title: Danish government wins backing for 2018 budget, defusing crisis
text: COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Denmark s right-wing government secured backing from a junior partner for the 2018 budget on Tuesday, defusing a crisis that had threatened to bring down the minority coalition. The Liberal Alliance (LA), part of the three-way coalition led by Prime Minister Lokke Rasmussen s Liberals, said it would support the budget in parliament and agreed to postpone the negotiations on tax and immigration reforms it wants until January. The anti-immigrant Danish People s Party (DF), whose support the government needs to pass laws, gave its backing on Dec. 8 for the 2018 budget, but the LA had said it still wanted an agreement on tax cuts.  I am willing to make another attempt to secure an ambitious tax reform and a new modern immigration policy,  foreign minister and Liberal Alliance leader Anders Samuelsen said at a press conference.  The budget will be passed at a parliament vote on Friday, he said. Failure to secure backing from LA could have forced Rasmussen either to hand power to the Social Democrat-led opposition or call a snap election. Tax cuts have been on the right-leaning government s wish list for a long time, but pro-welfare DF has been less eager to back that part of the government s policies. The 2018 budget deal includes among other things increased spending on health and elderly care and on infrastructure. 