Response to interpellation 2022/23:231 on more efficient permit processes

Statsrådet Romina Pourmokhtari (L)

Mr. Speaker! [I] have asked the Minister for Civil Affairs if he intends to pursue the proposals that the previous government initiated regarding a more efficient handling of environmental assessment cases, particularly the proposals concerning the county administrative boards' activities, and whether the county administrative boards can expect to receive resource support from the government in that work. She has also asked when the government will provide an announcement on how it intends to act so that the permit processes can be streamlined.

The work within the government is distributed in such a way that it is I who shall answer the interpellation.

Time efficiency and predictability in the permit process are of great importance for all industries covered by permit requirements. The Government is working purposefully to strengthen the business community's opportunities to be at the forefront of the climate transition. An important part of this is the ongoing work to streamline the permit processes, while Sweden shall continue to have high environmental requirements.

As stated in the Tidö Agreement, a new investigation will be appointed to simplify and shorten the environmental permit review according to the Environmental Code by making it more flexible, efficient, and predictable. The purpose is to strengthen the business sector's competitiveness and Swedish industrial production, as well as to promote a green transition with the export of climate-friendly products and climate-friendly technology. The assignment shall also include utilizing existing flexibility in the EU regulatory framework to increase predictability and reduce the time spent in the environmental permit process.

We are also working on the implementation of the Environmental Assessment Inquiry's proposals and the preparation of the Climate Justice Inquiry's final report.

At the end of last year, the government received the county administrative boards' reports on proposals for development measures that can streamline the agencies' review activities. We will follow up on the results of that work, including how cooperation during peak periods has been expanded.

The Government has also received the final report from the Committee on Technological Innovation and Ethics, which contains proposals that could lead to the authorities becoming more efficient in their work to support the companies.

At the end of March, the government received the county administrative boards' collective report on what the work to ensure an efficient permit review according to the Environmental Code has led to. I look forward to also receiving the county administrative boards' final report on the assignment aimed at promoting an efficient consultation process.

Before the government can take a position on all the proposals aimed at streamlining our environmental assessments in various ways, they need to be prepared and referred in the usual order. I can neither anticipate that work nor the ongoing budget work for 2024, which eventually leads to a budget bill.

I can assure Ida Karkiainen that the government's work with the streamlining of permit processes is a priority issue that we are working on in full.

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Ida Karkiainen (S)

Mr. Speaker! I would like to begin by thanking Minister Pourmokhtari for the answer, even though it is somewhat delayed and even though I would have wished for the interpellation to be answered by the Minister for Civil Affairs.

The reason is that my focus in the interpellation concerns precisely the activities of the county administrative boards. The work is distributed, or was at least, such that ministers at certain departments have responsibility for a portion of the assignments placed on the county administrative boards, but the Minister for Civil Affairs has the overall responsibility and also the responsibility for the total budget. It is this that is central to my questions.

The origin of my interpellation is the large investments we see in the industry's great green transition throughout Sweden, particularly in the north, which are the result of the fact that when we took office in 2014, we did not see the industry as "basically gone" but on the contrary pushed for a new industrialization and that it should be green. It is Sweden's great competitive advantage, and so it has also become.

The world's eyes and investments are now directed towards what is happening, particularly in northern Sweden. These are large investments that are accumulating, and it is a fantastic development.

For these investments to be able to take place and for Sweden to be able to keep the leadership position we have taken on, permits to establish and conduct operations are required. These permit processes are difficult and complex, and they land largely with the county administrative boards. The county administrative boards process the cases, which includes, among other things, extensive consultations with relevant actors, society, and other authorities, as well as, of course, also reviewing the applications.

As Minister for Civil Affairs, I visited many county administrative boards. I can testify that all around our country, in our 21 counties, very skilled officials are working on the permit processes. They also have many wise suggestions on how the permit processes can become more efficient without compromising legal certainty or important environmental values.

We can do a lot when it comes to the processes themselves. But no matter how much we try to streamline through regulations and the like, it will not be noticed if we do not simultaneously strengthen with more employees. In Norrbotten, as mentioned, large investments are underway, and it burdens the county administrative boards' operations when so many large assessments are to take place at one and the same time. It risks creating bottlenecks if there are not enough environmental officers.

A third investigation into the Environmental Code is nothing that will succeed in making the current government succeed in streamlining the permit processes in the short term. What can be done in the short term, however, is to increase the appropriation to the county administrative boards so that more case officers can work with the permit reviews.

I understand that the Minister cannot and does not want to go in and comment on the budget preparations, but I would still like to know if that which I have just stated is something that the government takes with it in its considerations when it comes to shortening the permit processes.

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Statsrådet Romina Pourmokhtari (L)

Mr. Speaker! It is noticeable that Member Karkiainen has worked as a minister, for it is wise questions that are being asked.

The short answer to the question of whether we take into account the aspects raised is yes. We have too much dialogue with the county administrative boards themselves, but also with different parties within the work that the county administrative boards, together with sometimes the region, sometimes the municipality, perform in the work with permit processes to see: Where are the roadblocks? What are the success stories? What has worked to improve the processes and solve the bottlenecks that are mentioned? How can one best ensure that this activity functions better?

