Municipal and regional issues

Oskar Svärd (M)

Mr. Speaker! Sweden is a fantastic country with 290 municipalities with different municipal councils, 21 regions with regional municipal councils and national governance from here, the Swedish Riksdag.

The breadth of issues raised in the motions included in the report that we are now debating demonstrates the diversity of tasks that our municipalities and regions have to manage. Overall, the report also shows the differing conditions that prevail. This is what I particularly want to comment on.

I want to highlight two municipalities in my home county of Örebro län: Ljusnarsberg Municipality with approximately 4,400 inhabitants and Örebro with 160,000 inhabitants. Both of these municipalities have inhabitants who set their alarms and go to work, inhabitants who invest time, commitment, and money into starting, running, and developing their companies, inhabitants who have worked an entire professional life and have now embraced retirement, and inhabitants who participate in associations and local heritage centers, engage in leisure activities, and contribute to civil society.

Despite significant differences in the size of the municipalities, Ljusnarsberg and Örebro share the same fundamental responsibilities. They must ensure that residents have access to good service, education, elderly care, and social interventions. Furthermore, the municipalities are responsible for the maintenance of roads and streets, environmental supervision, as well as the handling of planning and building issues. To manage this, it is required that the supply of competence is stable, that they succeed in finding specialist competence within several different areas, and that the regional development is given the right conditions.

Mr. Speaker! Regardless of how one compares Sweden's municipalities and regions, the mission is the same, even if the conditions differ significantly. It is obvious that a growing large city with a larger population base has different opportunities to meet its obligations than a municipality characterized by population decline.

Given that municipalities and regions bear the primary responsibility for the majority of welfare in the country, it is therefore natural that their conditions, organization, and capacity to fulfill their mission arouse great interest and commitment. It is of great importance that the local political assemblies have the right conditions, stable legislation, and security to lean on in carrying out their missions.

Mr. Speaker! Democracy is not a state one achieves once and for all. It is a daily practice. That practice is exercised just as much in a municipal council as it is here in the chamber where we find ourselves right now.

We now live in a time where social media sometimes rewards the loud over the thoughtful and the provocative over the constructive. It creates a pull in politics, not just nationally but at all levels, towards being seen rather than delivering and towards creating confrontation rather than solving problems.

Local democracy is not a symbolic issue. It is the foundation for everything else, and it deserves politicians who see their mandate for what it is: a trust from the citizens, not a stage for themselves.

If trust in politics erodes, if citizens turn away in despair, if young people watch a debate, local or national, and conclude that there is no point in it, then something more than a party or a mandate period is damaged. Then the system that we have a duty to nurture, as elected representatives and as citizens, is damaged.

Mr. Speaker! In conclusion, I would like to take the opportunity to extend a big thank you to you who engage in politics locally and regionally. It is the elected officials who every day bear a responsibility for the school, for elderly care, and for ensuring that the roads are cleared of snow when people are going to work. It is often at the local level, in municipal and regional councils, that the decisions are made that are closest to the citizens all around our elongated country. Local democracy is an important part of our society. We do our part nationally. The local level does its part for its municipality and its region, but with Sweden's best interests in mind.

I vote in favor of the committee's proposal.

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Peter Hedberg (S)

Mr. Speaker! Many of us Members of Parliament are involved in municipal and regional politics in various ways, even though our primary time is spent at the national level.

On Monday, I, as chairman of the Kramfors municipal council, led our first meeting this year. At that meeting, a decision was made regarding a reduction in the number of members and substitutes. The two main reasons were adaptation due to the population decline and the difficulty of recruiting elected officials. I have noted in both traditional media and social media that similar decisions have been made across Sweden over the last six months.

In many municipalities, this is a necessary change, but it is naturally regrettable, not least because municipal democracy and the decisions made at the local level are so crucial for those parts of the welfare and social construction that for the most part are closest to the citizens. It is about where schools should be located, and it concerns the conditions of home care, building permits, sanction fees, and investments in the local grid, and so on.

