Response to interpellation 2023/24:386 on the conditions for the Prison and Probation Service

Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! Rasmus Ling has asked me if I will be open to alternatives to imprisonment being possible in more cases, in accordance with the proposals from the Director General of the Prison and Probation Service. Furthermore, Rasmus Ling has asked if I intend to take any measures to reduce the risk of violence-promoting extremist views spreading in Swedish prisons. Rasmus Ling also asks if I will take any measures so that the Prison and Probation Service will be given the conditions to improve its results regarding recidivism.

The strained occupancy situation at all of the Prison and Probation Service's facilities is due to the expansion starting far too late. The Government is now taking its responsibility and has ensured that the Prison and Probation Service has received the conditions the authority needs to improve the occupancy situation and fulfill its mission.

The Prison and Probation Service is so much more than just the number of places in prisons and detention centers. That we shift the perspective from the perpetrator to the crime victim does not mean that the content of the operations is less significant. A good and qualitative operation that contributes to fewer people reoffending is also an important part of that shift in perspective, where the crime victims' restitution and society's legitimate interest in protection against crime stand at the center.

Getting people to break with a criminal lifestyle is one of the most important crime prevention tasks. During our time in opposition, the Riksdag, in a motion, urged the then government to strengthen the Prison and Probation Service's work in preventing recidivism. The government is now working to increase capacity within the Prison and Probation Service but also to ensure that Swedish criminal justice is effective and well-functioning, as well as that a qualitative operation is conducted that reduces recidivism.

The government has, in the national strategy against violent extremism and terrorism, which was decided at the beginning of January, identified the need to work preventatively in, among other places, the prison environment and community service. The Swedish Prison and Probation Service is thus a central actor in the preventive work. The authority has for a number of years conducted successful work in preventing radicalization in the prison environment and preventing recidivism in such crimes. Also in the work of providing support to those individuals who wish to leave violent extremist environments and who need help to do so, the Swedish Prison and Probation Service has a central role.

In its capacity report, the Prison and Probation Service reports that the expansion requires a considerable number of new ways of working and new thinking also regarding priorities. It is good that the agency is thinking new and broadly also regarding the opportunities that digitalization provides in terms of surveillance, staffing, and so on. The Government has also tasked an investigator to review the possibilities of leasing detention places abroad. The Prison and Probation Service's capacity report and other proposals are now being analyzed at the Ministry of Justice.

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Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! Thank you, Minister Strömmer, for the answer, even though what I see also contained a number of question marks! It is good that we have this moment to try to clear them up.

Regarding the work on preventing recidivism, the Minister for Justice refers in the response to what the Moderaterna did during their time in opposition. An announcement was made that the work to prevent recidivism would be strengthened within the correctional services. That can be pointed out. We do that too.

I do not know if Gunnar Strömmer longs to return to the time in opposition, but now one actually sits with the power of government and has the opportunity to do this. Still, it is said in the answer that one has ensured that the Prison and Probation Service has received the conditions the agency needs. I do not share that picture, Mr. Speaker. I think on the contrary that the Prison and Probation Service clearly signals that they are in an incredibly pressured situation, and I mean that the government does not take it as seriously as it deserves.

The situation is that the staff turnover is so high that the risk of violence and threats of violence for staff and detainees is extremely high. Restrictions are introduced which mean that inmates are not allowed to be outdoors as much as they have been allowed to do previously or are allowed to receive fewer visits. There are also double-occupancies in the cells during the night and evening. Collectively, this worsens the possibilities for recidivism prevention work in the correctional services. This must be seen, acknowledged, and the conditions for it must be improved.

Mr. Speaker! The Minister for Justice says that the expansion started too late. One can also turn it around and say that the reduction in the number of places started too early. It was indeed a period when it actually happened, not with Gunnar Strömer's predecessor but with the predecessor's predecessor, namely Beatrice Ask. But one can, of course, point out that the situation then was different than now. I do not know if it was a way of saying that the Social Democrats' and the Green Party's government would have done significantly more during this time. We must remember that the construction of a new prison admittedly goes faster than the construction of a new nuclear power plant, but it is still a time horizon of ten years or similar. Two parliamentary terms do not suffice in most cases, after all.

