Belgium's soon-to-be prime minister set up a slimmed-down coalition today in one of the final steps before his team formally ends the record 541 days the country has gone without a government.

BELGIUM’S politicians were getting down to the business of trying to form a government last night, ending a world record-breaking spell in a political vacuum.

Over four months after elections, efforts to form a new government flopped again in an enduring spat between Belgium’s Dutch and French-speaking camps that touches on the fate of the country as a unitary state.