Response to interpellation 2023/24:261 on after-school care for all
Translated from Swedish by AI; the translation may contain errors. The Swedish text is the original.
Summary AI, written in advance
The debate concerns the role of the after-school center in crime prevention and compensatory work. S believes that all children, including children of unemployed parents, should have the right to free after-school centers to create community and provide pedagogical support 1 2 3. S argues that the after-school centers are an important part of the school's safety net and that the municipalities do not always follow current legislation regarding children with special needs 2 3. L argues that the after-school centers are an important part of the school day and the crime prevention work 4 5 6. L emphasizes that the Education Act already grants the right to after-school centers for children with needs and that the municipalities must follow this 5. L also wants to see more trained after-school educators to ensure quality 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 Lotta Edholm (L)
Madam Speaker! I have been asked if I can see that the after-school centers are part of the crime prevention work, and when there will be a proposal for a decision that the Riksdag can take a stand on.
Increasing safety in Sweden and combating crime is a priority for the government. An important part of this is precisely the crime prevention work. The government has, among other things, tasked the School Safety Inquiry (U 2022:04) with proposing how a statutory responsibility for crime prevention work should be designed for the school system.
From the Education Act (2010:800) it appears that a student shall be offered education in the after-school center to the extent needed with regard to the parents' gainful employment or studies or if the student has a personal need due to the family's situation otherwise. Education in the after-school center shall also be offered if a student, for physical, mental or other reasons, needs special support in their development in the form of such education. Furthermore, it is stated that the after-school center shall stimulate the students' development and learning as well as offer them a meaningful leisure time and recreation.
When students succeed in school and have a meaningful leisure time, the risk of them being drawn into crime decreases. As Mats Wiking states, early interventions are important in crime prevention work. The Government has therefore carried out various measures to strengthen children's and students' basic skills. In the budget bill for 2024, the Government proposes measures to strengthen children's and students' language, reading and writing development, as well as mathematical skills. Among other things, an investment in fiction and non-fiction for preschools and schools is proposed, and that school libraries shall be staffed. These measures can together contribute to strengthening basic skills at an early stage. At the same time, the investments in literature and school libraries can contribute to children and young people having a more meaningful leisure time.
In areas with socioeconomic challenges, the school plays a crucial role in preventing crime and giving children and young people the opportunity to grow. The Government wants to make it more attractive to work at the most demanding schools. Therefore, the Government has proposed in the budget bill for 2024 that 165 million kronor per year be allocated over a three-year period to improve the working environment and working conditions.
The Government also wants to strengthen the Knowledge Grant - what was previously called the Equality Grant - with 850 million kronor in 2024. This means that the grant is proposed to amount to nearly 7.5 billion kronor for 2024. Far too many students do not get access to effective support measures in time. Therefore, the Government is also carrying out initiatives to increase access to special education teachers in schools and strengthen the possibility for principals to establish special teaching groups. The Government is also carrying out an initiative on school social teams to strengthen students' prerequisites to reach the goals of education, create a calm and safe working environment, and increase students' attendance in school.
The proposals in the report General leisure center and more students' access to development, learning and a meaningful leisure time (SOU 2022:61), which is the title of the investigation, are being prepared within the Government Offices.
Mats Wiking (S)
Madam Speaker! Thank you for the answer, Minister!
The question I asked the Minister for Education concerns precisely that investigation which falls under the title General youth center and more students' access to development, learning and a meaningful leisure time.
For a number of years now, children of unemployed persons have had a right to preschool. This has ensured that all children have the opportunity to participate in the preschool's care and pedagogy. It has been important for all children's development, but particularly important for children coming from homes that, for various reasons, cannot provide sufficient care and upbringing. In those cases, society's compensatory task is absolutely crucial.
Madam Speaker! When children of the unemployed reach school age, they no longer have the right to the support they received during the preschool period. It is suddenly expected that the children of the unemployed no longer need care before and after school. To be seven years old and have unemployed parents means that you lose the community, upbringing, and pedagogical activities that a place at a child care center entails.
When the completed investigation is presented in November 2022, the conclusions from the investigator were also that it should be legislated to provide an expanded right to free-of-charge after-school care for all six- to nine-year-olds, Madam Speaker, but also to be able to offer six- to twelve-year-olds after-school care or open leisure activities or more time in these two activities against the background of the child's living conditions.
Thus, the after-school center will also be available for children of guardians who are, for example, unemployed, on parental leave, or on long-term sick leave, or who participate in labor market measures or receive social assistance.
Madam Speaker! The proposal feels completely in line with the compensatory mission of the after-school center and the school. To see the school and the after-school center as a whole for all children, including children of the unemployed, is to take an additional step in this work. The investigator also emphasizes the after-school center's compensatory mission. What view does the Minister for Education have on the after-school center's compensatory mission?
Statsrådet Lotta Edholm (L)
Madam Speaker! I believe, just as Mats Wiking does, that the after-school center is an important part of the compensatory mission. Most children are also at the after-school center after school. It is perhaps to a lesser extent than one would wish, for it is important to remember that the Education Act is already quite strict today regarding that children who have specific needs also have a right to the after-school center beyond that which is solely for when parents are working. I think it is important that the municipalities live up to this responsibility.
When it comes to the crime prevention mandate, there are several parts that are interesting. School is probably the most important crime prevention measure we have at all, aside from the parents' upbringing. It is about the fact that school is a place where students are located. If they are in school and are at fritis, it also means that they are not somewhere else. It becomes harder for the gang criminals to catch them in their claws.
