Response to interpellation 2022/23:401 on parental leave for parents of children with diabetes
Translated from Swedish by AI; the translation may contain errors. The Swedish text is the original.
Summary AI, written in advance
The debate concerns vab-compensation for parents of children with diabetes and flexibility in the parental insurance. M believes that the government wants to increase flexibility through more double days and opportunities to transfer days to facilitate different family constellations 1 2 3. M emphasizes that the system should contribute to making the life puzzle work and that it is not about nanny checks 1 3. M believes that the government has as a priority to increase flexibility for families with children so that they can combine active labor market participation with an active family life 4. M believes that parents should be given more tools and increased opportunities to use the parental benefit more flexibly 4. S argues that double days do not solve the problem for parents of chronically ill children who today are forced to be away from work without compensation 5. S wants parents of children with diabetes to have a statutory right to be off work to help their children in school. S believes that these parents should have a statutory right to apply for vab-compensation so that the family economy does not crash. S believes that the government is dodging the issue by only saying that the questions are being prepared and demands a concrete proposal on vab-compensation now 6.
Written by AI in advance and may contain errors. The numbers lead to the speech a statement builds on; check against the text below.
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! Åsa Eriksson has asked me whether I and the government will take the initiative so that parents who need to help children with diabetes in school and preschool will be able to request vab-compensation.
The so-called VAB investigation, in its partial report VAB for care measures in school, submitted a proposal that the right to temporary parental leave and thus the following leave right shall be introduced for situations when the parent needs to refrain from gainful employment to participate in the introduction to the child's need for self-care measures in school or preschool. The proposal has since been treated in the investigation's final report and has also been subject to referral. The proposal is currently being prepared in the Government Offices.
The Government considers that parents should be given more tools and increased opportunities to use the parental leave benefit more flexibly in order to strengthen freedom of choice and increase the conditions for combining family life and high labor force participation. For this purpose, a proposal for expanded opportunities to use so-called double days has been referred, and this proposal is also being further prepared in the Government Offices. The Government also decided on 15 June 2023 on the Council of Legislation referral A possibility to transfer parental leave. In the Council of Legislation referral, proposals are submitted that aim to facilitate for different family constellations to use the parental leave benefit more flexibly.
In the work with the parental leave, my starting point is that any changes should contribute to making things easier for families and that there should be a sensitivity to the fact that families look different and have different needs. Creating these conditions could alleviate the daily routine and make people's life puzzles fit together significantly better. This is a high priority for me.
Åsa Eriksson (S)
Madam Speaker! Thank you, Minister, for the answer! It is pleasant to be here again.
In Sweden, thanks to several reforms, primarily from Social Democratic governments, we have a general parental insurance that provides a statutory right to leave from work so that one can be with their children when they are small. One also receives financial compensation during that time.
This is absolutely excellent, for several reasons. Not least, it promotes equality when both fathers and mothers have the opportunity to be at home and take care of their children and get to know their children properly. But it is also good because it encourages labor force participation that both men and women can work and build careers, which I believe both the Minister and I think is important and good.
We also have a system for temporary parental leave, commonly called vab, childcare, so that one can be at home and care for one's children when they are ill.
Madam Speaker! I am therefore sincerely surprised and actually also concerned when the Minister, in his answer to my question, refers to the parental leave. This is about parents who have children with chronic illnesses, primarily diabetes, but the Minister speaks of the introduction of double days in the parental insurance as a solution.
We Social Democrats have nothing against double days. It can, if properly designed, be a very good solution, we believe. But it does not solve this problem.
One of five guardians of children with diabetes states that they have been asked to substitute as a resource in school to help their children. They have been asked to do this without compensation and without a statutory right to be absent from their jobs. There are currently approximately 8,000 children with type 1 diabetes, so this is a major problem.
Parents who have children with diabetes have a very extensive responsibility to help their child. They need to ensure that the child has as steady a blood sugar level as possible and administer insulin without causing health problems.
Madam Speaker! To ensure that I have not misunderstood State Secretary Tenje, I would like to ask her: Does the government really mean that parents of chronically ill children should take out fewer parental days when the children are small, in order to then be able to use the parental days as some kind of duct tape in a moderate society that does not give all parents the same opportunity to be present in the children's everyday lives when the children are small? And if I have not misunderstood the State Secretary and the answer to that question is yes, and thus parental leave and double days are the solution to the problem, how then has the State Secretary thought that parents should solve the problem if the child needs help with their insulin pump today? Applications for parental leave must be submitted at least two months in advance.
