Response to interpellation 2024/25:185 on tax on sexual services
Translated from Swedish by AI; the translation may contain errors. The Swedish text is the original.
Summary AI, written in advance
The debate concerns tax on sexual services and whether women in prostitution should be taxed. M considers it unreasonable that women in prostitution should be taxed 1 2, but the government chooses not to proceed with a tax exemption because it risks increasing the exploitation of persons and benefiting criminals 1 2. M emphasizes that they are working with broader measures such as exit programs and support for vulnerable individuals 1 2. S considers women in prostitution to be crime victims and that it is a self-evident matter that they should not be taxed 3. S argues that the government has turned around completely 3. S requests an investigation to remove the taxation 3. S argues that taxing women who have been subjected to abuse is challenging and risks making the purchase of sexual services more legitimate 4. S considers prostitution to be an example of men's violence against women and that it is reasonable to consider the cancellation or reduction of tax debts for women who leave prostitution in order not to undermine exit programs 5. S argues that it is absurd that the state demands tax from crime victims and requests an investigation on how obstacles to increasing the conditions for exit programs can be removed 6. S expresses frustration that the government does not want to consider tax relief for the most vulnerable 7. M argues that the government does not want to worsen the situation and chooses not to proceed with tax relief as it risks becoming worse for the women 8 9. M emphasizes that they focus on strengthening exit programs and working against men's violence 8 9.
Written by AI in advance and may contain errors. The numbers lead to the speech a statement builds on; check against the text below.
Finansministern Elisabeth Svantesson (M)
Madam Speaker! Hanna Westerén has asked me if I have changed my mind since our debate just over a year ago and now consider it reasonable to tax funds derived from the sale of sexual services. Hanna Westerén has also asked me if I intend to change the regulatory framework so as not to risk cementing women in prostitution and exclusion by taxing funds derived from sex purchases, which is a crime according to Swedish law.
The government's ambition is that no human being shall be exploited for sexual purposes. Persons who are exploited in prostitution are in a vulnerable position, and it is of the utmost importance that these persons receive support and help to leave prostitution.
The Government is therefore working on several reforms aimed at this, among other things. In the report from the Inquiry on exit programs for persons subjected to prostitution (SOU 2023:97), there are, among other things, proposals for individually designed exit programs for adults who are subjected to prostitution and human trafficking for sexual purposes. The purpose of the proposed programs is to strengthen the identification of, and protection, support, and care interventions for adults who wish to leave prostitution or who have been subjected to human trafficking for sexual purposes. The proposals are currently being prepared within the Government Offices. In the budget bill for 2025, we are strengthening the support for persons subjected to prostitution by 10 million kronor.
Regarding the tax exemption of income from prostitution, the government has carefully analyzed the advantages and disadvantages of such a measure, with the starting point being that the goal is to reduce the exploitation of persons in prostitution and facilitate things for them.
Among other things, I invited, together with the Minister for Equality in June 2024, to a round table discussion to discuss what the government can do. Representatives from among others the organization Talita, Sweden's women's organizations, the Swedish Police Authority, and the Swedish Tax Agency participated in the round table discussion.
During the round-table discussion, several actors pointed out that there is a risk that tax exemption could increase the exploitation of persons who are in prostitution. Among other things, criminals could claim that unreported income comes from income from the sale of sexual services. A tax exemption risks, in other words, undermining rather than helping all those persons who are in prostitution.
In light of these risks, the government has therefore chosen not to proceed with the issue of tax exemption. As I said at the beginning of my response, the government is, however, working intensively on several other measures aimed at countering prostitution and providing support to those who are subjected to it.
Hanna Westerén (S)
Madam Speaker! It is customary to thank for the answer in an interpellation debate, but I honestly do not know if I have ever been so disappointed by a debate as I actually was by this one.
Given that the Minister for Finance and I belong to different parties with completely different answers to our time's challenges, many debates between Social Democrats and Moderates are predictable. However, I hoped and believed that this question would land differently.
