Financial stability and financial market issues

Ida Drougge (M)

Madam Speaker! I would like to begin by moving for approval of the committee's proposal for a decision. This means that we propose to the Riksdag that the communication that the government has submitted to us be tabled.

The communication concerns the work of the International Monetary Fund and the other world banks, which has taken place during the years 2021 and 2022, regarding issues including financial and monetary stability and their resources, assessments of the development of the international economy and the financial development, as well as the government's priorities for these international institutions' activities. That this is taking place is based on an announcement that the Riksdag made a decision on in 2016/17. It was desired to have reports on the work in these international bodies.

The report also contains a number of motions from the general motion period regarding financial market issues and financial stability. These are issues that have not been as relevant and topical as they are now for a long time.

From both the Moderates' and the government parties' sides, there are several arguments in the motions that we agree with and that the government is working on. On the grounds that much work on the issues is ongoing, we move for the motions to be rejected.

The Committee on Finance arranged an annually recurring inquiry on financial stability on 31 January. The Minister for Financial Markets and representatives from the Financial Stability Council, namely Riksgälden, Riksbanken, and Finansinspektionen, participated. For those who are interested in this, I can recommend visiting the Riksdag's website. One can both watch it in retrospect and read through the report on what was said there.

In our current order for macro-supervision, the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority in particular has a very central role. We in the Riksdag have decided that the regulatory framework shall apply with broad consensus. It is largely about minimizing systemic risks and strengthening stability in the economy.

The economic developments in recent years, including Russia's invasion of Ukraine, covid-19, the development of energy systems in Sweden, and the lack of stable energy sources in Sweden and other European countries, have resulted in high inflation and high interest rates today. As a result, Finansinspektionen has a specific mandate to evaluate what effects their work has in light of what is happening in the economy right now and the situation we find ourselves in.

On October 14, the Financial Supervisory Authority concluded that a general temporary waiver of the amortization requirement, which would apply to everyone, would not be well-advised in this situation. However, it has been reminded that banks have the possibility to do so for those who have special reasons and who need it. There are very many households that are currently hit hard, primarily by the high interest rates but also by the combination of the fact that practically everything has become more expensive.

How the exceptions that already exist in today's legislation are being mapped out now by Finansinspektionen on behalf of the government, following a decision made in December. This is to be reported here relatively soon, already in June 2023.

In a slightly longer perspective, the government has also tasked a committee to more robustly and thoroughly evaluate the amortization requirement, how it works in conjunction with the ceiling on borrowing, and the total macroeconomic risks, but also how we can strengthen consumer protection more purposefully than today. Today's rules regarding amortization requirements and amortization rates are relatively new and need a robust evaluation. Our hope is that they can become more proportionate in the future. However, it is nothing that happens in a heartbeat, especially not in the situation we find ourselves in now.

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Fredrik Stenberg (S)

Madam Speaker! Sweden finds itself in a restless time in a restless world, and today we shall consider the Committee on Finance's report on financial stability and financial market issues.

Unfortunately, to everyone's sorrow, Russia's war in Ukraine is ongoing. We have a NATO process that leaves much to be desired. The world's general economic situation with inflation and interest rates affects Sweden and the Swedish people to the highest degree.

In light of this, everyday life continues in our country. There are reforms that need to be implemented to move Sweden forward even in these difficult times. The government's response so far has been rather poor. In these restless times, deficiencies in having almost exclusively digital payments have also been exposed. There are many perspectives on the issue of cash, but being able to pay at all is a prerequisite for transactions to be able to take place. Infrastructure and rules are needed that enable this throughout our country.

Madam Speaker! That we live in an unequal society is obvious to most of us. But having a place to live is clearly a prerequisite for everyone. Regardless of what stance one has on the question of building housing—whether the public should take responsibility for it or not—one can state that it will be a double blow when the investment support for rental apartments is abolished and it coincides with an economic winter. Housing construction has come to a standstill. It will affect Sweden's competitiveness and continued development.

We Social Democrats still stand behind the importance of maintaining the construction of rental apartments at reasonable rents, but we also want to do more for those who are about to buy their first apartment but perhaps do not come from a family with financial resources. Often that is the case for young people. We think it is reasonable to develop a proposal on starter loans for first-time buyers. The Social Democratic government commissioned an inquiry into the issue. I can state that the matter is being prepared by the Government Offices – good! I look forward to concrete proposals that could facilitate entry into the housing market.