We also know that during the eight years that Sweden had an S-MP government and respectively an S-government, it was during three of those years - 2015, 2019 and 2022 - that the Moderates' budget passed. I am saying this now in case the Minister for Justice's wording was a way to blame the previous government and not say what one intends to do oneself.

Mr. Speaker! The purpose of the correctional services is, after all, that persons who have committed serious crimes shall be kept locked up and separated from society during the sentence, but also come out with better conditions to not commit new crimes. The Government must step up the work to give the correctional services better conditions, because now there is a significant risk that people are locked up and then come out with worse conditions.

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

Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! I thank Rasmus Ling for the opportunity to discuss these important issues here in the chamber today.

When it comes to correctional care, it is of course entirely correct that there are several purposes. I want to emphasize that incarceration in itself has an important purpose for the reason that it is such an incredibly important part of the surrounding society's reaction to crimes that we cannot accept. It is therefore important that the punishments in the future shall reflect the seriousness of the crimes in a better way than today. It is an extraordinarily important part of the victims' redress. This is also the way in which a civilized society compensates crime victims for the infringement that has occurred in their right to privacy, safety, security, and freedom.

Another important purpose is to protect the surrounding society against crime. The incarceration itself therefore has an important purpose, which is decoupled from the prevention of recidivism, but it is of course clear that the time in prison should be used in as productive a way as possible and, to the greatest extent possible, contribute to as many as possible coming out on the other side without relapsing into crime. Nothing in the Prison and Probation Service's mandate has changed in that part. On the contrary, we emphasize the importance of it in various ways.

I also want to point out the Safety Preparedness Agency (Trygghetsberedningen), which received a new mandate in connection with the change of government, which concerns the interface between the recidivism prevention work in the correctional services and what happens next when one leaves prison.

We are, therefore, moving the positions forward. My reference to the announcement in the Riksdag in opposition was not an expression of any ill-hidden longing to return to opposition, but for the long lines in our positions regarding recidivism prevention work.

With that said, there is no doubt whatsoever that the great pressure on the correctional services affects the possibilities of conducting an operation as good as one would wish. I would like to say that a good deal of the pressure for transformation also, admittedly, offers opportunities.

Rasmus Ling mentioned double-layering. That just that circumstance would be negative in relation to recidivism prevention measures, I believe is difficult to substantiate.

My impression is that the double occupancy is not what the Prison and Probation Service themselves point out as a major problem compared to the pressure that a double occupancy entails when it comes to, for example, shared surfaces and the challenges of differentiating them and ensuring that there is access to meaningful activities that necessarily must be conducted during a larger part of the day than before, and so on. It is clear that it affects in a negative way, but there are also positive development opportunities in it. It is clear that the solution does not lie in an increased unmanaged pressure but in the Prison and Probation Service expanding and growing so that one can conduct a good operation inside the walls.

Regarding the issues of responsibility, I do not personally have a huge need to dwell on them, but I still think it is important to clarify the conditions under which we entered this assignment. In February 2023, a couple of months after the government took office and I received this role, the trade union Seko released the report Invest in the Staff. It was an incredibly grim reading regarding the state of the prison and probation service. One could call it a very dark balance sheet over the eight years that Rasmus Ling and Miljöpartiet were largely responsible for. That is the starting point for our journey. It will take time to reverse the development, but we will provide the prison and probation service with good conditions even in the short term. I am completely convinced that the prison and probation service has its best time ahead of it.

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Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! Nor do I wish to dwell forever on the distribution of responsibility from the past. But I note again that since 2006, five budgets have been submitted by S and MP and sometimes other parties, and which have passed through the Riksdag. The rest of the budgets that have gained approval have been submitted by the Moderates and various other parties.

