(cont. from § 7) The Judiciary (cont. JuU1)

Martin Melin (L)

Mr. Speaker! The question is what is most important – how much money the police receive for their budget, or what they do with the money, that is to say, what results they deliver.

In my world, the results will always be more important than the budget.

So many police officers out on the streets and squares also think this when it comes to talk about the police budget. They want to know what they get in salary, what OB-allowances they have, and how many weekends they have to work. Can I get vacation this summer? Is there money for training? Can I replace this old car? My uniform is torn, can I get a new one? Will there be a Christmas buffet?

The police officers see the operations. They see the everyday life they work in.

If you are the head of any of the agencies we are discussing today, for example the police, it is a matter of being able to keep two balls in the air at the same time. The budget must of course be maintained, but the operations are also important. The results must be delivered.

As a police officer, I have worked under eight different Ministers of Justice and seven different Commissioners of the Swedish Police. It has been with mixed feelings and mixed results. Today, for the first time in my 33 years of service within the Swedish Police Authority, I feel secure. We have a government that understands the importance of investing in crime policy. We have a Minister of Justice who has will, courage, and ambitions. We have a Commissioner of the Swedish Police and a Deputy Commissioner who have will, visions, and even there, ambitions. The conditions for Sweden to also in the future have a good and functioning crime policy and a well-functioning police authority are thus good.

The justice system

In addition to the obvious that crime should decrease and people's safety increase, the government is clear that it wants to see the police show results. There shall be more locally present police officers, so-called area police. They want to see a better clearance rate and better investigation results for volume crimes, the so-called everyday crimes. Violence in close relationships shall continue to be prioritized. They also want the work against organized crime with shootings, explosions, and recruitment of young people to continue to be high in the prioritization.

In order to be able to do this, the Police Authority is allocated 45 billion in the budget. That is more money than the police have ever received before. But with that comes also demands for performance. Then we are back to what I said at the beginning of the speech about budget and results: The budget must be maintained, but one must also deliver results.

Mr. Speaker! Shootings and killings are still occurring in Sweden at a completely unacceptable level. Then one can be sarcastic and say: Look, shootings are happening despite the government presenting offensive policies and offensive laws and the police receiving more resources than usual. One can say that, and one receives applause from one's own ranks.

But let us pause in that thought for a second and instead think: How bad would it have been if this government had not been as offensive as it is? If it had just sat passively and watched, as previous governments have done through the years, how would it have looked then?

This government has produced reform after reform, law after law. Much of what the Police Authority has said it needs in order to be effective has been received.

But the work against crime, not least organized crime, is difficult. When the police move forward their positions and become more effective, the criminals see to it that they duck and find other paths and other ways to earn money. Today we see how more and more people in leading positions within the criminal networks are no longer active in Sweden but are located abroad, not infrequently in slightly less democratic countries where it is difficult to establish cooperation for the law enforcement authorities. There, it is difficult to get to them.

Here at home in Sweden, the police can disrupt the activities - make it difficult to be part of the criminal networks, make it difficult to be a criminal. The leaders, however, are harder to reach. We can cut off the dragon's arms, but we need to cut off the head.

This requires a new way of thinking. I am therefore pleased to see that the government and the Minister for Justice are involved and at the forefront of that work. I noted that the Minister for Justice has been abroad and met with their counterparts in order to reach good cooperation. I know that the Police Authority is also working in that direction. That bodes well.

Mr. Speaker! I have a colleague at the police who is called "Doktorn". He is a known face in Gamla stan here in Stockholm, where he is not infrequently seen riding around in the alleys on his Segway. "Doktorn" is a community police officer, and in my opinion, he is the prototype for how a community police officer should be. He is accessible. He is visible. He is out and working on streets and squares. He knows the business owners in the area. He knows those who live in the area. He knows who usually looks for cans in the trash cans. He knows which doors have broken locks. He knows the pickpockets' tricks at the Christmas market. He can recognize a fraudster from a long distance. There is not much that happens in Gamla stan that "Doktorn" does not know about.

This is how a community police officer should be. He or she should be a natural part of the street scene. A community police officer should have knowledge of their area, of those who live there, of those who visit it, and of those who operate in it, legally or illegally. That is when the crime prevention work works. That is when the community police officers make a difference.

Many area police officers testify to this today: It works well when they are allowed to work in a problem-oriented manner, when they are allowed to operate undisturbed by other activities, and when they are allowed to work long-term.

When it comes to crime prevention work and its importance, I believe I said this last year, and I can repeat it again. The police work in three ways: crime prevention, intervention, and investigation. The more crime prevention the police can work on, the less one needs to intervene and the less one needs to investigate. Then one can also move the resources to the crime prevention work.