Mr. Speaker! We would need to have more elected representatives in municipalities and regions, but unfortunately, reality is as it is. There is, however, a group that actually, in many ways, upholds the democratic backbone of local democracy, and that is our elderly and seniors. This applies to both political mandates and within association life – within local heritage societies and in sports, disability associations, religious communities, and much more.

We Social Democrats want to strengthen the elderly's participation in local democracy. Therefore, we propose this year, just as in previous years, that every municipality and region shall establish a mandatory pensioners' council. The goal of such a council is to strengthen the elderly's influence and oversight in issues concerning their living conditions that are handled at the municipal level. We do not, however, want to regulate in detail how the councils should be designed, as that is best done locally. We do believe, however, that continuous and systematic dialogue with pensioners' organizations and municipal representatives is of great importance to meet the needs of the elderly group. Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I move for approval of reservation 4.

This is a report that last year contained significantly more reservations. Due to the lack of many reservations, I had intended to hold a small principled discussion here, as I have requested six minutes of speaking time. Then, however, I saw the agenda and the speaking list for other matters and suddenly saw an urgent need to streamline the chamber's work, and since Oskar Svärd so creditably raised many of the principled questions regarding which we have the same view of the challenges, I thank you for the floor already now.

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Jan Riise (MP)

Mr. Speaker! One sits here in good spirits and thinks: "He will probably keep going for a couple of minutes more." But that is not what happened!

I have no reservations regarding this report. It may look a bit dull that the Green Party would not have any formal opinions on this, but that does not mean that we do not have views on various matters. I thought, therefore, I would still speak a little, and it may happen that it takes up to six minutes. We shall see.

I thought I would start by speaking a little about local self-government, which is mentioned already in Chapter 1, Section 1 of the Instrument of Government: a representative and parliamentary system of government and through local self-government.

The right of municipalities and regions to make their own decisions and to levy taxes has developed over a long period and has gradually become increasingly extensive. What we call the welfare state has come to take up more and more space in regions and municipalities, both economically and in the everyday lives of many people. School, healthcare, and care have simply grown in importance.

Simultaneously, and somewhat paradoxically, state governance has become more detailed. It is possible to say that even we as legislators contribute to this with new requirements on municipal governance. Furthermore, our authorities contribute even more details.

We have also recently had a discussion about how the municipal right of veto should be designed so that state interests do not get squeezed – to put it a bit acidly. For my part, I think that municipal self-government and the multi-level governance it can entail is also an indispensable part of our independence and our legal system.

Mr. Speaker! Multi-level governance is a relatively new field, or rather to say it has existed for a long time but has not been discussed within research until actually the 90s. For Sweden's part, it also became more relevant in connection with the EU's expansion, when we became members just over 30 years ago.

We thus have a structure with four levels with their respective prerequisites: municipality, region, nation and EU, and then coordination is, of course, in some sense A and O. The relationship between the EU and nations and regions is an area, and one can say that the subsidiarity test that is carried out here in the Riksdag of proposals for legal acts is a part of that coordination.

Another example at the national and international level is climate adaptation and climate work more generally. In Sweden, the previous government provided funds to support municipal work with climate adaptation by financing a number of services specifically for coordination at the county administrative boards around Sweden. It was not large sums, but it was enough for one or a couple of people in each region who could help the municipalities develop and get started with various forms of climate adaptation measures.

Personally, I think that, on one hand, it was unfortunate that these supports were removed, and on the other hand, that they themselves point to precisely the coordinating role that is required for governance at multiple levels to be effective and beneficial.

Other initiatives that emerged during the first decades of the 2000s were that cities, especially large ones, all over the world joined forces to accelerate climate development based on both a desire to contribute and an insight that while national strategies and legislation are good, the work is created locally. Stockholm was one of the cities that participated early in the so-called C40 cooperation.

This involved, among others, some of the truly large philanthropic organizations, such as the Rockefeller Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies and, on a slightly closer level, Realdania in Denmark. This led to a collaboration that now encompasses 100 cities which have collectively and individually reduced their emissions by significant volumes.

Mr. Speaker! Regarding the free municipality attempts, for which there is also a motion and which has been addressed in the committee report, a "devolution" was carried out in the United Kingdom just over ten years ago, where a number of powers were transferred from the state to the city of Manchester – or actually Greater Manchester, that is, some kind of Greater Manchester.