Madam Speaker! Crime and fraud must be combated. Taxpayers must know that the taxes paid go to welfare and definitely not to organized crime. Preventing the looting of our common resources is an urgent matter. Therefore, the issue of money laundering and fraud is urgent to actualize. It is important and a priority to continue finding ways to access this crime. Here, it is important that all actors take their responsibility, from law enforcement agencies to banks and other actors. Together, we need to safeguard our financial system.

Madam Speaker! We have serious problems in the country. Many families with children are struggling to put together enough money for the most basic needs, such as nutritious meals, and the economic uncertainty is palpable. Families with children and economically weak households are particularly vulnerable in the times we live in.

We view over-indebtedness and the risks it entails both for the financial system and for individuals with great concern. Especially now that the economic winter for the Swedes has arrived quickly and palpably, it may seem tempting to borrow money to finance everyday life.

That Sweden does not have a national debt register is a deficiency. One such register needs to be established so that lenders can perform a good credit assessment with all the facts on the table. Sweden's financial stability is important to secure jobs and prosperity. We Social Democrats want to increase financial stability and therefore believe it is urgent to establish a debt register and perhaps also an additional asset register.

I choose to vote in favor of reservation 19.

(Applause)

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Dennis Dioukarev (SD)

Madam Speaker! Cash is still a current issue. There are many reasons why one can be in favor of cash in the future. There is a fairness perspective – large groups both want and need to use cash in their everyday lives. We have the democracy perspective – eight out of ten Swedes want to be able to pay with cash in the future. Above all, we have the preparedness perspective – what happens if a cyberattack knocks out the Swedish payment infrastructure? It is one of the risk scenarios that MSB paints in its risk analysis.

I still become a bit thoughtful. What the Social Democrats say in the rostrum and what they write on paper in their committee motion sounds very good. But when the Sweden Democrats submitted the proposal to legislate that we should have a cash obligation in Sweden for food, fuel, and medicines, the Social Democrats said no to it in the Payment Inquiry. What one stands and says in the rostrum sounds very nice, but how is it that when it actually comes down to it, they ignore the cash?

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Fredrik Stenberg (S)

Madam Speaker! I do not agree that the Social Democrats are ignoring this. I can state that we have had a very free market which has led to the fact that we no longer use cash. I believe it is because it has simply been convenient. But it is clear that the risks in the system that we have actually created for ourselves are being exposed now. It also means that we may need to take more measures from the political side than what has been relevant previously. I believe it is also important to bear in mind that this type of measures entails costs for which there needs to be an acceptance. I believe that acceptance may be easier to find now in different systems.

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Dennis Dioukarev (SD)

Madam Speaker! I do not doubt that the Social Democrats have understood the problem formulation. The member may agree with the problem formulation as much as he likes. But when it comes down to it, one has not prepared for what one says one de facto stands for.

In the investigation directives to the Payment Investigation, which were formulated by the previous Social Democratic government, it was written that they wanted to investigate the need for legal tender in the future. Legal tender, according to the Riksbank Act, is banknotes and coins. What the Social Democrats actually said was that they should investigate the need for cash in the future. Talk about a negative attitude towards cash!

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Fredrik Stenberg (S)

Madam Speaker! The Social Democrats are not negative towards cash. But I believe that we need to find a system where both cash and digital payments can coexist. Even digital payments will need to be developed and secured to function, for example, in the time we in Europe now find ourselves in with a war in our immediate vicinity.

(Applause)

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Yusuf Aydin (KD)

Madam Speaker! Today's debate concerns very important and highly topical areas, namely financial stability and the financial market. In the wake of the crisis in some American banks and also some financial unrest in some European banks, these issues are the subject of many analyses and discussions.

After a strong recovery in 2021, the world economy was hit by a series of challenges in 2022. The economic development both in Sweden and globally has been heavily affected by the covid-19 pandemic but also by Russia's invasion of Ukraine, with among other things high inflation and rising interest rates as a consequence. The IMF and other institutions assess that the risks to financial stability have increased since the spring of 2022. The IMF and the World Bank Group therefore, together with the national supervisory authorities, have an important role when it comes to identifying and managing the risks that can arise and in various ways contributing to maintaining financial stability.