But above all, it is about the school, by providing knowledge to the students, also ensuring that there is an alternative reality - a reality where the students, through their knowledge and efforts, create a life where they support themselves and so on. In that regard, the after-school center is also very important, not least when it comes to being able to help with homework and other things and in that way be compensatory for those students who really need it.
Mats Wiking (S)
Madam Speaker! The description that the Minister gives when she says that most have leisure spots is probably correct. But it is also about the children who really need leisure time because they have special needs. They have a right to it according to the Education Act. My experience as a school politician for over twenty years in Western Sweden has taught me that the municipalities do not provide that opportunity; instead, an application from parents is required, and furthermore, quite a lot of work.
From the Social Democrats' side, we believe it would be desirable that one could avoid this trouble. A student should be able to get a place and time at a fritis regardless of whether one has special needs or not. That is where friends go, and that is where they are when you yourself go home with a key after school is over. The sense of community one gets at a fritis cannot be replaced by being a key child at home. Therefore, I think the preventive work is important. It gives all children good conditions.
Just as the Minister for Education says, consistent research shows that after-school care, school, and preschool together are one of the most important building blocks when it comes to giving children a successful future. Why then should we not provide after-school care to everyone, when we have research that shows this?
Every additional boy or girl who succeeds in school is not only something fantastic for the individual child; it also saves money for society in the long run. This may not apply to the school budget but for society's cost in total. The cost for social interventions for children, youth, and families tends to increase. We had a discussion here earlier about HVB homes. It is about children who fall through the safety net - the school's safety net and the social services' safety net - and perhaps are placed in an HVB home with interventions for costs of 5,000-10,000 kronor per day.
I have personally worked in the social sector, so I have seen how lack of schooling and social exclusion have caused children and young people to end up on the wrong track in life. What has been successful in the work with vulnerable children has been to ensure that there are good adult role models in school and to have a day that offers a school that functions but also support outside of school. A place in an after-school center (fritidshem) can therefore be one of the keys, even for children who today have unemployed parents, or parents who for various reasons are not in gainful employment.
Madam Speaker! At the same time as we Social Democrats want to open up for after-school centers for everyone, we need to review the quality and the size of the children's groups. The S-led government took steps to reduce the children's groups during the last parliamentary term, all to increase the quality, but also to be able to open up to offer after-school centers to all children.
I perceive that the Minister for Education understands the need for preventive work, and I heard in the response regarding measures – mostly pure measures in the school's teaching. But can the Minister for Education see that the after-school centers can also be a good complement to the school in creating care and upbringing, but also be good at pedagogically supporting children who, for various reasons, need extra support?
Statsrådet Lotta Edholm (L)
Madam Speaker! Of course I see that. I believe that after-school care is an important part of the school day, and it is important that as many as possible participate. Quality is also important. It is clearly a major problem today that we have too much untrained staff, for example in after-school care as well as in some schools and preschools. It is therefore important that we can get more young people to want to become teachers and leisure educators within the after-school centers. It is important in order to be able to maintain the quality.
The government is also taking a number of other measures. We have given the School Safety Inquiry additional directives to submit proposals on how the school can work and receive a crime-preventive mandate that it does not have today. The inquiry was commissioned by the Social Democratic government, and the background was the murders at a school in Malmö. The inquiry was commissioned then so that ways could be found to act against, for example, school shootings.
Since then, society has changed, just during this short time. Now we see serious crime trying to get into our schools. Then it becomes important with a crime-preventing responsibility, just like the mission we have given the School Safety Inquiry to review the possibility of locking schools so that people who have no business being there cannot get in.
With that said, I believe that the after-school center is also a very important part of the crime prevention work, especially regarding those children who need it the most.
Mats Wiking (S)
Madam Speaker! I thank the Minister for the answers I have received. The answers are largely about what the school can do and very little about what the after-school centers can do. Now, however, a bit more was said about that.
What I and we Social Democrats are trying to emphasize is that one should see the whole of the after-school centers and the school. There is a whole, and there can be decent adults who can take care of and support a child at the after-school center when it is not working with the teachers. It can be that which makes a student go to school on Monday morning – that one knows there is some decent adult who supports them with, for example, the homework or socially. There can also be a connection to the voluntary sector.
One should not believe that the after-school centers cannot offer crime prevention work. It is a soft activity, but it has a wonderfully fine pedagogy and care and can perform good preventive work.
I thank the Minister for Education for the answers. We agree on the compensatory mission of schools and after-school centers, but we have slightly different views on the path there. We in the Social Democrats will now follow how the government handles the inquiry into the after-school centers. We believe it is time to make the after-school centers accessible to all children. Can the Minister give any indication of when a proposal might be on the table?
Statsrådet Lotta Edholm (L)
Madam Speaker! No, I do not dare do that. The matter is being prepared in the Government Offices now, so I do not intend to give any timetable for this. It would be wrong of me.
I share Mats Wiking's view that the after-school centers are an important part of the school system. They are often an integrated part of the school, not least in primary school but partially also in middle school. It is important that the after-school centers maintain high quality and that we get more young people to want to become teachers in after-school centers.
It is also important that the municipalities see this and actually follow the legislation that exists in this area, because it gives children who have specific needs – completely regardless of what the parents' needs look like – the right to participate in the after-school center. I think it is important to point out that we already have quite extensive legislation today, but that it is not always followed.
Source: The Swedish Parliament. The speeches come from the open data of the Riksdag, translated into English by AI, which may contain errors.