Regarding correctional services and double occupancy in cells, it is not the case that it is negative to share a cell in every single instance. Nor have I asserted that. But there are great risks if this is the new normal, as the Minister for Justice has said, if this is what will apply, if there will be less and less opportunity for the correctional services to choose, and if the flexibility decreases because the pressure becomes so great.

In my interpellation, I also raised the risk of violence-promoting extremism and asked how the Minister for Justice views it. I do not think this is being addressed sufficiently well either. There are indeed mentions of it in the national strategy, but the wording is weaker than it was in the communication from the government that was shared with the Riksdag in 2015. The need to review this is, however, greater today than it was then, even though it was naturally large then as well.

How should one, for example, view a situation in the correctional services where hate preachers, who should to the greatest extent possible be kept isolated from others, must share a cell and thus be given the opportunity to influence others for many hours every day? It is not a satisfactory situation, and the Minister for Justice should not think so either.

Mr. Speaker! The forecasts from the Prison and Probation Service in the capacity study that has been conducted show that as early as 2033, that is in nine years, we could have a situation where Sweden ranks second highest in Europe in terms of sentenced prison years per capita, and where it concerns 35,000 people compared to approximately 9,000 people today. This is a serious warning bell. Gunnar Strömmer and I agree that those who commit the most serious crimes should be imprisoned for longer periods and that it has been important to increase the sentences for many of the serious crimes, but this is something that occurs significantly more broadly than that and which risks having consequences that affect society and individuals in a negative way.

An example, Mr. Speaker, is the increased penalties for drug offenses that were made this summer. Significantly more will be sentenced to prison, and one will not receive parole in the way we have had until now. This means that those who previously went unpunished and are now sentenced to prison terms will establish contacts with scarred gang criminals for a longer period in prison. This leads to greater harm for both society and the individuals who, with a milder treatment from society, would not have had to go that way.

Mr. Speaker! I believe there are reasons for the government to look at the situation in the correctional services in a less prestigious way and see how the conditions can be improved in the long term. People who commit crimes that are not of the most serious character should not bond with scarred criminals, which however risks happening more and more in the future.

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Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! I will begin with what Rasmus Ling took up at the end regarding how we should view the future and the development in Swedish correctional services. Regarding the forecasts that the Prison and Probation Service is now making, one must admittedly see that there are significant margins, as there are many factors that influence the future occupancy. But let us start from the assumption that it could be a question of a tripling of the number of places in the correctional services during the coming ten-year period. There are several factors driving this. I want to emphasize that it is not for one moment a matter of prestige. But it may perhaps be about the view of society and how one should handle the major social problems.

A very important reason why many more will be sitting in prison and will sit there longer is that societal development has brought us to a point where we can state that the lethal firearm violence over ten years has tripled. Shootings and explosions are occurring. It is a matter of very gross and serious crime that, not least, children and young people are being drawn into. More will be sentenced for serious crimes regardless of what we do with the sentencing levels moving forward.

A second part that I want to highlight is the crime clearance rate. The police in Stockholm succeeded during the past year in increasing the clearance rate regarding gun violence from 15, 16, or 17 percent to over 70 percent. In Uppsala, the clearance rate was 85 percent during the past year. More effective tools for the police, better working methods, and greater success in solving crimes will also mean that more people are convicted for their crimes. Since it concerns serious crimes, they will be imprisoned for a long time. It is fundamentally a positive development. We inherited a situation with a crime clearance rate of under 20 percent regarding the so-called quantity crimes, even lower figures for deadly violence in some places, and so on. It is incredibly important for the legitimacy of the entire rule of law that we increase the crime clearance rate. A both inevitable and desirable consequence of that is that more guilty parties will be arrested, prosecuted, and convicted for their crimes. Then, naturally, the sentencing will also affect the situation.

Nothing in today's situation in the correctional services is a result of the Tidö parties' upcoming sentencing toughening; it is the result of a number of other factors. What we are doing now is planning long-term and persistently to meet serious crime and other crime with a sharper view on punishment than until now. We believe that a shift must be achieved, so that the perpetrator's interests are considered to a lesser extent while the crime victim's interest of redress and the surrounding society's need for protection are considered to a greater extent.

