Municipal responsibility for crime prevention work

Lars Isacsson (S)

Madam Speaker! We shall now debate the municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work.

I would like to begin by moving for approval of the committee's proposal in the report, where we Social Democrats have a specific statement.

The proposition is in many ways a social democratic product. I am pleased that we Social Democrats have so clearly raised the issue of preventive measures through the program for crime prevention work that was developed in 2017. I also think it is right that the municipalities are given the primary responsibility for the crime prevention work.

In the proposition, it is established that crime shall be countered through crime fighting. In order for crime to be fought, it is fundamental that committed crimes are detected, investigated, and prosecuted, which is primarily a task for the justice system's authorities. It is further established that crime shall be countered also through preventive measures. Crime prevention work aims to reduce the risk of crimes occurring at all by influencing the causes of or the conditions for crime.

What we want to highlight in our special statement is police presence and funding. We view the police presence with some concern. It states in the bill that the municipalities within their geographical area shall be responsible for the coordination of the crime prevention work by working to ensure that written agreements on cooperation are entered into with relevant actors, and when it comes to relevant actors, the police are number one, two, and three. After that come property owners, local business, civil society, and so on.

If the police do not have resources and officers with local knowledge, this work will fall flat. Police presence with local anchoring, personal knowledge, and an evidence-based approach is absolutely crucial for the crime prevention work in a municipality to be successful. In an investigation on police presence across the country that I requested from the Riksdag's investigation service, it states that the mission for the municipal police activity is primarily to coordinate and work for the local police areas' crime prevention and safety-creating work.

In 2022, there were 227 municipal police officers in the country. According to the same data, there were 1.5 municipal police officers per municipality in Region Stockholm, which is the highest number of municipal police officers per municipality in the country. The lowest number of municipal police officers per municipality is in Region Nord, which has 0.36 municipal police officers per municipality.

The second question we raise in our special statement is the municipalities' financing. The coordination function is financed with 20 kronor per inhabitant. In the bill, it states that the coordination function shall specifically coordinate and support the implementation of the municipality's work according to this Act. It shall constitute the municipality's point of contact in relation to external actors and contribute to ensuring that information about the crime prevention work is disseminated to the municipality's inhabitants and others who may have an interest in or need for such information. The central role that the municipalities hold makes it of great importance that the work carried out is effective and knowledge-based.

The coordinating function shall also have contact with other important actors, such as the Crime Prevention Council, the Gender Equality Authority, the Prison and Probation Service, the county administrative boards, the Agency for Family Law and Parenting Support, the Swedish Tax Agency, the Social Services Agency, the State Institution Board, the Swedish National Agency for Education, and the Swedish Customs. It is not a few tasks we are placing on the coordinating function - and for this, we are allocating 20 kronor per inhabitant.

The board member and committee colleague Ulrika Liljeberg, who was previously the chairman of the municipal executive board in Leksand, often says that Leksand, with its 16,000 inhabitants, is Sweden's median municipality. In half of the country's municipalities, the compensation is therefore at most 320,000 kronor; in many municipalities, it is lower. It is half a municipal position, and in large parts of the country, there are 0.36 municipal police positions. This means that it will be difficult to achieve equality across the entire country, which is something we Social Democrats will come back to in the future.

Madam Speaker! The major crime prevention work, however, takes place in the municipalities' ordinary activities - in preschool, primary school and upper secondary school, within social services, in leisure activities, in the libraries and through support for the voluntary sector. Now, Sweden's municipalities face a steel bath. Municipalities and regions that have just made it through a difficult pandemic are now hit with full force by inflation and cost increases. We have seen the consequences before: They are significant cuts in healthcare, school, elderly care and social services.

Unfortunately, the government and SD remain silent. They do not want to talk about the steel bath that will soon hit ordinary people across the entire country. Their single largest budget commitment this year is a tax cut for high-income earners that costs the state 13 billion kronor. The state grants to municipalities and regions, on the other hand, are far from sufficient.

The consequences for crime prevention work risk being significant. When municipalities are forced to save and streamline, it always happens that they must prioritize the statutory activities. What they can save on are field assistants, outreach activities, youth centers, and student assistants. When municipalities are forced to save on support for community life, it automatically results in less meaningful leisure time and less sports.

Something we have also become aware of in our committee group after meeting, for example, Unizon, is that in many municipalities there is also a reduced support for women's shelters and girls' shelters. Given the increase in men's violence against women, this is completely the wrong way to go.