A year ago, Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson and I met, and I received very clear signals then that for once we wanted the same thing. It was surprising and fantastic at the same time. In a difficult time for our country with war in the surrounding area and skyrocketing inflation, it was uplifting that the Finance Minister, in her address, signaled hope, as she also considered it unreasonable that money derived from prostitution should be taxed and that the woman selling sex thus risks a harsher punishment and greater vulnerability than the man who has taken the liberty to assault her for payment.
I take the liberty, Madam Speaker, to refresh both the Minister for Finance's and the audience's memory regarding what was said here in the chamber on this specific issue one year and two days ago. I quote Elisabeth Svantesson: "Is it reasonable to collect tax, Madam Speaker, from women who are victims of prostitution, who have been raped, assaulted and suffered injuries, mental and physical, for the rest of their lives? Of course, I see the unreasonableness in this."
I want to pause for a moment, Madam Speaker, at the last part. "Of course, I see the unreasonable in this." One who sees an injustice and has as much power as the Minister for Finance also has the tools to change it. And it really sounded like that was going to happen then, a year ago. I quote the Minister for Finance again: "I will continue to follow the issue and see what we can do to ensure that what is unreasonable here, the unreasonable in this situation that I mentioned in the previous answer, can cease. Today it is difficult to know exactly how we will proceed, but we will continue to follow the issue and see what needs to be done after the exit study is in place. I can guarantee that I will not let go of my part of this, which is precisely taxation, because that is my area of responsibility in the government."
Madam Speaker! Now it has happened. The Minister for Finance has dropped the issue. Furthermore, the vulnerability of women in prostitution will become even greater, with the state's good memory. I cannot for my life understand what has occurred or happened that has caused Minister for Finance Elisabeth Svantesson to so radically change her stance and drop the issue of taxation.
Annika Strandhäll (S)
Madam Speaker! Thanks to the Minister for Finance for this debate!
I also participated in the interpellation debate almost exactly one year ago, and I also felt exactly what Hanna Westerén described here just now – a hope that here we could reach an agreement across the block boundaries.
We know that in Sweden, sex trafficking has been illegal for a long time. We were the first in the world with abolitionist legislation and have been very proud of this. Despite that, we are in a situation where women in Sweden are hunted and taxed by the state when they are actually victims of crime.
Selling sex is not a job. Selling sex is not a hobby. It is to be exploited, and it is to be subjected to a modern form of slavery. Four out of five women in prostitution are victims of human trafficking, and the majority of them come from poor countries both within and outside Europe.
It is a self-evident matter that the one who sells sex should be regarded as a crime victim, and I truly believed when we stood here in the chamber a year ago that the government shared that view. Just as Hanna Westerén said earlier, I thought the Finance Minister was very clear about it.
Therefore, it is extremely strange that the government has completely about-faced and that both the Minister for Finance and the Minister for Gender Equality are now going out and saying that it could risk fueling organized crime. Income from the sale of sexual services would thus fuel organized crime. It is a statement that feels completely detached from reality as an argument for maintaining the taxation of prostitutes.
In this case, reference is made to a round-table discussion that was supposed to take place in June, where this issue was discussed and where Talita participated. It is just that when one speaks with Talita about what emerged at this round-table discussion, Talita is not of the opinion that what emerged there is what the Swedish government is presenting.
It also doesn't matter, Elisabeth Svantesson, if it concerns individual cases per year, because it is about the signal we send when it comes to prostitution - about our fellow human beings who have their bodies exploited and their lives destroyed. As I said, Sweden was the first in the world to introduce abolitionist legislation that places the blame on the perpetrator. Let us not now go backwards by placing a double burden on the already vulnerable woman!
No, Elisabeth Svantesson, I appeal to the government to reconsider this position and appoint an inquiry that can look at how we should remove the possibility of taxing prostitution in Sweden.
Kalle Olsson (S)
Madam Speaker! Thank you, Hanna Westerén, for a very important interpellation!