But for there to be enough area police, it is required that the police force grows. It is also doing that. There are more police officers here in Sweden. This summer we crossed the magic threshold: 24,000. So now there are over 24,000 police officers. There have never ever been so many police officers in Sweden.

If this chamber had been full of police officers, there would have been applause now. More police officers mean that the working environment for our police officers will become better. There will be more who share weekends, nights, and overtime. It means that more police officers will remain in outer service, where police are needed.

Mr. Speaker! Lastly and perhaps most importantly – I see today with concern how more and more young people are being drawn into crime, into serious crime. Teenagers are being recruited to carry out transports of narcotics and weapons and to commit murder. There are today places on the internet and apps where the assignments lie like menus in restaurants. You just have to choose and pick. You get 10,000 to transport a bag from Helsingborg to Stockholm, 100,000 to shoot someone's head off in Eskilstuna, 25,000 to blow up a car in Upplands Väsby and so on. The lists are long and many.

This is, of course, tempting and enticing for a young person who may be doing poorly in school, who lives in a dysfunctional family, and who has grown up with violence and drugs. It can be a young person whom no one sees, whom no one asks how he is doing or how he feels. It can be a young person who throughout his entire upbringing has been told that he is not good enough, that he is not good at anything, and that he is worthless.

Then these guys come, who egg him on and support him and get him to take one of these missions. They cheer him on: Just shoot through the door. It's no danger. You won't get caught.

After he has done it, he is someone. Finally, there are some who see him, who appreciate him and who praise him. And those others, those who previously did not see him, now look at him with completely different eyes, with some form of respect but above all with fear. This elevates him. It gives him self-confidence. Suddenly, he is someone.

But life in crime is not the solution. It is often just a short-term escape from something else. Not infrequently, life in crime and the criminal networks quickly become unpleasant. What was voluntary and exciting at the beginning soon becomes coercion and discomfort. Suddenly, the shooting and killing become reality. You yourself become one of the targets. You start sleeping poorly, you are stressed, you get anxiety, you get a bulletproof vest, you do not dare to move freely and you skip school. Drugs, weapons, controls and police searches become everyday life.

Suddenly one day you are sitting there in the cell with bare walls. You are alone and abandoned. The gangs don't give a damn about you. There are others who can take over after you. Once again you are back where you were at the beginning - alone and abandoned, and no one sees you.

Mr. Speaker! There we, as a society, have a duty to do something. We must be there early and catch these young men who are not seen today and the children who do not feel that they have any other alternatives than to seek out the criminal gangs. In some form of desperation to become something, to be someone, they are prepared to kill. We are talking about children as young as 12 or 13 years old. They are lost, abandoned and unseen. We must stop the new recruitment. We must never stop having that debate, Mr. Speaker.

(Applause)

(TALMANNEN: A mild reminder about proper language in the chamber. In the chamber, we say that one disregards things and do not use the verb that the member used.)

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

Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! We live in a restless and violent time. We have areas and countries with conflicts and full-scale wars. We have a global terror threat, which is also directed towards Sweden. We also have a widespread culture of violence, not least in gang environments. And we have organized crime. The situation is extremely serious.

That it is serious means that the issue is prioritized. It is prioritized for Miljöpartiet and for the rest of the opposition, but also for the government and the government base. Of course, we have different views on different issues. As an opposition party, we will criticize proposals that we do not believe in. We will not be afraid of that. But we will also not criticize for the sake of it. We will welcome proposals that we believe can lead forward. We will present our own proposals and naturally welcome it if the government takes them further. We will also criticize in cases where that does not happen.

Mr. Speaker! We will reassess and take new positions in cases where the world changes or circumstances justify it. We will have no prestige in this.

The police have received many new tools. Miljöpartiet has stood behind most of them. There are things that we have not stood behind in the last year, for example, visitation zones and anonymous witnesses. But the majority we have seen as necessary. We think, for example, that secret coercive measures, even in cases where they are used preventively and for those who have not turned 15, will also be necessary because the development has led there. It was needed to save lives.

The penalties for committing crimes have been significantly increased over the last decade. It is worth illustrating the development and where we have arrived, Mr. Speaker. In 2014, when the S-MP government took office, the minimum sentence for aggravated weapons crime was six months of imprisonment. Today it is four years. We have also increased the penalties for sexual offenses and other serious violent crimes. And it has been justified.

Most of those who sit imprisoned in our facilities around Sweden are not serving time for having committed the most serious crimes. The vast majority have not committed murder or serious sexual offenses but are locked up because of other things. We need to be vigilant so that we do not get a situation where people who have been sentenced to prison for a shorter period are recruited by the gangs during the prison sentence and come out as more hardened criminals than when they were locked up.