What would we have done differently from the Social Democrats' side? Yes, we would have handled the economic crisis differently. Instead of lowering taxes for the richest, we wanted to see twice as high state subsidies, and our election promise that every krona invested in the justice system would be matched by a krona on crime prevention work, I think was the best election promise we had.

In conclusion, I want to say that the right-conservative government now has a great responsibility to continue developing the crime prevention work. Not everything can be solved with harsher penalties. It does not have to be either/or, but it must be both and. The preventive work and cooperation between school, social services, and the police is absolutely crucial if we are to succeed.

(Applause)

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

Pontus Andersson (SD)

Madam Speaker! Today we shall debate the government's bill Municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work. The proposal is to support the government's legislative proposal.

The proposal aims to ensure that the municipalities work with crime prevention measures in an effective and knowledge-based manner. According to the new law, the municipalities shall produce a situational analysis of crime and, based on this, assess the need for measures and decide on an action plan. The municipalities shall also take some responsibility for the coordination of the local crime prevention work and establish a coordination function.

Madam Speaker! I want to begin by emphasizing that the most important measures to curb serious crime in society are the responsibility of the Riksdag and the government, but in this exceptional situation, everyone needs to do their part.

Sweden is a strong welfare country, which means that from birth one is given the opportunity to stay at home with one's parents for a long period thanks to the generous parental insurance we have in Sweden. After that, one can start in preschool for a comparatively low sum, and it is free of charge for those who do not have money.

After that, a schooling awaits which is free of charge up to the university level. From upper secondary school, one also receives grants to study. After school, one can go to after-school activities. Many municipalities offer free homework help. Sweden also has an extensive voluntary sector where one can engage in the activities one likes. In the evening, one can socialize with friends at the municipality's youth center.

In short: In Sweden, there is no reason at all to choose a criminal lifestyle. That is not primarily where Sweden's work is failing. It fails where convicted persons can continue to commit crimes while awaiting prison sentences because we lack prison places. It fails where foreign citizens who throw stones at the police are not deported from Sweden. It fails where a 16-year-old boy who shoots and kills an innocent man in a gym in central Stockholm is a free man before he is even 20 years old.

With that said, everyone needs to pitch in due to today's exceptional situation. From the Riksdag and the government, we can enact laws that ensure dangerous people are kept off the streets for a longer period. We can also ensure that we provide the law enforcement authorities with the tools they need to convict criminals.

The individual citizen can contribute by not using drugs, which fuels criminal activity in Sweden. One should refrain from shopping in unscrupulous stores and from getting a haircut, getting nails done, exchanging money, or washing the car at places where gang criminals launder money, in order to thereby avoid maintaining a black market.

Today we stand behind the government's bill on municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work.

As a resident of Rydebäck, and not least as a citizen of Helsingborg, I have seen firsthand how Helsingborg Municipality has for a long time worked both proactively and reactively at the municipal level to do what can be done to curb organized crime.

Helsingborg is Sweden's eighth largest municipality but has problems similar to those we see in the large cities in Sweden. Therefore, initiatives were taken early, for example, for camera surveillance in crime-prone locations. They ensured that more security guards were recruited who can operate in a larger area than before. They have also worked with agency cooperation with the Swedish Tax Agency, the Customs, the police, and the city's own environmental department to fight hard against organized crime in the city. They use the municipal housing company to renovate socially vulnerable areas in the city, which has also yielded results.

But the new law is not aimed solely at municipalities with serious organized crime resulting in shootings and explosions, but at all of Sweden's municipalities. Even though most municipalities in Sweden are not in the same situation as Helsingborg, Malmö, Södertälje or Stockholm, there are municipalities that could end up there. There are also municipalities that will never end up there but which have completely different problems, which exist in all municipalities in Sweden. Measures against violence in close relationships, work against honor-related violence and initiatives against substance abuse or to protect children who are harmed in different ways are such things that an action plan can contain.

Sweden is by no means a perfect country. People suffer in all parts of society, and therefore all parts of society must also ensure that we are constantly working towards a safer Sweden. The responsibility lies not least with the Riksdag and the government, but if we are to win the fight against evil forces, we need measures at all levels of society.

I vote in favor of the bill.

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

Charlotte Nordström (M)

Madam Speaker! Think of the little newborn child that one holds in one's arms, who coos and smells so good!

See the small child in front of you - the curious, knowledge-hungry child who has the desire and the joy to learn everything. Take that image further into the future! The same small individual now has a few more years on their back. The path there has been lined with encounters with social services and the police due to substance abuse and brawls, and now the individual sits behind bars for drug trafficking, knife murders, or shootings.