Madam Speaker! For many years, we have had a rather expansive monetary policy with very low interest rates, which has also led to the fact that indebtedness in households and companies has increased significantly and lies at comparatively high levels. Now that interest rates are rising rapidly and sharply, this exposes many households and companies to severe economic pressures. Many households have to use an ever larger part of their income to pay interest costs. The real estate and housing markets risk being hit by high capital costs, which can cause spillover effects to the banking sector.

We can, however, observe that the financial system's resilience to disruptions has been strengthened since the financial crisis of 2008-2009. Crisis preparedness has improved, and Finansinspektionen has been provided with more resources to be able to carry out its supervisory work and its monitoring of risks. The Swedish banks are therefore assessed to have good resilience with high capital levels and large liquidity buffers.

Madam Speaker! The current order for macroprudential supervision, where the Finansinspektionen has a central role, has been decided by the Riksdag in broad political consensus. It concerns measures to reduce systemic risks and strengthen the stability of the financial system.

In the autumn, the Financial Supervisory Authority was tasked with evaluating the effects of the supervisory measures implemented in light of the current economic development, where we have high inflation and high interest rates. The Authority's assessment was that a general temporary exemption from amortization requirements would not be a precise support for the households that risk serious economic difficulties. At the same time, it was pointed out that individual mortgage borrowers will be hit hard by the economic development ahead and that there may be reason to then grant individual support.

There is also a safety valve for those families and mortgage borrowers who are hit hardest to be able to utilize in order to obtain a temporary exemption from amortization requirements. This will, as mentioned earlier, be investigated and reported back quite soon.

We Christian Democrats have been persistent in pushing to extend and strengthen the supplementary grant for those families with children who receive housing allowance and in this way support the most vulnerable families. In the same way, this safety valve is very important to alleviate the economic situation for those who are currently having it the toughest.

We Christian Democrats also consider that the current amortization requirements are too strict and make the threshold for owned housing too high for many households. We therefore want to ease the reinforced amortization requirement and conduct a review of the combined requirements to find a good balance between people's need for housing and financial stability. We therefore welcome that the government has now, in April, appointed a committee to analyze and evaluate how the amortization requirement and other supervisory measures have functioned so far and how they can be designed moving forward.

Madam Speaker! The report also addresses the issue of cash. We can observe that the demand for cash is decreasing and that we are moving towards a more digital solution. At the same time, it is important that there is a well-functioning cash management throughout the country.

The responsibility for this has been further clarified in the new Riksbank Act, which entered into force on 1 January 2023. The new Riksbank Act contains, among other things, an obligation for the Riksbank to operate banknote depots throughout the country and increased requirements for companies in the payment market to prepare to be able to maintain operations during peacetime crises and during high alert.

We find ourselves in a difficult economic situation with a recession and high inflation, and a global environment characterized by war in Europe and great uncertainties ahead that can also affect financial stability. In this situation, it is important that there is good preparedness to handle risks that can disturb financial stability.

The Government and the authorities that are part of the Stability Council are following the developments closely and are prepared to act to maintain stability in and confidence for the financial system. With this, I move for approval of the committee's proposal in the report.

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Dennis Dioukarev (SD)

Madam Speaker! We need stability in the financial system for several reasons. It is needed so that lending to households and companies can function, so that the supply of capital can function, but also so that the financial services we use in our daily lives can function. Predictability, reliability, and stability are needed in the financial system so that the economy can run and grow.

If we do not have financial stability, we have some form of crisis policy instead. Lately, the world has been tossed between these two. We now have, for the first time in several decades, high inflation in the world.

When I became a member of Parliament in 2014 and up until last year, it was the risk of deflation that central banks all over the world fought with a pro-cyclical monetary policy. Then came the corona crisis, and the world shut down. We got supply chain disruptions, a pent-up consumption need, and extremely low interest rates that created cheap money and inflation in housing prices and financial assets.

But there are no free lunches, as the saying goes, and now the bill is here and waiting to be paid. On top of everything, we have once again got war in Europe with Putin's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. In addition to the human suffering for Ukraine that it has caused, we have also received a price shock on food and, above all, on energy.