The Prison and Probation Service is one of the most pressured agencies in Sweden. They have visited us in the Committee on Justice today. They are doing a fantastic job and are expanding both physical sites and staff at a rapid pace. But they are under pressure. This has consequences for how one can work so that those who are incarcerated become better when they are released one day.

Mr. Speaker! Striking at the money is essential in the fight against gang crime. Many of us have high hopes for the new forfeiture legislation, which we handled here in the Riksdag just a short while ago.

In some parts, Miljöpartiet would have wanted to go further, which is evident in our follow-up motion. We have also asked questions about this earlier to the Minister for Justice. In the bill, this was accounted for: When the district court rejects that the seizure shall remain, we have wanted that it should not happen until the judgment has gained legal force. If the case is to proceed to the Court of Appeal, it means that the person who had something seized shall not get access to it, but rather that one shall wait until the Court of Appeal has conducted its review. I hope, Mr. Speaker, that the government wants to consider proceeding with the proposal.

Regarding the budget, which is the subject of the debate, Miljöpartiet is the party in Sweden's Riksdag that invests the most in the justice system. We want to invest more in the police and the Swedish Economic Crime Authority than the government does, and we want to establish a police inspectorate as an independent authority. In that case, it would replace the Special Investigations Department that exists today. We want it to be a separate authority, similar to Ivo for healthcare and the School Inspectorate for schools, which should be able to audit the police and perhaps also some other part of the justice system. This becomes more urgent as the entire justice system grows as it is doing.

Mr. Speaker! We also have investments of 1 billion SEK on crime prevention work. We are making an investment in legal assistants so that more people can receive legal aid, which is an important issue of legal certainty, and we want to invest more in compensation for damages incurred due to crime.

Since the budget framework for Miljöpartiet is larger than the government's, there is no possibility of making a motion. Instead, I refer to Miljöpartiet's special statement in the report.

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

Torsten Elofsson (KD)

Mr. Speaker! I had not intended to request the floor, but when Rasmus Ling brought up an investment of 1 billion for crime prevention measures, I was unexpectedly reminded of something Albert Einstein is said to have said: The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.

I became a little curious. Over the years, a lot of money has nevertheless been invested in crime prevention measures within social services and schools. In the municipalities, a number of crime prevention interventions have been carried out in different ways. But we have nevertheless ended up in the situation that we find ourselves in today, with serious crime, with children being recruited to commit serious violent crimes and so on.

How do you intend to spend this billion on crime prevention measures? Is there anything new that has not already been done?

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

Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! I thank you very much for the question.

I can agree that it is madness to repeatedly do things that do not work. This applies to things that have been tested, however, not in Sweden. As Teresa Carvalho described in her post, in Denmark they have invested in identifying young people on the move who risk being recruited into gangs.

It is naturally not free to have adults who go with the children and ensure that they are in school and do not commit crimes afterwards. After school, they accompany the children home and ensure that they do their homework. This costs money, and we have allocated 1 billion where this becomes an important part.

In Denmark, this has proven to be an effective measure. One can, of course, also take other measures - 1 billion is a lot of money but will not be enough for everything. For those who have already started committing crimes, monitoring with an electronic ankle bracelet can be an option. There is also youth supervision and other things.

To invest properly - 1 billion - to ensure that these boys, which is what it is usually about, do not commit crimes or are sucked in by the gangs would be significantly better than choosing to do as the government and invest 30 billion to lower taxes for those with the very highest incomes.

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

Torsten Elofsson (KD)

Mr. Speaker! I thank you for the answer.

It is possible that the method of marking young criminals can have an effect. It is not the case that the police have not tried this previously in some contexts. It has notably occurred in our home city of Malmö.

I am a bit curious whether Rasmus Ling sees no crime-preventing effect from the fact that we solve crimes, lock up serious criminals for longer periods, and ensure that they cannot commit the crimes they might have committed if we had a more liberal criminal policy than what is currently the case.

The idea is, of course, that we are to remove dangerous individuals from the street so that they cannot commit crimes. It should also, naturally, have a certain deterrent effect for other people who may have plans to commit crimes.

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

Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! It is beyond all doubt that crimes being solved and that crimes have consequences in themselves are crime-preventing. I hope that is sufficient answer to the question, even if it might be possible to elaborate on the whole. Obviously, it has an effect - even a crime-preventing one - if a large proportion of the crimes committed are solved.

If one looks at the research and other countries, one can conclude that the answer is not as clear when it comes to imprisoned persons being a deterrent factor. The countries that have the highest penalties do not have a lower proportion of crime than other countries. Such a clear connection does not, therefore, exist. If, however, individuals who are extremely violent and who commit serious violent crimes and have done so on repeated occasions are incarcerated, they obviously cannot commit crimes against society during that time.