What happened along the way? Who bears responsibility? Who can influence and prevent this from happening? The parents, the maternal care, the preschool, the school, the social services and the police - yes, there are many who can be and are involved.

The development that has occurred with increased youth crime and serious crime must be stopped, and we must start at the beginning. It requires a gathering of forces for cooperation and shared responsibility when it comes to the individual child and the individual youth. We must expand cooperation and create a shared vision and a common basis in the work with interventions for children and young people who are doing poorly.

In my previous role - a few years ago - as the chairman of the municipal executive board in Skara, a strong focus was placed on early preventive measures so that children and young people would get the best start in life. Skara was also the first municipality to sign a cooperation agreement with the police in its region. I have a strong belief in good cooperation and collaboration in a focused crime prevention work. I know that one can make a difference, and this is very close to my heart.

Crime must, of course, be countered through both crime fighting and preventive measures. There are many pieces of the puzzle in this work. Patient crime prevention work can yield results, but it is about holding on and persevering.

Today we have to deal with the bill Municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work. I would like to express the following, Madam Speaker: Finally, the responsibility will be enshrined in law!

I note with pleasure that we have a broad consensus, and that bodes well. The committee considers that the three motions are addressed by the bill, and it is therefore requested in good order that these be rejected. It feels hopeful, quite simply.

Successful crime prevention work must be based on close cooperation between the police and the municipalities, especially in activities such as preschool, school, and social services. Such work shall be regulated in cooperation agreements and can involve early interventions aimed at children and young people or improving crime-affected areas and making them safer places.

Much of the crime prevention work can take place - and does take place - at the municipal and regional level. It is about counseling. It is about child healthcare. The region's activities have the unique opportunity that one meets children and young people in many phases of life - even before birth. Also, the cooperation between the municipal and regional level is extremely important.

If the police and the municipalities also coordinate the efforts with parents, the business community, property owners, associations and other good forces, the crime prevention work can become even more effective.

The police have an obvious role in society's crime prevention work - it is part of their mandate - but the municipalities do not today. A clear responsibility is required for the municipalities to coordinate and lead the local crime prevention work. The municipalities have a presence in the local community that no other authority has.

That is why the municipalities are absolutely crucial for us to have an effective crime prevention work throughout the country. In order for the work to be conducted in a focused and professional manner across the entire country, a clear responsibility needs to be placed precisely on the municipalities.

From experience of municipal and regional collaborations, I believe that the formal responsibility in the cooperation with the police should lie with the municipal executive board. The time for the so-called Brå work to be included in some kind of public health council has long passed.

The role of the municipalities in preventive work is great and decisive. A focused crime prevention effort is, I believe, a strategic issue for a municipality to become a safe and attractive place to live and work.

Madam Speaker! According to the new law, the municipalities shall produce a situational analysis - this is included in the cooperation agreements where the municipalities are responsible for the coordination - and ensure that cooperation is entered into with the right actors, partly based on this situational analysis. The issues shall be handled in a strategic council, not a public health council, where other important actors shall hold leading positions and a mandate to decide.

The municipalities shall therefore have a coordination function, support the implementation of the work, and also contribute to the dissemination of information about the work. The municipal executive board shall, unless the municipal council decides otherwise – I hope that is indeed the case in the country's municipalities – be responsible for the management of the municipality's crime prevention work. So right, so very right! Now, order and clarity can be established in the work.

The municipalities' broad mandate means that, together with the Police Authority, they form the core of local crime prevention work. Now we can take another step in the work towards the goal of achieving a safe Sweden, with the hope that more children and young people can continue to be inquisitive, have the desire and joy of learning things and not go down the criminal path.

The municipalities' responsibility is significant. It is a factor that can clearly contribute. It will take time, but it will happen.

With this as a basis, I move, Madam Speaker, for approval of the committee's proposal to adopt the government's proposition on the law on the municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work.

In this speech, Fredrik Kärrholm (M) agreed.

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

Lotta Johnsson Fornarve (V)

Madam Speaker! We are now debating the report Municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work. It concerns a new legislative proposal aimed at strengthening and clarifying municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work. It is good and a step in the right direction. We therefore stand behind the proposal. It is, however, absolutely crucial that municipalities receive sufficient resources for this to be possible.