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! I want to begin by saying that I share the member's view on the importance of us having a good system in Sweden regarding parental leave and temporary parental leave in order to create better conditions for parents to participate actively. It is about equal conditions for both mothers and fathers from a work perspective. It is also about them being able to make the puzzle of life fit together and be able to participate actively in family life.
We have recently had several delegations visiting, among others from Japan and South Korea, specifically to study our system. Both in South Korea and in Japan, there are great challenges due to far too few children being born. We believe that our system with parental leave and also temporary parental leave has played a large part in that we have still managed relatively well in Sweden.
To address the member's questions and inquiries raised in this exchange, I can only state that no, my answer to the question of how to proceed was not that one should do it in a different way or save one's days. What my answer shows is that the reforms that this government has implemented, proposed, or moved forward with regarding the possibility of transferring some of the days in the parental leave and expanding the possibility for the double days strengthen the basis for what I was, however, touching upon and telling about: that the government wants to increase the flexibility in the parental leave and in the temporary parental leave in order to facilitate for families to use the system we have more flexibly and purposefully according to family constellation and how one chooses to do it.
It was, therefore, more a comment regarding the fact that the government is taking very many measures precisely in this area, and when it comes to the VAB investigation and the proposals contained therein, they are currently being prepared in the usual order in the Government Offices.
To move on to the important question regarding families with children who have chronic illnesses, the safety in our schools, preschools, and after-school centers is extremely important. There is also a regulatory framework that helps create good and safe environments for children and for parents of children who, for example, have diabetes. It is therefore extremely important that we provide the right conditions and greater opportunities for children with disabilities and their parents to participate in school activities just like everyone else.
In response to the member's question, I would like to say that the proposal contained in the investigation, which we are now discussing in the usual order, is being prepared in the Government Offices right now. Regarding those parts, I must therefore ask to return at another occasion.
Åsa Eriksson (S)
Madam Speaker! I share the view that our system with parental leave and temporary parental leave is very good. It is great that delegations from other countries come and learn from it. It needs to be spread across the world. I was myself in Taiwan last week and spoke, among other things, with Taiwan's president and invited her to Sweden to learn about, among other things, our system with parental insurance and high quality of publicly funded preschool and elderly care in order to remedy the problem that far too few children are being born.
So far we are in agreement. But with that said, I want to make a side note: For God's sake, do not destroy this system which is so good! Do not introduce nanny checks and other things that result in it not being the parents who are at home with their children, because that is very important! That is why the parental leave exists.
Madam Speaker! It was the Social Democratic-led government that commissioned the investigation on how the parental insurance should be reviewed. The investigation was also tasked with looking at how we can solve the problem that hundreds of parents of children with diabetes today are forced to be away from their jobs without compensation or perhaps flex if they have the possibility to do so. But as we have also understood, there is a silent agreement where many employers let their employees report sick, even though they are not sick, in order to take care of the children in school when they need help with, for example, adjusting an insulin pump.
I know that the Minister is eager when it comes to curbing fraud in the health insurance. So are we Social Democrats, and therefore we can never allow people to be forced against their will to commit fraud in order to be able to help their children who have a chronic illness. We simply must solve this problem, and now!
Madam Speaker! We appointed this inquiry a long time ago. There are finished proposals. It is only a matter of getting started. For the Minister to say that it is being prepared in the Government Offices is simply dodging. I mean that all parents who today have a knot in their stomach because they do not know how they can get away from work to help their children in preschool and school when resources are lacking in the school to help out need an answer from the government. They would have needed that answer a long time ago.
I also mean that this is a class issue. There are parents who have the possibility to sometimes push back their working hours a bit or perhaps work again later in the evening when the child has finished school or preschool. But not all employees can. Many LO workers, for example, do not have the possibility to either push back their work tasks, be somewhere else, or change their working hours.
If the government is serious about us having a parental insurance that is actually permeated by the concept of insurance – that is, that we pay into the insurance and get it back when it is needed – and where the idea is that everyone should be treated equally regardless of what type of employment one has, then I mean that the government must return to the Swedish Riksdag with proposals on how parents of chronically ill children should be able to receive vab-compensation to help their children to good health.