Mr. Speaker! This measure is nothing that has been tried. We do not mean that police should accompany the young people, but we want to make a state investment similar to the one that has been made in Denmark. There, it has been very clearly established that this has a great effect.

I know that the Tidö parties and the government are very interested in Denmark. But unfortunately, they have ignored this measure, even though Denmark has clearly shown that it has had a great effect. Instead of investing money in keeping potentially criminal individuals away from crime and instead having them in school and doing homework after the school day, the government unfortunately chooses to prioritize tax cuts for people who have a very high monthly income.

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

Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! In the 2022 election, the Moderaterna and the parties on our side of politics received the mandate to get Sweden in order. A majority of the voters voted for a change to reverse the development in a Sweden that has become poorer and more dangerous.

We took over in a situation where ten-year-old children are recruited into criminal networks and where children both murder and are murdered. We took over in a situation where shootings and explosions undermine the integrity, freedom, and safety of innocent people and where rules on secrecy prevent school, police, and social services from sitting down around the same table and sharing information with each other about children who are suffering.

We took over in a situation where authorities are being subjected to infiltration and influence, where criminals are deceiving our welfare systems and where the criminal economy has been allowed to flourish while gang leaders live luxurious lives and engage in serious crime against Sweden from sunnier latitudes.

The starting point we inherited was, therefore, dark. Between 2012 and 2022, the fatal gun violence in Sweden tripled. The police have estimated that the criminal economy turns over 100-150 billion kronor per year, and a staggering 62,000 people are judged to be either active in or connected to a criminal network.

The Swedish problem situation that we took over is unparalleled in our Nordic neighboring countries and, in that respect, in other European countries. In the long run, our free and open society is threatened.

For far too many years, far too little was done - too little to strike against violence, too little to strangle the criminal economy, and too little to break the recruitment of children and young people into the gangs. But now we have changed course. No task is more important for the government than to push back the system-threatening organized crime.

Since the change of government just over two years ago, we have been shifting the policy to combat and prevent crime. The strategy is simple and stands on three legs: strike hard against the gangs' gross violence, choke the criminal economy, and break the recruitment of children and young people into the gangs. Month by month, it is now becoming much harder to be a criminal in Sweden.

In October last year, the police were granted the right to wiretap gang criminals in order to prevent shootings and explosions and also to do this preventively. In January, the minimum sentence for serious weapons offenses was doubled, in February stay-away orders were introduced, and in April, the police were granted the right to establish security zones while the protection for police officers was strengthened. It concerns the police officers who work closest and who are most exposed to organized crime.

In July, it became easier to evict criminal tenants, in September we further expanded the possibilities to use secret coercive measures, and in November, the police and prosecutors finally got the opportunity to go directly after the mafia leaders' assets and luxury items.

Two years into the parliamentary term, however, we are still far from finished. We are only at the beginning of a ten-year journey to take control of the gangs.

From the turn of the year, Mr. Speaker, it will become easier to break the gangs' culture of silence through anonymous witnesses. The rules on secrecy will be changed so that information can be shared between authorities to prevent and solve crimes, and the system regarding the young is being fundamentally overhauled – from a new Social Services Act all the way to youth imprisonment. At the same time, the government is making large economic investments in both the justice system and in broader crime-preventive measures.

Mr. Speaker! The Government is therefore proposing that the appropriations to the justice system during the years 2023-2027 shall increase from 69 to 100 billion kronor in total. In the budget for next year, there are clear priorities. Let me mention four of these.

Firstly, we are increasing the police density and strengthening the police's capability. The police shall grow towards the goal that the police density shall at least correspond to the average in the EU. To get more people to apply for police training, we are strengthening the conditions for aspirants. It is the first substantial salary increase for aspirants since 2002. We propose that those who study at the police training from the autumn semester of 2024, under certain conditions and terms, shall have their student loans repaid or waived.

We are now establishing a financial intelligence center within the police and strengthening the police's camera capabilities. When we now make such substantial investments in the police, it is also very much about the police being able to do much more than combat gang crime. This applies in particular to violence against women.

This is absolutely necessary so that we also get full force in all other reforms in this area that are now underway: the tightened contact prohibitions, the increased penalties, and the secrecy-breaking rules, which so to speak shall be torn down so that information can be shared in order to prevent the deadly violence against vulnerable women.

Growth is also important to ensure that it happens locally. It provides increased opportunities to resolve more crimes in the criminality that affects citizens in everyday life. In the assignment that we gave the new police commissioner upon taking office a year ago, we underscored the importance of increasing the impact and efficiency - I gladly use the word productivity - in the agency now that we are adding so much more of the taxpayers' money. That was the first thing.

