screenshot (with permission)
The event, organised by the group singing organisation Danmark Synger (Denmark sings), has gained 191,170 members since it was launched on March 26.  It was also broadcast on Denmark's two national television stations and livecast on Facebook
 
The country's popular Queen followed the event from the sofa of her living room in Denmark's Fredensborg Palace. 
 
“Thanks for the song. It was truly a fantastic experience. It went straight to the heart,” she said in a short statement to public broadcaster DR after the performance was finished. 
 
The sing-a-long was led by musicians from the Copenhagen Phil symphony orchestra, the singer Thomas Buttenschøn, and 130 selected children and adults, with Danes encouraged to join in from their homes, workplaces or schools. 
 
As well as Denmark's birthday song “Idag er det Dronningens fødelsedag” (Today, it is The Queen's birthday), the performance also included “Solen er så rød mor” (The sun is so red, mother) “I Danmark er jeg født” (I was born in Denmark), written by Hans Christian Andersen, and the Kim Larsen song “Papirsklip”, or Paper Chain.
 
“We think it went really, really well. It attracted more than a million viewers I guess, and a lot of schools and neighbours got together,” Stine Isaksen, from the organisation Sångens Hus which helped organise the event, told The Local. 
 
“My youngest daughter went to school for the first time in a little bit more than a month, and the whole school was participating in this event.” 
 
She told the Ritzau news agency that the event was supposed to “give a feeling that it is all of us are collected together for the birthday.”
 
“For example, if you stand on your balcony or outside in the garden, we hope you will be able to hear the neighbours singing along.” 
 
 
The “Denmark sings for the Queen” group was originally created by the graphic artist Kim Bruhn. 
 
“When it was canceled, I thought we had to do it in a different way, and then it took off,” he told Ritzau.
 
On the Queen's birthday, there is a tradition that well-wishers travel to Copenhagen's Amalienborg Palace to sing the birthday song, Isaksen told Ritzau. 
 
“This time many others have also got the chance to sing for Her Majesty,” Isaksen said. “Of course it is a pity that people cannot physically gather, but now everyone can join in wherever they are.”
 
Well-wishers can leave their congratulations digitally on the Royal Court's website. Margrethe II will give a birthday address to the nation at 7pm, the court announced early today in a press statement
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