One of the more striking results of this is that the more local governance within the health area could contribute to improvements in local health. Since the change was implemented, life expectancy in Greater Manchester has increased. It may not be a good measure, but still. There are, of course, several conceivable explanations for this, but it is still interesting that it appears. The results have been published in The Lancet, which many surely recognize as one of the most respected journals in health and medicine.

Mr. Speaker! The report also contains an account of how symmetrical and asymmetrical distribution of responsibility can be used. The symmetrical means that all bodies at the same level, for example municipalities, have the same responsibility to provide services to their inhabitants. The asymmetrical, therefore, means that in some cases it may be possible to, so to speak, outsource activities, for example to a neighboring municipality with better conditions. This can particularly be relevant for municipalities with a limited population base. We have heard a bit about this before.

This has been investigated in various contexts, and the committee has, in the meantime, chosen not to take a position on any announcements as long as the preparation of submitted reports is ongoing. I think that we have not seen the finished map yet and that more such agreements may be added.

Mr. Speaker! Pilot projects are usually a good way to test something new. We in Miljöpartiet have, among other things, proposed testing the right to vote for 16-year-olds in some municipalities and regions for evaluation and potential adjustments before it can be introduced on a larger scale across the whole country. I request to return to this in another speech in the near future, as the saying goes.

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Jessica Wetterling (V)

Mr. Speaker! I would like to begin by moving for approval of reservation 3 in this report.

I intended to speak about the reservation that we from my party have in this report, but I was somewhat inspired by previous speakers and want to first and foremost say that when one speaks about municipalities and regions, one really needs to emphasize that the heart of our democracy is all those thousands of amateur politicians who do not, as we in the Riksdag, have the privilege of engaging in politics as a full-time occupation.

They choose to spend large parts of their evenings, weekends and leisure time engaging politically and thereby contribute to our democracy being strengthened and developed throughout the country. This also applies to all the civil servants who carry out political decisions in municipalities and regions and execute what we politicians aim to implement.

Now I intended to speak about that which concerns my reservation in the report.

Mr. Speaker! In the 1980s, Sweden was one of the countries that led the way in the fight against apartheid. After courts had put a stop to municipal boycotts against South Africa, the Riksdag took responsibility and enacted a law, called the South Africa Act. It gave municipalities and regions, or county councils as they were called then, the right to boycott South African goods and services. The reason and purpose were clear: taxpayers' money should not be used to support a brutal apartheid system. The South Africa Act applied between the years 1986 and 1993. Nelson Mandela and others have testified that the boycotts contributed to strengthening the resistance against apartheid and to its eventual end.

Today we see how democracy is threatened in our world, and there are new cruel examples of states that violate international law, occupy the territories of other countries and commit serious crimes against human rights.

Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the four-year anniversary of which we noted in the chamber yesterday, has resulted in extensive and well-documented reports of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The International Criminal Court ICC, the UN, and various human rights organizations have gathered evidence of systematic abuses against the civilian population. In December 2023, South Africa filed a case against Israel with the International Court of Justice, ICJ. South Africa argues that Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, and several other countries have stood behind the accusation. Since 1975, large parts of Western Sahara have been occupied by Morocco.

Mr. Speaker! In addition to these examples, we are daily disturbed by violent war scenes, extensive destruction, and above all, how children are affected by war, famine, and death. Despite this, it is not legal for Swedish municipalities and regions to act in solidarity and refuse to procure from the responsible states. The Local Government Act means that every such decision will be overturned by an administrative court if anyone appeals it. We have also seen examples of this in recent years.

In the opinion of the Left Party, it is high time to update the legislation, and it is therefore why we propose that a new solidarity legislation similar to the previous South Africa Act should be introduced. Such a law could give municipalities and regions the right and opportunity, with reference to international decisions, to refrain from trading with states that violate international law.

We believe that municipal citizens should be able to have a reasonable expectation that their tax money does not go to or support states that violate international law. In that case, such a decision in a municipality or region should, of course, be based on decisions by, for example, the UN or the International Court of Justice, ICJ, or an arrest warrant from the ICC.