Secondly, we strengthen the Security Service's ability to reduce serious threats from foreign powers and violent extremism and terrorism.

Thirdly, we ensure that the Prison and Probation Service can continue its expansion with full force.

For the fourth, the courts are provided with funds to be able to handle an increasing number of cases and strengthen security. At the same time, the Prosecution Authority also receives increased resources so that more crimes can be investigated and prosecuted and more criminal gains can be recovered.

These priorities are about our ability as a country to handle the potent threats to our internal security: terrorism and violent extremism, the state actors acting hostiley towards Sweden, and organized crime. At the same time, we shall have a breadth so that we can also handle all other challenges to the freedom and security of individual people in our country.

Mr. Speaker! We see now that new resources, new tools, and new methods of working are beginning to take effect. The number of shootings during the first three quarters of this year has decreased significantly in comparison to the bloody record year of 2022. Significantly more violent crimes are being prevented and solved.

Step by step, we are also giving back the power to the responsible majority. Through residency bans, open drug scenes have been able to be closed, and honest citizens have begun to get back the public space from the gangs. But the risk of new spirals of violence remains. Innocent people continue to be affected by the violence. The gangs are constantly finding new ways to enrich themselves and recruit new children and young people.

Even before the election, the Moderates said it would take at least a decade to reverse the development. Experiences from other countries confirm this. We are talking about a marathon, not a sprint. In New York, it took ten years to take back control from the gangs. In Denmark, it took approximately the same amount of time.

Sweden is now two years into its ten-year journey. We will continue to move the positions forward until we arrive – until we have struck down violence, strangled the criminal economy and broken the recruitment of children and young people in Sweden.

Budget by budget, reform by reform, we continue to make Sweden a safer and freer country.

(Applause)

In this speech, Caroline Högström (M) agreed.

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

Teresa Carvalho (S)

Mr. Speaker! I want to begin by extending a sincere thanks to the Minister for Justice for participating in the debate here today. It gives me the opportunity to ask a highly topical question, and for that, I am particularly grateful.

In just the last year, the number of children under 15 suspected of being involved in murder cases has increased by 200 percent. The municipalities' costs for the placement of children and young people are skyrocketing while the government has put the municipalities on a slimming course that forces them to now save on interventions for children and young people with criminal behavior. Instead, the government lowers the tax for the richest and urges the municipalities to prioritize.

That the government does not add a single krona to the general state grants to the municipalities, nor does it step in to specifically provide relief given the skyrocketing placement costs, is not only tone-deaf but also inept. Everyone knows that we must break the new recruitment if we are to be able to stop the criminal gangs' rampage, but this is undeniably the government's blind spot.

The police also warn that gang criminals operate and own HVB homes and that HVB homes function as drug and weapon caches, from which children are recruited using completely ruthless methods. All too often we hear about teenagers who have escaped from just HVB homes and are out on murder missions, and last week we heard about a company that cashed out 10 million kronor in profit from our tax money, which should have gone to the care of these children.

We Social Democrats want to stop this by increasing the staff's powers and letting the municipalities take over, but the Moderates firmly say no to this. I want to ask the Minister for Justice: How can the government defend this sick HVB home failure?

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

Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! I am listening to Social Democratic municipal councilors who do not believe at all that it is even possible, possibly theoretically, to municipalize child and youth care.

It is, of course, not the same as defending the poor conditions that exist both in homes run by private actors and in those that are, for example, run in associations between different municipalities.

During the autumn, the police, in cooperation with the Swedish Economic Crime Authority and Ivo, which is the supervisory authority, have conducted very intensive work to locate, inspect, and shut down homes where there are substandard conditions.

There is no doubt whatsoever about the government's line and the responsible authorities' line. That work will not cease until the last element of crime is uprooted. This applies regardless of who happens to be the head of the household.

When it comes to austerity measures, it is unfortunately the case that the inflation we inherited from the previous government has put our entire society on a diet. The fact is that the best we can do to ensure that municipalities have resources in the long term to also carry out offensive work for crime prevention is to push back the inflation so that the money does not continue to lose value. Through that work, the entire municipal and regional sector will only have 50 billion more to move with next year when it comes to reduced pension costs.

When it comes to lowered taxes on labor, there was a time when the Social Democrats also gave thought to how the resources in society should grow. We know that the best way to get the resources for welfare and the justice system to grow is for people to work and that it pays to work.

I am proud that we are re-establishing that line. It is the one that guarantees that growth will increase, that resources will increase, and that opportunities will improve for municipalities and law enforcement agencies to work both preventively and repressively against crime.