A perfect storm of supply disruptions, massive demand stimuli, and war has placed the world, Europe, and Sweden in a very difficult-to-navigate macroeconomic terrain. The central banks continue to raise interest rates to achieve their goal of an inflation of 2 percent. The interest rate hikes have made it more expensive to finance home purchases and renegotiate loans. Households have seen their consumption space decrease as housing costs have increased and food prices have risen sharply.

Unprofitable companies have found it harder to survive, and profitable but highly leveraged companies have seen their financing costs skyrocket. The central banks' rapid interest rate hikes have made some banks' bond holdings practically worthless, which triggered the largest fall in market interest rates since 1987. American and European authorities saw a banking crisis in plain sight and are doing what they can to avoid spillover effects to the real economy.

It is a difficult landscape to navigate for central banks and governments around the world. Interest rates must be raised to combat inflation, but it must not risk creating financial instability. The recession – if or when it comes – cannot be fought with demand stimuli in order to not hinder the Riksbank's mandate.

It is a difficult landscape to navigate. But what it tells me is that this report in the Swedish Riksdag today is more important than it has been in a long time. The Sweden Democrats have a well-developed policy in this area through our committee motion Enhanced rights for savings and investments.

It is a motion that contains proposals for an abolished second amortization requirement and a scrapped interest rate differential compensation in order to increase mobility in the housing market and the voluntary amortization rate.

There are proposals for a modernized ISK law for an improved capital supply. It is a proposal for which there is also a majority in the Committee on Taxation.

There are proposals for improved transparency in the bond market for financial stability and a proposal for a national cash strategy for Sweden. A national cash strategy is needed especially in times like these, with war and bank robberies. We simply need redundancy in the payment system. Cash is important from a preparedness perspective.

MSB, Myndigheten för samhällsskydd och beredskap, recommends that all Swedes have at least 2,000 kronor in cash at home, not only for times of war but also for times of crisis.

Warfare can, as is well known, occur at a low intensity without direct military attacks, through for example cyberattacks. What happens if a cyberattack knocks out Swedish payment infrastructure? How are we to be able to buy bread, milk, and butter if cash has disappeared in such a scenario?

We must, therefore, ensure that we can pay for essential consumption with banknotes and coins. Therefore, the Sweden Democrats propose a cash obligation, that is, a requirement for businesses within what we have defined as essential consumption to accept cash as payment.

It is about food, fuel, and medicine. That is why the Sweden Democrats are in talks with the government regarding the cash issue, with a focus on how we are to stop the withdrawal of cash in Sweden. We want the government to promptly appoint an inquiry that exclusively focuses on cash and gives it the attention it deserves in a separate inquiry.

In conclusion, Madam Speaker, we stand behind all our proposals, but for the sake of time, I move for approval of only reservation 1.

(Applause)

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Carl B Hamilton (L)

Madam Speaker! Ida Drougge has accounted for the formal processing and how it works here, so I will skip that section.

I would like to begin by drawing attention to the most serious incident in recent years regarding deficiencies in financial stability and a failed bank supervision. It has gone completely wrong in some areas, and we must see what conclusions we should draw from this.

What I am thinking of is primarily the crashes at Silicon Valley Bank and First Republic Bank in California in the USA and at Credit Suisse in Switzerland, where the state forced a bankruptcy and a takeover of the bank by the competitor UBS. These are very large measures being taken. It was therefore required that state interventions with very large support measures be made to resolve the current problems in these banks, and this at great costs for the taxpayers in the USA and in Switzerland. There were actually losses in the billions of kronor also in Sweden, in Alecta. We are therefore not independent of whether supervision and controls are not carried out in a correct manner in other countries.

Against that background, and having read the motions, it strikes me how much of the points that have now emerged again have already been investigated in Sweden. This has been commented on in Swedish politics and investigated in Swedish inquiries. We had, for example, the bank union inquiry a few years ago. We had Anna Kinberg Batra's inquiry just a few months ago. It is 1,000 pages long, and then a number of appendices are added. We must somehow economize on the efforts we ourselves put into the sea here in this country. The bank union inquiry is also 1,000 pages. But it seems that it then just disappears. The political system and the governments—and I am not pointing out any particular government—have difficulty internalizing these reviews. But we must do it!

