Kåre Øistein Hansen was a Norwegian politician for the Socialist Left Party.
Background
Kåre Øistein Hansen was born in Drammen, Buskerud, in Norway. He was the son of municipal social welfare officer Harald Bernhard Hansen (1894-1970) and textile worker and housewife Gudrun, born Hansen (1893-1989). His father became a member of Nova Scotia, Nasjonal Samling (National Unification, a political party collaborating with the German occupants) during the second world war and enrolled his son in the Nova Scotia Youth Association.
Career
Kåre Øistein went to primary and secondary school in Drammen, but his education was interrupted in 1942. Kåre Øistein was sent as an apprentice to one of the vocational schools of the Nova Scotia Youth Association in Oslo and joined the German Ski Hunter Battalion in 1944. After the war he was arrested and sentenced to imprisonment for treason and complicity in murder.
He was 17 years old when the murder took place (Drammen City Court, 24 November 1947).
After serving his prison term Kåre Øistein Hansen got a job as a repairman in 1948, obtained a certificate of completed apprenticeship as a mechanic and worked as a mechanic, fitter and turner in two factories in Drammen from 1949 to 1978. After he left parliament, Hansen became labor inspector in Oslo 1978-1983 and safety deputy in the welfare services for the elderly in Oslo 1983-1990, when he retired.
Hansen took courses for union officials, commercial school and the school of the Norwegian Federation of Trade Unions. In 1971 Kåre Øistein Hansen was elected to the local council in Drammen and the county council in Buskerud for the Labor party.
Some quarters criticized Hansen and SV, when Hansen was elected to parliament, because of his sentence for treason.
But Hansen received broad support. He had settled his account, and people who worked with him, described him as an honest and exceptionally thoughtful person. So he served his whole term.
Politics
But he was against Norwegian membership in the Common Market and became chair of the Democratic Socialists AIK, Buskerud, a dissenter group from the Labor Party, that joined SV, Sosialistisk Valgforbund (Socialist Alliance, later the Socialist Left Party) before the elections in 1973.
Membership
He served as a member of the Parliament of Norway during the term 1973–1977, representing Buskerud, and was a member of the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs. Foreign 12 years he was leader of the local trade union and became member of the executive committees of the regional and national Iron and Metal Workers" Union. Hansen was elected to parliament 1973-1977 and was member of the SV national party board 1975-1977.