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

Teresa Carvalho (S)

Mr. Speaker! Let me begin where the Minister for Justice finished. It became a tax policy debate.

I believe that the Minister for Justice knows that the Social Democrats do not say no to all tax cuts. We also have tax cuts for ordinary people. What I objected to was that the government, with almost surgical precision, steps in and lowers the tax for the very richest in our society.

It is being done in a situation where we find ourselves in a national crisis with children murdering and being murdered, and more money is needed for social services and everyone possible who needs to work on breaking the new recruitment.

It is obvious that it is the government's blind spot. It is obvious that the government has no further crisis insight when it comes to the role of HVB homes in the national crisis, which was what I asked about.

That criminals can run HVB homes and make money from them, buy and sell them on Blocket like used cars, is not just a failure. It should also be a red line for all parties, and perhaps especially for the party that leads the government.

Mr. Speaker! In addition to the reluctance to stop the HVB failure, the government has also cut specific state grants that are targeted at breaking the new recruitment in vulnerable areas. They say no to our proposals for 1.5 billion for the identification of young people on the move with ankle monitors or companions.

Then I do hear from time to time that the government has started talking about stopping the new recruitment. That is incredibly welcome. It has not always sounded like that. But the measures still shine with their absence.

I really want to urge Gunnar Strömmer not to let this remain merely a lip service. I hope that the Minister of Justice returns to the chamber after a much-needed Christmas break with a bit more commitment to break the new recruitment.

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

Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! I can promise that the commitment will be at least as high as it has been for two years when we also reform the crime prevention work with the same systematic approach as for the crime-fighting work.

The fact is that the children who are now being drawn into the gangs were either just newborns or two, three, or four years old when the Social Democratic ministers moved into Rosenbad.

I completely agree with the need to change the system, change the crime prevention work, and reform the entire child and youth care. But it is difficult to say that one can find any guidance in the work that the Social Democrats themselves have conducted in the area. We are forced to seek inspiration elsewhere, and that is what we are doing now as well.

It concerns everything from the most absurd parts. For example, it has not been possible to take mobile phones or tablets from those who are admitted to the Sis homes. It would still be commendable with a certain degree of humility if one leaves such a legacy behind when it comes to prevention.

It is not that the social services have had the tools they need. Finally, a social services act is now being put in place, which is furthermore paired with an investment of 8 billion kronor so that it can have full effect.

The requested highlighting is now coming. If you would like a little more commitment from my side, I would like a little more communication and substance than hot air in the new year. I have noted the initiatives in the committees. They are characterized by being half an A4 page with double spacing, and no other parties vote for them.

If I am to show a bit more passion in policy areas that other ministers are responsible for, I would like to receive a bit more substance to work with from the other side. Perhaps that would be an appropriate mutual New Year's promise.

What I take away from this day, where I have sat for quite a long time and listened here in the chamber, is what we are bringing here. It is four parties with a great insight into reality, an ability to renew politics when it comes to both crime fighting and crime prevention, and an ability to agree on money that is real.

Furthermore, we are jointly responsible for an economic policy that is stable and has an idea that the cake should grow so that we can invest even more. I heard Teresa Carvalho say that she does not have an alternative gathered behind the Social Democrats. That has been confirmed today. Perhaps we will also see more of that commodity in the new year.

(Applause)

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

Ulrika Liljeberg (C)

Mr. Speaker! This week I met a dairy farmer in Dalarna. He is an entrepreneur and is also involved in LRF Entreprenad. He told me about the challenges that rural businesses face within forestry, land, and agriculture.

A report from LRF Entreprenad regarding their member companies that came earlier this autumn shows that thefts of diesel and fraud continue to be the largest crime groups, but they are not increasing. On the other hand, thefts of machines and tools have increased.

What is astonishing is that half of those affected by crime state that they do not report it to the police. This in itself is a gross undermining of the trust in and confidence in the police and the justice system. A third of those who did report state that the police dismissed it immediately or refused to accept their report.

My question is: When will the large resource increases that the government proposes and that we support arrive? When will they yield results for these small rural enterprises?

We have a crime debate and a tax debate, but it is also a budget debate that touches upon economic policy. Continued growth is important. We know that the small businesses that keep the country running are important.

The question is: How long should small businesses wait for the productivity and efficiency, which are worthy, to arrive? When will they come? Is it in ten years or eight years?

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Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! It may possibly take a year or, in the worst case, two years.

Thank you for the opportunity to discuss a very important aspect of crime. It is also reflected in the mandate that we gave to the new police leadership when they took office a year ago.

There is no doubt whatsoever that organized crime must be combated. This applies to the violence, the criminal economy, and the recruitment of children and young people, which we have spoken about so far. It is an incredibly central task for the police. The extensive resource reinforcements must, of course, be seen largely in that light.