An experience that has been made in many countries and at different times is that a functioning supervision of banks requires competent and highly experienced staff and very large economic resources to feed into the banks and financial institutions that fall into insolvency.

If the USA and Switzerland had been under, for example, the ECB's legal supervision and been part of the ECB's supervision mechanism, which is much tougher than the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority, and applied EU legislation for banks, the large and dramatic liquidity problems would likely never have occurred in either the USA or Switzerland.

A systemic error is that the banks themselves and the supervisory authorities have rarely or never had sufficient understanding of when and how stability risks are built up. They often lack the competence and will to handle new or stealthily creeping stability risks.

If our country is to increase protection against financial market catastrophes of the type that have now occurred in both California and Switzerland, the simplest thing is for us to actually do what we were about to do this year, namely to join the EU's supervisory mechanism. One does not need to join the European cooperation, but one can still join the supervisory mechanism fully and completely. One can do it on equal terms, non-discriminatory terms for Sweden, and obtain a situation in Sweden that is roughly the same as the one in Finland. It is not so scary, is it?

The European Securities and Markets Authority drafts provisions on supervisory issues regarding the financial market. If Sweden had these provisions and participated in the work, it would be a protection for Sweden, Swedish bank customers and Swedish companies.

The Swedish banks would certainly not be cheering over this; that must be kept perfectly clear. It would become a tougher, more competent and more well-staffed authority than what the Finansinspektionen can muster. That would be good for Swedes and Swedish companies. It would result in a safer financial sector in Sweden, in short.

When Nordea left Sweden and moved its seat and headquarters to Finland a few years ago, the company stated the reason for the move as precisely Finland's membership in the banking union. I do not know if that was the true reason deep down, but in any case, it would be interesting to now make an evaluation of the lessons for Sweden from the move.

There is also a safety mechanism - for those who are particularly concerned - for the event that Sweden should join the banking union solely for financial market reasons. It would enable Sweden to, as a last resort, leave this banking union. I am therefore not talking about the euro, but I am talking about the banking union. One can leave the cooperation after three years of trial participation. There is thus a possibility of trial participation - that does not sound so scary, does it?

In summary: There are two advantages to participating in banking supervision managed by the ECB. I want to emphasize the first, which is the high competence and the extensive experience in supervisory matters of many of the people required. This exists in Frankfurt and in other places on the continent. The second advantage is access to the economic resources that may be required for interventions and rescue operations in the event of a crisis in a bank or in the banking sector.

We do not need to risk the Swedish krona. We can actually ensure that we share the risks with others, who also have some other advantages in the form of competent people and a lot of money.

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Samuel Gonzalez Westling (V)

Madam Speaker! Sweden is currently facing incredibly large problems. The high inflation and its effects show with all unwanted clarity how passive the government is. One needs to ask whether it is due to ignorance and incompetence or if it is about a lack of ability to want to do anything at all.

What remains clearly evident is that the government has two tracks. Inflation is preferably to be solved by itself by starving the households, and the magical market shall sort everything out. To the extent that there is to be any help to be had at all, however, one must have succeeded in qualifying for the exclusive club of high-income earners, that is to say those who earn over 50,000 kronor a month. Then, one can count on receiving some form of relief in the form of tax cuts.

It was also this we saw as the result of the budget for 2023, at the expense of municipalities and regions, which now face a steel bath where the effects will hit households to an even greater extent in the form of deteriorated healthcare, school, and care.

It is striking how little the government does otherwise, especially since it is essentially three factors that are driving inflation. Electricity prices are skyrocketing, but the government chooses not to address the total market failure that now prevails, even though it would be very simple to solve by introducing the Vänsterpartiet proposal on Sweden prices on electricity. Food prices are soaring, and even though the Finance Minister eventually listened to Vänsterpartiet and called the food giants to the Government Offices, there were never any sharp demands to reach an agreement. It ended with some loose talk. The result has been disappointing, to say the least. The only thing that is clear is the government's passivity. The government simply does nothing, except cry crocodile tears over the harsh situation.

The third inflation-driving factor is housing prices, and even there the government chooses to be completely cold-blooded. The four major banks made a combined profit of approximately 100 billion during the past year, and a large part of that profit comes from the mortgage loans. Since the financial crisis in 2008, the margins for mortgage loans have increased sharply, and today they are at historically high levels. As recently as yesterday, record-high profits for the banks were reported, and they are in agreement that interest rates should be raised. Sure, they pretend to argue a bit about how much they should be raised, but fundamentally they like what they see.