I want to turn against the description that this should be an expression of some general, generic, and imprecise repression. I have now heard several times from the left that it is what we are engaged in and that we should instead only focus on the shootings, the bombings, and the gross violence. Then I want to highlight reporting that has recently given us a reminder of what today's rules have for consequences in the form of low sentences for, for example, gross sexual assaults and violent rapes. One can be released after two-thirds of the sentence even if one has an enormous propensity for recidivism and so on. It is not a satisfactory order. We shall do everything we can to push back the gross violence. There is no doubt whatsoever about that. But we must also lift our gaze and see that there is a great deal of other serious crime that affects large parts of our society and which must meet a more powerful response than what is the case today. We shall, in the long term, equip the criminal justice system to be able to meet that development.

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Rasmus Ling (MP)

Mr. Speaker! It is quite clear that crime solving is important for both trust in society and the possibility of preventing crime in the future – not only because those who have committed the crime are sentenced to prison but also because an increased risk of being caught for that type of crime will be crime-preventive. We are completely clear on that. Therefore, we have also had a broad consensus that the police should be given more preventive coercive measures but also on many other things.

To return to the correctional services: It is true, Mr. Speaker, that the toughening of penalties that the right-wing government and the government base have announced have not yet fully taken effect, even though some have entered into force. Even more importantly, when we have an already strained situation, is it then a matter of seeing what the announced matters will lead to; an expansion of the correctional services was needed under all circumstances, but how can it happen in a way that ensures we do not end up in a situation where we get these incredibly risky and negative consequences, which we actually risk getting?

Alongside this, the government has also stated that the correctional services shall take over the responsibility for those who today are convicted under the Act on Closed Juvenile Care. I am not saying that it is wrong in principle, but given the situation we are in, it is being done too quickly and in a forced manner, Mr. Speaker. It is to be completed by 2026. That is less than three years. There is a risk that it will not be done in a good way from the start. For example, one must find physical premises and staff.

Mr. Speaker! I am glad that we have had this debate, but I am quite certain that we will have reason to return to the subject. The government must step up and take the situation in the correctional services more seriously than has been done until now.

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Justitieministern Gunnar Strömmer (M)

Mr. Speaker! Once again, thanks to Rasmus Ling for the opportunity today to discuss these important issues! I want to emphasize that the government has taken the issues with the utmost seriousness from the very first moment. But I am happy to raise the level of ambition even further.

There is no doubt whatsoever that social development, crime solving, and a changed view on punishment with a focus on crime victims and community protection mean that the development of the Prison and Probation Service over the next 10-15 years will be a primary task for Sweden. In that regard, the government has already taken the lead.

I will take this with the juvenile prisons as a hook for a more general reflection. The time until 2026 is both short and long. There is no doubt that it ramps up the pace of the transformation process. But we do that because the societal problems are so extraordinarily acute.

I now often hear us all saying: We see the shootings and the bombings, and we all agree that it is terrible. We must do everything we can to push it back. But it has no consequences in sense of urgency when it comes to the reforms.

It is complex. But we must, with joint efforts, ensure that we implement reforms that allow us to break the development and do so expeditiously. The insight into the extent of societal problems must have some kind of consequence in the view of how we implement reforms. It must be a high tempo but also high precision and high quality.

I also want to confirm the importance of seeing the challenges that the correctional services face. Double occupancy is not a walk in the park. But it can be done in a good way, and it can be done in a bad way. A very important thing when the correctional services are now to be expanded is that one can plan for double occupancy in a different way already when building new, compared to the situation that exists today when one must handle premises that were actually built with a different starting point. All of that lies ahead of us. We will be able to do that in a dynamic and very good way.

Lastly, I want to say something briefly about violent extremism. The wording in the strategies is very strong, but that is not the decisive factor. The decisive factor is how well, methodically and purposefully the work is carried out in practice. On that, we are in complete agreement.

The interpellations debate was hereby concluded.

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