But as I underlined earlier, one must see that the large resource additions that are now occurring are also intended to ensure that that task does not push out all other important police work.

In the assignment to the police leadership, the primary task was to ensure that the growth in police numbers occurs locally where crime occurs near the citizens. That is the first thing.

The second is the successes we are now seeing when it comes to, for example, crime clearances of fatal shootings. These are crime clearances since 2022. It has gone from approximately 20 percent nationally to over 70 percent this year.

It is a quite remarkable journey that the police are undertaking with new ways of working, new resources, and new tools. That way of working is also to be transferred to citizen-proximate crime. That is the second important part of the mission. There we have such things as those that are not counted as everyday crime, such as violence against women and that type of crime, but there are also, to a high degree, the crimes of misappropriation, the thefts that affect many citizens and not least farmers, for example diesel thefts and other fuel thefts, machinery, and theft of electronics.

I therefore think that we should return to the crime-affected farmers and say that help is on the way. The police now have a mission to implement the effective methods from gang crime also when it comes to everyday crime, which in these cases can admittedly also be part of organized crime. The step is not far.

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Ulrika Liljeberg (C)

Mr. Speaker! These are entrepreneurs that I meet here and now, not one or two years ago. They are food entrepreneurs, and since this is not public service, I can say that I, for example, meet grocery retailers who say that they submit police reports but then do not even open the envelope when it comes back, because they know that the crime is directly written off.

This is about the social contract. We stand behind the investments, and they are laudable ambitions, but as representatives of the opposition and the citizens, we also have a great responsibility.

Did I perceive that the Minister spoke of one or two years? Safeguarding the social contract so that people call the police because they expect the call to be answered also makes people want to pay taxes and go and vote. There is, therefore, very much in the balance here. The crimes occur in our entire country, so we should not have any further polarization.

Just to repeat it: it was therefore spoken of one or two years and also of eight years or ten years in the entry. These are important messages for these companies, which every day choose to invest and work for Sweden.

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Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! Thank you, Ulrika Liljeberg, for raising these incredibly important issues regarding small business activity! There is a strong sense of community there, and it is, between us, possibly why I also believe that the more systematic party community should be moved forward a bit.

With that said, I just want to say that it is very important that we raise these issues now.

Regarding local growth, we have said a few things, if I am to elaborate on that part of the assignment. We do not invest so much of the taxpayers' money in the police now so that it should grow at the top, but it must grow close to the citizens. The police must answer the phone when the citizens call. The police must acknowledge.

Regarding the Ica and Coop retailers that Ulrika Liljeberg refers to, many also say that they do not call the police, because they do not think it is meaningful. One might not experience the police responding in the way one would wish, but unfortunately, it is also the case that the journey that begins if one is to take a matter all the way to court, with the effect of all-too-low penalties and other things, appears as a meaningless operation.

I completely agree with this. We are to have a police force that grows locally and that answers the phone when citizens call. The police shall also handle what is sometimes, I think, a bit sloppily described as mass crime, i.e., the crime close to citizens and businesses. The police shall also transfer the effective methods of work that have resulted in such a significant increase in the crime clearance rate when it concerns, for example, fatal shootings, to the local crime investigation activities.

This work has been initiated. When I said one to two years, I meant that they should see the effects of this tangibly in the near term, even though we have enough insight, just from international experiences, to say that the point where we can say that we have taken a proper stranglehold on the criminal networks and really pushed them back to a point where we are ahead of the curve lies a number of years ahead in time.

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Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! I also want to take the opportunity to thank the Minister for his presence at this debate. It is not the first year, but something recurring, and I think it is very good for the democratic dialogue and the debate surrounding these very important issues.

I intended to dwell a bit on the situation in the correctional services, which is extremely strained in many ways. The detention centers are full on the vast majority of days and occasions. We have even seen cases where it has been necessary to use the police's holding cells to temporarily house persons who are not to be released. Many are also detained for a long time, and many have restrictions. This is something that, of course, one does not do just for the sake of it, but because it is needed during the course of the investigation.

There are, however, people who are held in custody without restrictions, and there are people who are released on bail. I wanted to ask about a previous proposal from an investigation, which the management of Kriminalvården has also put forward as a request in the capacity report that was submitted to the government nearly a year ago. In that report, it was requested that the possibility of so-called house arrest and area arrest be introduced as a kind of middle ground between being on bail and being held in custody without restrictions. This means that one receives an ankle monitor and must be either in their home or in a delimited area.

Mr. Speaker! Is this, or something else, something that Gunnar Strömmer will consider to alleviate the pressure? This obviously does not apply to the most serious cases and should also not be to the detriment of investigations, but it is about increased flexibility and about being able to ease the pressure.