There are also very good reasons for that. It is impossible today for mortgage customers to determine whether the interest they are offered by the bank is reasonable in relation to the interest that the banks themselves pay, the so-called Stibor rate. This is particularly critical in this situation, as interest rates are rising dramatically for everyone and we have still not seen the full effect of the interest rate hikes since a majority of the loans expire this year. It concerns tens of thousands of loans that are to be renegotiated to new interest rates, and there mortgage borrowers face a situation where they cannot possibly determine whether the offer they receive from their bank is reasonable in relation to the profit the bank is expected to make.

It is worth noting that in Finland, our neighboring country, there is a different model. There, interest rates are often set as a markup on the interbank rate in the eurozone, Euribor. For Finnish borrowers, it is therefore clear how large a markup the bank makes and thus simpler to compare the bank's offer.

The Left Party's proposal is therefore that we should introduce a similar system in Sweden. The banks should be required to report margins in both percentage points and in kronor. This would make mortgage negotiations more transparent.

This is, however, opposed by the other parties in the Riksdag. Why is unclear. One might assume it is out of love for the banks, but I believe it is better that they answer for themselves why they do not think households should be given the same insight and conditions as our neighbors in Finland. This is particularly important in times like these, when inflation hits very hard on all fronts as a consequence of the government's passivity.

The answer we have received so far is that the customers themselves should compare the banks' offers, but that it is not considered relevant that comparisons should be made where all cards are on the table. It is an extremely poor negotiating position to put someone in, and here both Sverigedemokraterna, government parties, and others are equally responsible for the answer.

We in Vänsterpartiet, however, stand on the side of the households and have concrete proposals that would ease this difficult situation. Therefore, I move for approval of reservation 2.

The government's paralysis must come to an end. The Riksdag should therefore urge the government to return with a proposal on how we can introduce a system that creates more transparency in loan negotiations. It could have an immediate effect for households, and it is important not only right now but also in the future. It is clear that it is only Vänsterpartiet among the parties in the Riksdag that takes the issue of inflation seriously.

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Dennis Dioukarev (SD)

Madam Speaker! It is not true that you stand on the side of the households. You do not stand on anyone's side, considering that you are presenting an expansive budget that will run at a deficit next year. All things else considered, it will lead to higher inflation, according to all scientific economic theory. It is not an opinion; it is a fact. Higher inflation would worsen everything in our society. One would not be able to negotiate wages. Families with children and ordinary people would face increased prices on food and energy.

Let me also remind you of the conditions the red-green parties have set for the Swedish people. Politicians cannot control everything in terms of inflation, even if the Left Party seems to believe so, but let me remind you that it was the Social Democrats, the Left Party, the Green Party and the Centre Party who abandoned nuclear power during the last parliamentary term.

We are now seeing the effects of it. "Double electricity prices tomorrow after today's power outage," reads a headline today. It is the effect of your policy.

Fuel prices in Sweden were among the highest in the world even before Putin's invasion of Ukraine. Vänsterpartiet proposes a tax increase on fuel in its budget. What effect would that have on inflation?

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Samuel Gonzalez Westling (V)

Madam Speaker! I thank you for the question.

Even the Financial Supervisory Authority notes that if increased resources were given to municipalities and regions, it would not be inflation-driving. It is not only Vänsterpartiet that says it is necessary to do this, but also the country's authorities note it.

It is still a bit strange that one says that they are going to do so much from the Sweden Democrats' side when we can stack the broken promises on top of each other. Wasn't it the Sweden Democrats who promised to lower the gasoline price by 10 kronor? Or was it the diesel? It was one of those at least. And then one starts talking about these things. What would it actually do? I don't understand it.

What we can clearly and distinctly state is that today we have municipalities and regions that, due to the Sweden Democrats' priorities, will need to cut back in school, elderly care, and healthcare because it was preferred to lower the tax for those who earn absolutely the most in society rather than give those funds to municipalities and regions.