The crime prevention work begins with a well-developed welfare for everyone, even in so-called socially disadvantaged areas. If the school, leisure activities, and society in general function well, the opportunities to recruit children and young people into gang crime decrease.

Stopping the recruitment into criminal gangs is central. Children should go to school and play football, not act as drug couriers. The negative development in socially vulnerable areas must be reversed through long-term investments in, among other things, school, social services and general welfare. It is also about measures in the short term, here and now.

Unfortunately, instead of investments in welfare over decades, we have seen large cuts. This has led to increased economic inequalities, social vulnerability, and a society being torn apart. Insecure, unequal societies are a breeding ground for exclusion and crime. It is possible to create safe, equal societies if the political will exists, but then one cannot, as the current government with the help of Sverigedemokraterna does, make large cuts in just welfare.

Vänsterpartiet works for a society where no one has reason to see crime as a solution. We want to give all children an upbringing that gives them opportunities in life, from preschool to school and the first job. It is necessary to reduce crime and ensure that as few as possible are affected by crime.

The new bill that we are now debating means that municipalities receive a certain responsibility for the coordination of crime prevention work. Municipalities shall also map crime and develop an action plan. All of this is good and necessary, but it then requires, as said, that municipalities receive the resources required to do this.

For the crime prevention work to be effective and successful, it is required that all relevant actors at the local level cooperate, both when it comes to mapping crime and the problems that exist locally and when it comes to developing an action plan. These actors are the police, school, social services, civil society organizations, religious communities, leisure activities, and many more. It is important to work systematically and long-term from a holistic perspective.

A good school is absolutely crucial for crime prevention work. Today, we have unfortunately received an all too segregated school. The school should contribute to increased equality, not sort and divide as today's profit-driven market school does. Rich school corporations move our tax money abroad, while our schools in the suburbs and in the countryside are left behind.

A young person who completes upper secondary school rarely joins a criminal gang. We must ensure that the school has enough adults to catch those children who risk going astray, and catch them in time. We must ensure that the school has the resources and power to educate young people for jobs and studies.

An important crime prevention effort that must not be forgotten in this context is to prevent violence against women and children in close relationships. We know that the violence affecting women most often occurs in the home and is committed by a close male relative. The preventive work must also here be broad. It involves, among other things, educating staff who may come into contact with vulnerable girls and women. It involves supporting women who have been subjected to violence and supporting girls' and women's shelters. It also involves students in school receiving good knowledge about equality, learning to critically examine power structures linked to gender and violence, and receiving knowledge on how they can get help if they are subjected to violence.

Vänsterpartiet has proposed that vulnerable women who want to leave their residence should receive help through the establishment of safety teams from the social services, the police, and the municipality, which shall work according to a concrete action plan. The team shall ensure that the police help the woman leave the residence but be able to remain in the area, and that the housing solution then becomes long-term, combined with a restraining order already decided by the prosecutor. The police shall also have a specific mission to monitor that the woman is safe.

We also want to introduce a "stop-hitting" program similar to the one already being worked on in North Carolina, Domestic Violence Intervention. The purpose of the program is to protect vulnerable women and children from violent men as well as to make it easier to get the right support for those who want to escape a violent life and stop hitting.

For effective crime prevention work, a local and present police force is required – a police force that knows its geographical area of responsibility, that creates safety and stability, that knows the people who live there and whom the people who live there know and trust; a police force that is committed to its work, that has high competence regarding local conditions and local crime issues and that can both prevent fatal shootings and speak at the residential area's school; a police force that has good contact with the local social services, the local schools, the youth centers and the field assistants and the local community life; a present police force.

Many police officers do an excellent job today. We also know that the police profession is exposed. It is, however, evident that the current police organization has challenges and shortcomings. We therefore consider that the entire police organization needs to be reviewed.

There is already much good crime prevention work today to learn from. The Swedish National Council for Crime Prevention, Brå, has developed the so-called phase model which can be applied in long-term collaborative projects against crime and insecurity in vulnerable areas. It has, among other things, been used in Gottsunda in Uppsala with good results.

Another example that has increased the safety and quality of life for the residents in Gårdsten in Gothenburg has been the establishment of so-called safety groups and safety wardens who are available to solve problems and also function as good role models for children and youth in the area, while simultaneously creating safety for elderly people.

There are many more examples of similar work around the country. What is common is long-term perspective, local presence, coordination, and broad cooperation. But that requires prioritizing preventive work and allocating sufficient resources to school, social services, leisure activities, local police presence, safety-creating measures, service and renovation of housing, premises, and outdoor environments. If this is not done, the crime prevention work will just be a lot of beautiful words on a piece of paper.