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Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! Thank you, Rasmus Ling, for the question!

There is no doubt whatsoever that there is a great pressure on the Swedish criminal justice system, and it is a long series of factors that has brought us to that point.

It cannot be avoided that the expansion of the correctional services started far too late. The social development, which we have described from different perspectives today, with organized, very serious crime, creates a very high pressure in itself. When we see that the police are now increasing the crime clearance rate from 20 to 70 percent regarding fatal shootings, the most serious crimes, which will result in very many years of imprisonment, it is an enormously large success in our society, but it is clear that it also contributes to further increasing the pressure on the correctional services.

Necessary sentencing increases that have contributed to this have already been made, for example, the doubling of the minimum sentences for the serious weapons offenses and the illegal handling of explosives - these are completely necessary sentencing increases that also contribute to the increased pressure. In that situation, we are of course prepared to do a number of different things to not only alleviate the pressure but also persistently ensure that the correctional services expand and can carry out its mission.

That is why we are investing record sums in Swedish correctional services. It is an appropriation increase without historical precedent. We have tasked the correctional services with streamlining operations in various ways. For example, a very progressive digitalization work is being conducted, which can also be very rationalizing when it comes to personnel resources in the correctional services. We are investigating the possibility of leasing prison places abroad. We are also open to looking at other tools and measures that can contribute to this.

Without pre-emptively writing off any proposals, we must keep in mind what is the purpose of the detentions. That must not be compromised. The risk of flight and of destroying the investigation must always come first. If one can take that into account and still contribute to easing the pressure, I am open to looking at it, but I cannot give any more concrete answers today.

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Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! I look forward to clearer announcements ahead when the government has considered this further.

Of course, it should not jeopardize investigations or complicate preliminary investigations, which I underlined in the first post and maintain even now. But as we heard today, one can be released. We basically have no middle ground between being remanded in custody without restrictions and being released. If one does this in a well-balanced way, it could also reduce the risk of flight.

This concerned the prisons, but there is also a great pressure on the staff. Even with the large expansion and large increase in appropriations that the Minister for Justice mentions, we nevertheless face a situation in the foreseeable future where it will be pressured. The recruitment need will probably be greater than what will be achieved all the time. It will be a pressured agency for a long time to come.

Even in this area, we have discussed how we should facilitate. For natural reasons, we are usually focused on the most serious acts of violence and the worst crimes. But most of those who are imprisoned do not belong to those who have murdered or committed aggravated rapes; instead, most are something else. The Safety Preparation, which was led by Henrik Vinge, also proposed increased opportunities to serve the sentence with an electronic ankle monitor in cases where it is appropriate. Is this something, Mr. Speaker, that the government will consider moving forward with?

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Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! We are, of course, considering the Safety Commission's proposal carefully. The commission was led, quite rightly, by Henrik Vinge from the Sweden Democrats. A long series of very solidly substantiated proposals emerged – moreover, in great party-political agreement. It is clear that we are considering those proposals very carefully.

An important starting point has been that the type of, for example, electronic surveillance and ankle bracelets could certainly be used in several cases, but not in such cases when it, for example, concerns crimes where it would be offensive to use that type of sanction – typically seen crimes directed against a person.

We are open to this, and it is part of the whole that we are now working on regarding the consequences and the future of Kriminalvården.

I do not know if we will have more exchanges before Christmas, and let me therefore say a big thank you for all the meaningful exchanges of views with Rasmus Ling. Nevertheless, I must still make a reflection on the so-called alternative to that which we four parties put forward in today's debate. It concerns a few things that I take with me from here today.

One such example is the Social Democrats' message that they do not have a unified alternative behind them but are only arguing as a party. That might hold for a few more months, but I do not believe it will hold much longer. When it comes down to the wire, this must be reconciled. I know there were different opinions on whether to enter the work with different views on which economic frameworks should apply. 200 billion is no small amount. Either the Social Democrats will not buy this when it comes down to the wire, and then 200 billion of Rasmus Ling's budget will be removed. Is it then the justice system that should take that hit? Or else the Social Democrats must give in, and then the debt will increase. Then taxpayers' money will go towards interest on loans instead of to the justice system. It is going to be an interesting and extraordinarily central debate to continue moving forward.

Since then, it is a fact that the Social Democrats vote for our proposals because we put them on the table, but in 70 percent of the cases the Left Party says no and in 60 percent of the cases Rasmus Ling says no. How you are going to make the political content work remains to be seen as well, but we can take that in the new year.

Thank you for this year and until we meet again!

(Applause)

The deliberation was hereby concluded.

(A decision was to be taken on 11 December.)

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