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! I believe that we both are quite moved by the fact that we should not have a system where one is forced to cheat in order to be able to help their children. Of course, we all are willing to go very far to help our children get the right security and support in school and preschool, but it is clear that we should not have a system that encourages cheating. And just as I have said in both the first and second speeches: These issues are neither forgotten nor hidden. They are being prepared in the usual order in the Government Offices, and we will simply have to return to the issues a bit further ahead.
I also want to point out, Madam Speaker, that there is still some possibility today, although not a great possibility, for parents to, for example, through the care allowance or contact days, receive compensation for being present in the school and informing and handing over information about the child's needs for self-care.
In addition to this, the government, as I have touched upon, wants to increase the flexibility so that it becomes a more flexible and adapted system with more double days and also the possibility to transfer parental leave days so that, for example, a grandmother, maternal grandmother, or some other family friend can assist if a parent has difficulty getting away. It is not nanny checks that it is about. I know that the member has had major objections to this. But I believe it is important to state that not all families look the same. Not all families have the same needs, and the system as such in all its excellence may not be adapted for all different family constellations. Therefore, it is important to increase the flexibility to the greatest extent possible.
Overall, that is what we have taken. The previous government appointed the investigation that the member was referring to a very long time ago and then chose to do nothing on the issue. Now the questions are being prepared, and we simply get a reason to return later and surely in more interpellation debates - who knows.
We therefore want to continue to create conditions for relief in everyday life so that the puzzle of life fits together. This is very important and a priority for the government. This applies in particular to parents of children with illnesses or disabilities. In this work with the parental leave, it is my starting point to contribute to making things easier for the families. There must also be a sensitivity to the fact that families look different and have different needs.
Åsa Eriksson (S)
Madam Speaker! Contact days are good. It is absolutely excellent that they exist. But it is not enough. I hope that the Minister has met, for example, the Diabetes Association. They have fought for this for several years, since the judgment in the Supreme Administrative Court which means that one can no longer take parental leave to help their children in school and preschool with, for example, an insulin pump. They testify to how big a problem this is and how often it occurs. When I wrote on social media that we would have this debate, a woman named Karolina commented as follows:
I see at close range how parents struggle to make everyday life work with constant call-outs to the school when the medication is not working. It is incredibly draining, both for the finances and for the energy. A common misconception is that it can be difficult for a while until the medication is adjusted and then it works painlessly, but that is not the case. The medication must be adjusted and adapted continuously, which means that things falter in school, at work, and with sleep for these types of families.
Madam Speaker! I do not believe that either the Minister or I want it to be so. I want these parents, even if it is flawed and troublesome, at least to know that they have a statutory right to be off from their jobs to help their children when it is needed in school, and they shall have a statutory right to apply for vab-compensation so that they receive at least some financial compensation so that the family economy does not also crash.
I want to ask the Minister one last time: When will the government present these proposals, which were presented in a partial report as early as June 2021? They are ready, and all that needs to be done is to start writing a government bill and place it on the floor of the Riksdag. I am convinced that it will be easy to get a majority for that change in the Swedish Riksdag. When will it happen, Minister?
Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)
Madam Speaker! I have probably been clear that the member will not receive any exact information regarding a date in this matter. The matter is being prepared in the Government Offices, and we will return to the Riksdag in the usual order, and to everyone else as well. But there will be no announcements here today regarding an exact date.
This government has, as I have pointed out several times, as a priority issue to increase flexibility and create greater opportunities in everyday life for our families with children to make the life puzzle fit together - to ensure that one can have an active labor force participation and at the same time take an active part in family life. This applies in particular to parents with children who have long-term illnesses or disabilities.
Just as the member describes very well, the everyday life that many of these parents navigate and the burden they carry is often much heavier than for many others. If we now have the world's most generous system when it comes to parental leave and maternity leave, it should of course also be an opportunity for these families.
The Government considers that parents should be given more tools and increased opportunities to use the parental leave benefit more flexibly in order to strengthen freedom of choice and increase the conditions for combining family life and a strong labor force participation. Parents' need to participate in school in order to provide instructions regarding the child's needs and self-care is a situation that can definitely form the basis for continued work moving forward. These parts are very important and very prioritized. With this, I would like to thank you for this debate and hope that we can continue it further ahead.
Source: The Swedish Parliament. The speeches come from the open data of the Riksdag, translated into English by AI, which may contain errors.