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

Juno Blom (L)

Madam Speaker! I have met and spoken with young guys who have been recruited into crime and who have robbed, sold drugs and assaulted others. These are meetings that have affected me.

I remember when I sat down and talked with some guys to listen to how they saw their lives. They hadn't turned 20 yet but were movingly in agreement that life was over. Some of the guys said that I would have been there when they were five or six years old. They described a childhood filled with violence at home, at school, and in the residential area. In the meeting with these young guys, when we managed to get under the surface, their double roles became so clear. They have been victimized, they are being victimized, and they victimize others.

Now we finally have a new law that clearly points out the importance of the municipalities taking responsibility for crime prevention work. The research has been clear; with good upbringing conditions, good health and the opportunity to complete school with passing grades, the risk of children and young people embarking on a criminal path is significantly reduced.

Now it is required that the whole society joins forces, that all actors step up. Only together can we turn the development around. There are no other alternatives. And the work must begin early, already at the maternal and child health center.

Invest in home visit programs! Today, it is more important than ever that social workers, together with BVC, go out to new parents to create relationships and tell them about the support they can offer. It is necessary to create trust and break through the misleading information spread through the hate and threat campaigns directed at the social services that frighten parents.

It is sad and irresponsible that the problems have to become so large before the insight into crime prevention work must be written into law and receive the highest priority. Now, research is required that truly analyzes what lies at the basis of why we have children who are prepared to commit such serious crimes as occur today. It is important knowledge in order to be able to implement the right measures in the crime prevention work.

We must dare to challenge parental rights and start talking about parents' responsibilities and obligations. I am thinking of all the preschool teachers who express that they saw early on that there was an obvious risk that things would go wrong, without their concern being taken seriously and without the right measures being implemented in the right time.

Necessary measures are needed for the child as well as for the parents, early and clearly. We must dare to set demands and have expectations of parents just as much as giving them the right conditions to take their responsibility.

If we are to be able to reverse the development, it is incredibly important to look at the social norms and values that are established early in the family. To change what was taught in preschool age later in the teenage years is very difficult, says Carin Götblad in an interview. I agree completely with Carin Götblad's analysis. I also remember how she warned early on about the crime development among young people that we see today.

A central issue in the crime prevention work is the municipalities' responsibility to ensure that children grow up in homes that are a safe place. We must take into account that for over 200,000 children, the home has instead developed into a crime scene. That children today lack the right to say no to contact with their perpetrator and are subjected to forced contact with a violent parent is a serious problem that the Liberalerna pointed out throughout the entire last parliamentary term. A home characterized by violence can never provide good conditions for upbringing.

The boys' appeal was: You should have been there when I was subjected to it as a child.

Madam Speaker! I am thinking of all the children who run to school with dreams for the future. These are children who want to learn to read, count, and write. These are children who dream of becoming carpenters, football professionals, hairdressers, doctors - the list can be long. But I can promise that no child who puts on their school backpack for the first time dreams of becoming a criminal.

The future that awaits Sweden tomorrow is in our classrooms today. It is a massive betrayal that so many children's dreams are extinguished so early. It is a massive betrayal that so many children leave school with incomplete knowledge and lack complete grades.

In that crime prevention work, a school of knowledge for all children is by far the most important compensatory measure to prevent crime. Knowledge is the key to being able to realize one's dreams.

I am thinking about civil society's important role, about all the voluntary forces that exist there and that see and affirm the child who is lost, seeking their identity. They are good forces that create context, participation and meaningfulness, and that save children and young people from being recruited into criminal gangs.

This week I visited Huddinge Basket. To listen to their philosophy, to feel their commitment to all children and young people in their activities truly gave hope. It becomes clear how important it is with the investment of 100 million to vulnerable areas to strengthen the sports movement.

Madam Speaker! With evidence-based crime prevention work, we can reverse the development. And with coordinated crime prevention work, we can give hope for the future to more. And with early crime prevention work, children can continue to dream. And with clear crime prevention work, all children can dare to move freely in their area.

Through cooperation within the municipality and between municipalities, with determination and a clear roadmap, we create the conditions for all children and young people to be given the right and the opportunity to grow up in a freer, more open, and safer Sweden.

Municipalities' responsibility for crime prevention work

I therefore move for approval of the proposal in the report.

The deliberation was hereby concluded.

(A decision was to be taken on 12 April.)

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