Stockholm
“We have received support for four new years since we have delivered on what we pledged,” Solberg said in Oslo, thanking her Conservative Party members and voters.
She also thanked her junior governing coalition partner, the right-wing populist Progress Party, and two small centrist parties that have backed the center-right government.
The four parties were set to get 89 seats, compared to the 96 they had in the outgoing 169-seat legislature.
“A re-election means that you win on your own policies,” Solberg said at a post-election debate with other party leaders.
Her re-election would be the first for a Conservative Party prime minister since 1985, which was hailed as a sign of her popularity among the Norwegian electorate.
The prime minister said she would sit down and discuss with her partner parties the coming government’s policies, adding “we have plenty of time.”
The conservatives were projected to get 45 seats, dropping three seats compared to the 2013 elections, the election authority’s estimates showed.
Solberg’s party would thereby keep their place as Norway’s second-largest party on 25 percent, while the Progress Party was third on about 15 percent, losing one of its 29 seats.
Solberg campaigned on pledges to create more jobs, improve public services and increase spending on defense and law enforcement.
The Labour Party lost more than 3 percent of its share of the vote and was projected to finish at 27.4 percent, translating into 49 seats, six fewer than in 2013. It remained the country’s largest party.
Labour’s preferred coalition partners, the Socialist Left Party and the Centre Party, both made strong gains in the polls.
The Greens were set to keep their single seat in parliament while the Communist party, Red, won a “historic” first seat.
The national election authority’s projected results were based on almost 95 percent of the counted votes.
Results from Solberg’s home city of Bergen were delayed due to road works ahead of the world cycling championships, local election authorities said, according to the Bergens Tidende daily.
On conceding defeat, Jonas Gahr Store of the opposition Labour Party said the result was “a great disappointment.”
“Our goal in this election was to give Norway a new government,” Store told party faithful, adding “it doesn’t look like we have succeeded.”
Store also congratulated Solberg, and wished her “best of luck.”
Store said he would stay on as Labour Party leader, and pledged that the party would be “a constructive and tough opposition.”
Knut Arild Hareide, leader of the Christian Democrat party that has supported Solberg’s government, said “it has cost to be honest” after the centrist party narrowly cleared the 4 percent parliamentary threshold.
His party has rowed with the Progress Party on immigration and said it would prefer Solberg to seek other partners in government.
He repeated that stance at the post-election debate, but said he would take part in talks led by Solberg.
Tine Skei Grande, leader of the Liberals, said it would be necessary to “evaluate” how the government had operated and what could be improved.
There are almost 3.8 million eligible voters in Norway. Initial results said turnout was about 77 percent, down 1 percentage point from 2013.