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Muharrem Demirok (C)

Mr. Speaker! It is the time of annual meetings all over Sweden, both in political parties and in various associations. Many of us travel around the country and participate in these meetings. I was at such a meeting yesterday in Frödinge bygdegård. It was perhaps the feeling from there that made me answer as I did when my children asked me this morning what I was going to do today. Yes, I said, I am going to stand in the chamber and give a declaration of love to Sweden's local democracy and local self-government and to all municipal and regional politicians around the country. They looked at me as if I had lost my mind completely.

I really want to emphasize, and I have heard several say so from the rostrum, that it is a declaration of love for the very best thing, namely local democracy.

I would, however, like to begin by moving for approval of the Center Party's reservation 1.

Sweden is a fantastic country, but it is also a country that looks very different depending on where you are. For us in Centerpartiet, it is a self-evident starting point that politics must reflect this diversity.

To be elected to a Swedish municipality or region is one of the finest assignments one can have. It is there that democracy meets everyday life: in the school, in care, and in the planning of our shared living environments. But for local self-government to be more than a beautiful principle on paper, the municipalities must have the actual conditions to carry out their mandates. Local self-government must not just be a fine line in our constitution; it must be seen as the very engine of our welfare.

In order for that engine to continue to have the strength to pull, it is required that we stop seeing municipalities and regions as subordinate branches and instead see them as the independent, innovative partners they actually are. Therefore, today I particularly want to highlight two perspectives that concern exactly this: the power of cooperation and the courage to let go.

Mr. Speaker! The first perspective is about ensuring service across the entire country by differentiating the municipalities' areas of responsibility. We know that many small municipalities today struggle with an unreasonable administrative burden. It is about difficulties in recruiting specialist competence for the exercise of authority in, for example, environmental protection or managing complex financial assistance. Sometimes the statutory obligations are simply too costly or personnel-intensive for a small organization.

Centerpartiet has therefore pointed towards a voluntary path forward, namely to let the municipalities move areas of activity that are strongly state-regulated to another municipality or to a regional level, if both parties agree. In this way, decisions can be kept close to the citizens in core activities such as preschool and school, but the organization can be relieved where heavy specialist competence is required.

A particularly important perspective here is the protection of the most vulnerable. Through a differentiated distribution of responsibility, we can facilitate for persons who are subjected to violence in close relationships to seek support in a municipality other than the one where they are registered. It is a concrete safety reform that could make a difference.

Critics say that existing collaborations are sufficient. We in Centerpartiet say that one does not exclude the other. We want to give the municipalities another tool in the toolbox to secure the welfare.

Mr. Speaker! My second point concerns the need for a new, more far-reaching free municipality experiment.

In the 80s, we dared to test giving the municipalities greater freedom from state regulations. It turned out well and laid the foundation for the 1991 Local Government Act. Now, more than 40 years later, it is time again. We need to strengthen the municipal sector's capacity by daring to test new ideas locally. We want to see trials with simplified decision-making processes, and especially for small municipalities, we can test directly elected municipal boards.

Imagine an organization where the municipal council and the municipal executive board can function as a single unit, similar to the old municipal boards. It would reduce bureaucracy and shorten the decision-making steps. We want to see trials with an adjusted number of substitutes. By reviewing the number of municipal assignments, we can increase participation and make it easier for more people to engage politically without drowning in administration.

A new free municipality trial is about taking advantage of the innovative power that exists in municipalities from north to south and from east to west. It is about letting local solutions to local problems take precedence over rigid national regulations.

Mr. Speaker! Sweden needs a policy that sees the potential in every municipality. The Centre Party's vision is a Sweden where power is moved closer to the people, closer to those whom our decisions affect. We want to replace state-mandated instructions with local capacity for action. By facilitating cooperation between municipalities, we give them the tools to be robust. By introducing free municipality trials, we give them the freedom to be creative.

Therefore, Mr. Speaker, I move for approval of the Center Party's reservation 1 in the report.

(Applause)

The deliberation was hereby concluded.

(Decisions were made under § 19.)

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