This is a need that has been pointed out for a long time in politics: the need for our permit processes to function better and more efficiently than they do.

If nothing else, the European Union will soon be pushing from behind with clear arguments on how permit processes should look in terms of timing, which are not in accordance with how Sweden's processes look. There are therefore many reasons to really tackle this work, both in the long term and in the short term, as mentioned here.

What can we do in the short term so that the work with permit processes in general functions better? What I can report from the government's side is that we have allocated special funds to the county administrative boards, for example, due to the increased number of applications to build offshore wind power, which we see as permit processes that require a lot of time and resources. There, we have allocated special funds. We have also allocated special funds to permit processes internally within the Government Offices where we have also seen a need. But these are short-term measures, and there is a need to take a holistic approach to the issue of permit processes. This government will do that. It is regrettable that the previous government did not take a holistic approach to the question of how our permit processes are designed. There is truly a need to do so in order to accelerate the work being done with our transition and with securing our industry in this green revolution, as we call it.

The environmental permit review has a very important purpose in strengthening the Swedish industry's opportunity to thrive in the transition and in the development towards a fossil-free economy, but also to achieve the purpose of our Environmental Code and promote the sustainable development that we are all so keen on and which means that both current and future generations can enjoy a good natural environment and a healthy and good environment to stay in. There is therefore much to do here, not only for the sake of efficiency and industry but also for the sake of our environment. We need to ensure that the work with permit processes functions in a better way than it does now.

The Government considers, Mr. Speaker, that both short-term and long-term measures are required. The long-term measures are to take a holistic approach in an inquiry on how permit processes can be managed in the future, as they cannot be managed as they are currently. In the short term, it is about ensuring that funds are provided where there is a need for them, for example to county administrative boards when it concerns handling issues regarding offshore wind power.

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Ida Karkiainen (S)

Mr. Speaker! I am pleased to hear the Minister's answer to that question, and I also hope that there will be clear results from the ambitions that the Minister highlights. The previous Social Democratic government, among other things, tasked the county administrative boards with developing methods and forms of cooperation to promote an efficient consultation process according to the Environmental Code. The same government tasked the county administrative boards with reporting proposals for measures that can streamline the authorities' review activities. Furthermore, a task was assigned to the county administrative boards concerning the streamlining of the electricity grid issue specifically.

There were three quite clear assignments that the county administrative boards had to work with, and these important assignments have led to important conclusions that I hope the government will truly take to heart and take further. It will require some budget investments linked to that. Unfortunately, the government has not shown that in the budget so far, except regarding the offshore wind power and the other assignment that the minister accounted for. But there are several areas that need to be strengthened, and as I mentioned in my first speech, it is primarily also about more environmental officers.

We Social Democrats and the government parties unfortunately have differing opinions regarding the appropriation to the county administrative boards. I would like to go back a bit, specifically to the decision on the state budget for 2022. At that time, 80 million was deducted from the county administrative boards in the budget from the Moderates, Christian Democrats, and Sweden Democrats – I therefore cannot blame the State Secretary Pourmokhtari for this. There, they proposed cuts totaling 80 million kronor compared to the then-government's proposal. It concerned the important work with both the climate transition and the energy transition. It was an appropriation that was intended to go precisely to securing the power grid – expanding the power grid faster and ensuring that the shortage in electricity supply is addressed – and also to ensure that a good dialogue was maintained with the municipalities, because the municipalities are also an important part of the entire permit process.

The fears one had regarding what the removal of the 80 million could lead to were precisely slower expansion of the power grid, insufficient electricity supply, and increasing electricity prices. This could hit the Swedish base industry hard. Now, the evaluation has not been made, and the government compensated to some extent for this because it was the budget from M, SD, and KD that was approved. But the county administrative boards testified that, as a result of that decision, it was difficult for them to shorten processing times and speed up the permit processes. It is an important historical aspect to carry with one when considering how the budget appropriations should be allocated and what has happened historically.

Another important matter concerns the management of the county administrative boards. They have an incredibly broad mandate and should have one. There are 21 county administrative boards working to ensure that we have an efficient state administration in Sweden that will ensure that we, with a holistic perspective, work to promote both the county's development, cooperation with municipalities, and ensure that one has a good dialogue with both state actors in the county and other actors. It is important that these authorities are well-financed and that we move away from the appropriation distribution that has been in place where the mission grant has been financed heavily but not the basic administrative grant, and furthermore, given them unfunded mandates.

So my question to the Minister is: Can the Minister promise not to place unfunded mandates on the county administrative boards in the future?

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Statsrådet Romina Pourmokhtari (L)

Madam Speaker! Thank you again, Member Karkiainen, for a very important discussion on how we can ensure that we streamline our permit processes in the best possible way.

The Chairman specifically highlighted that we, from the government's side, have acted regarding offshore wind power and the applications that have been submitted in this regard, and specifically those parts concerning appropriations and funds to manage the work with permit processes.