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Dennis Dioukarev (SD)

Madam Speaker! We can state that the Sweden Democrats are the only party in this chamber that has absolutely zero responsibility for how Sweden looks today. The Sweden Democrats have been a coalition partner to the government for barely a year. Today's society is, whether one likes it or not, a result of red-green politics over several decades.

The Sweden Democrats entered the Riksdag in 2010. In 2022, we became a coalition party of the government. The criticism the member directs towards the structures we see in society today, he can take to his friends in the previous government base. Ask them why it looks the way it does!

On the subject of support to the municipalities: The Government and the Sweden Democrats allocated 12 billion kronor to municipalities and regions in the autumn. These are funds that will go to childcare, to elderly care, and to healthcare. We are, therefore, also doing that.

But I received no answer to the question: What effect will the Left Party's expansive budget, where they run a deficit and borrow money to stimulate demand in the economy, have on the economy in Sweden? What effect will it have on inflation in Sweden? I envision a scenario where we get inflation at the level of the Soviet Union and Venezuela. It is perhaps a type of dream society for the Left Party, so maybe that is the policy they want to continue to pursue. And what effect will the Left Party's tax increase on fuel have on inflation? Can I get an answer to that, please!

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Samuel Gonzalez Westling (V)

Madam Speaker! I believe it is particularly exciting for the parties that sit in the government to hear that the Sweden Democrats apparently have no responsibility at all. One can do exactly what one wants in the Riksdag, in the media, in the municipalities, and out in society. Those were probably very exciting news for everyone here to receive, I believe – and especially for the voters in the country, who have nevertheless chosen to make the Sweden Democrats the second largest party.

The Sweden Democrats have been beating the big drum that they now certainly intend to implement major, revolutionary changes, but they apparently have no sense of responsibility whatsoever.

The government has indeed allocated a certain number of billions to municipalities and regions, but SKR (Sveriges Kommuner och Regioner) has stated that they would have needed perhaps 8 billion over what the government allocated in order to maintain the levels of community services that were present in 2022. That was what SKR stated in connection with the government presenting its budget, which the Sverigedemokraterna actually have a responsibility for. That cannot be escaped.

It means that it is the Sweden Democrats' responsibility when the schools will need to cut back in all of Sweden's municipalities. When healthcare is brought to its knees, it is the Sweden Democrats who bear that responsibility. I think one should be honest and stand up and take that responsibility. We in the Left Party will always do that when we are given the opportunity to influence. But right now, it is the Sweden Democrats who are in power.

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Martin Ådahl (C)

Madam Speaker! I shall keep this relatively brief. I first wish to move for approval of our reservation 3 under point 2 and reservation 22 under point 10.

Much of this report is somewhat overstated right now, when we are in a rather tough position regarding financial stability and the financial markets. The very high leverage in Sweden, one of the highest in relation to income in the world, means that we face harsh tests when inflation and interest rates rise. Many households are under severe pressure. But it is also the Swedish housing market. There can therefore be effects on financial stability in Sweden in many different areas in this situation.

It also concerns the real estate market, with real estate companies that are also highly leveraged and have small margins. Now, one might have to roll over 100 billion in corporate bonds, which might have to be transferred to loans in the banking sector. It is a very pressured situation, Madam Speaker.

I believe it is important that we show unity in this situation, but we must not show the same passivity in the situation that the government has shown in many other areas. This applies to the crisis generally, and it applies to small businesses and their opportunity to hire as well as the municipal sector.

We must be proactive here. We must, among other things, accept that the amortization requirements, which have served well to curb the price increase on the housing market, are not the important thing right now. They should be paused. This applies in particular to the reinforced amortization requirement, which singles out the very weakest households. It has been promised by many parties here, but we stand by it in this situation.

Furthermore, we must be more careful in stress-testing and reviewing the financial markets. There has just been a banking crisis, which we, thank God, survived. Resources were withdrawn quickly, with the press of a button, from a smaller niche bank. This can happen in many other cases, even in Sweden. Even though it sounds uncomfortable, one must dare to say it. We must ensure that we account for this in the stress tests that we perform with our banks, so that we can monitor the new situation in the financial markets.

I thus ask to be allowed to thank you for the debate. These are very important issues that will be highlighted further ahead.

The deliberation was hereby concluded.

(Decisions were made under § 13.)

The speech at riksdagen.se, in Swedish (opens in a new tab)