I want to point out that even though the work to streamline our permit assessments is an ongoing process that takes place continuously, among other things through how we distribute appropriations and how we can provide additional funds to avoid bottlenecks and such, it is also a procedural system which, when it is of the kind that our permit processes are, must be sustainable in the long term and must have a predictability. This is nothing that can be changed overnight, and I know that the member, who is also a former minister, is also well aware that it is a difficult issue to best change how our systems function and ensure that they become more efficient and that this does not occur at the expense of the high quality that we maintain regarding the environmental requirements in Sweden.

For it is something to be proud of and something that contributes to the competitiveness of our industry and other things, that one knows that Sweden has high sustainability requirements and environmental requirements that ensure our products are clean. But the government needs to work so that our permit processes become both more efficient and more modern and that they correspond to the reality that now prevails and in which we are now acting. It is about a long-term sustainability that this government needs to take into account.

Regarding the question of what is underway, there are very many things I can mention, and it is difficult to choose what I can manage to bring up. But the main thing, I must mention it nonetheless, is simply that the government is now generally working on the implementation of the Environmental Assessment Inquiry's proposals, and that in addition to that, we will appoint a new inquiry to simplify and shorten our permit assessments, entirely in accordance with the Environmental Code we have. It is a task that I truly believe will be able to contribute to this issue in the long term. It is a need that many of us have observed for a long time. We really need to take a holistic approach to the permit process issues in a better way than we have previously succeeded with in Sweden.

Then we also have the Government Review Inquiry, which is an ongoing inquiry examining different types of processes that all have in common that they are decided by the government as the first instance or after an appeal. This can then involve, for example, the handling of the review according to the Act on Sweden's Economic Zone, area protection, decisions on off-road driving, etcetera.

In all these matters, the starting point is that the government shall only review those that contain clear political trade-offs. That is also a way for us to streamline our permit processes.

In addition to this, we have the Incentive Inquiry and many of the initiatives that the member himself raised and which are ongoing in our country. We collect statistics on environmental assessments and consultations, and we try in many different ways to promote the county administrative boards' conditions to carry out this work in a more efficient manner.

I believe it is of the utmost importance that, in addition to the discussion on funds and grants, we also discuss the long-term aspect of this issue, where there has truly been a lack of initiative for a long time.

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Ida Karkiainen (S)

Madam Speaker! It may not be that initiatives have been lacking, but one needs to work systematically with this issue. I am pleased that the Minister carries this with him in the government.

Given the county administrative boards' competence, it is easy for a government to imagine that the county administrative boards can do everything possible without receiving more funding for it. It is admittedly true that a county administrative board has the ability and competence to do very much, but for every assignment, resources are also needed. It is my hope that the minister can draw a line for this in the Government Offices.

Finally, I want to say that the streamlining of the permit processes is not only about the county administrative boards' working methods. It is also about those who apply for permits submitting complete documentation and about other authorities in the permit chain also having sufficient resources to be able to work effectively with the issue.

It is a large link where all links need to have secured funding and sufficient resources. To, for example, ensure that the Armed Forces enter early in the permit process is a way to secure the entire chain of permit reviews so as not to delay the process even further.

Again: It is important with the collective grip regarding the administration around the permit processes. This is not only the Minister for Climate and Environment's responsibility, but it is the entire government's responsibility.

There are several proposals on the government's table, and many of them are wise. Proceed with them! Do, however, conduct a review or an investigation in the area, but also make use of the immediate solutions that, among others, the wise officials at the county administrative boards have highlighted!

In conclusion, I want to say that it is my hope that we, in broad political consensus, will be able to move forward in this issue. It is my full conviction that we can achieve an effective and legally sound review, despite large and complex issues.

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Statsrådet Romina Pourmokhtari (L)

Madam Speaker! It is perhaps exaggerated to thank Ida Karkiainen once again, but I truly think it is a wise question that is asked and that there is a need for long-term thinking in these matters.

I am positive that in any case, many of us in the Riksdag see a need to handle this in a different way and to modernize our permit processes to meet not only the needs of our industry but also the pace of our transition.

This is an important issue that is clearly prioritized by the government. There is a reason why it is so clearly written in the Tidö Agreement that we want to handle this and that we will do so both in the short term with funds and in the long term with an investigation, which may possibly have a slightly different element than previous investigations have had. That is well the reason why one wants to conduct an additional investigation.

Even what the member mentions regarding complete documentation and all parties' opportunity to modernize and streamline our permit processes is something that often comes up when one engages in a dialogue with county administrative boards that may have been particularly successful in their work with permit processes.

It is about developing opportunities, dialogue, and cooperation with all parties involved in these processes so that, for example, one has complete underlying documents from the start and that the municipalities are aware of what is happening in the municipality before permits are granted, as well as that there is a dialogue, an openness, and an opportunity to in this way handle these complex issues, which affect several different public interests, without it occurring at the expense of these interests. This applies to the defense's and the municipality's own interests as well as the transition's.

Doing this in a long-term way that does not sideline the different interests that exist in this complex work is of the utmost importance. I am very hopeful that it will be a work that is further developed and proceeds in a good way.

The interpellation debate was hereby concluded.

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