Sweden was, as we heard from Annika Strandhäll, the first country in the world to criminalize the purchase of sexual services. Prostitution was to be seen as part of men's violence against women. This legislation has not removed the problem, that men still take the right to a woman's body, but it has clearly contributed to changing the attitude of many in the group I belong to - the group of men.
This is in itself a big and important matter. I have never in my entire 40-year life heard another man say or joke about having bought or intending to buy sex. That does not mean, as said, that there are not men out there who nevertheless do so – who take the right to a woman for payment. But the normative effect of the legislation is palpable.
It is, Madam Speaker, important that it continues that way. It is important that it is perceived as wrong and unacceptable to buy sex. It is important that prostitution and human trafficking for sexual purposes are seen and discussed from the perspective that it is a part of men's violence against women - that there are no gray areas in this, but that it is wrong, period.
If we agree that prostitution and human trafficking for sexual purposes are part of men's violence against women, which I believe we do in this chamber, it is, to put it mildly, challenging to imagine that these women in the next link of the chain should be taxed on incomes they have received by being subjected to abuses that many times can only be described as rape.
The woman Maja, who was interviewed in DN earlier this year, describes how she continued to sell sex because she needed money to pay off the tax debt she had incurred when she had sold sex previously and how she, as she herself says, "put myself up for rougher and rougher things that I didn't actually want to do. Things that hurt."
As said, Madam Speaker, it is challenging to imagine that women should be taxed on income they may have received by being subjected to abuse that many times can only be described as rape.
I wonder what this does to the general perception that prostitution is wrong. A risk that I see, in any case, is that it opens up for a discussion where the purchase of sexual services is perceived as something more legitimate, so to speak. The women do pay tax – then it's not that bad, is it? I wonder if the Minister for Finance sees that risk.
Would it not have been more in line with how we have previously approached this issue to, as Hanna Westerén, look at other countries and how they, with pragmatic solutions by writing off tax debts, have tried to support women in a different way?
Finansministern Elisabeth Svantesson (M)
Madam Speaker! Thank you, Hanna Westerén, for this interpellation! I appreciate the discussion. How do you best help women who are or have been in prostitution and who are seen by many men as a commodity, a product in the sex trade? How do you help women who have become trapped in the dirty, degrading trafficking network, which is often organized by grossly criminal men in grossly criminal gangs? These are women who, every second of the day, here in Stockholm and in many other places around Sweden, are treated as if they had no value whatsoever.
For the government, it is a priority issue to prevent and combat human trafficking, including the demand for sexual services. I know - that is why we are here - that this is an important issue for many here in the Swedish Riksdag. We here see prostitution and human trafficking for sexual purposes as part of men's violence against women, as someone said before - so it is not in all places in the world.
Sweden was, as mentioned, the first in the world to criminalize the purchase, but not the sale, of sexual services. Since then, we here in this chamber have had as a starting point that all income shall be taxed.
Here we come to the question of unreasonableness, Madam Speaker. Yes, I absolutely stand by every word I have said here in the chamber. I think that the situations that arise for certain women are completely unreasonable. But two things can be completely unreasonable at the same time.
I and Paulina Brandberg, who is the Minister for Equality, have listened to several parties. We have gone in-depth; it has not just been round-table discussions, but we have really talked and delved deeper. We see that this, however one looks at it, is a difficult issue, and there is no optimal solution. But I never want to risk that these women would have it even worse.
Why is this proposal coming? Why is the argument being raised? The women who are in prostitution often, as I said, have criminal men in their vicinity. There is a lot of cash, a lot of money. We know that this has truly grown and become larger in Sweden. Without this legislation, there is a great risk - several are raised - that this cash and money ends up with these women, and then they become even more vulnerable.
I understand, Madam Speaker, that one can arrive at different conclusions here. Life is not always simple, and choices are not always easy. But what the government is working on is much broader. This issue of taxation on prostitution is an important matter, but what we are working on is broader, for example, the exit program we are now working on, which aims to help women out of this environment – to gain value, to be healed on the inside and to feel like one's own, free individual again.
There is much to do here. Previous governments have done things, and we continue this work intensively. I fully understand that some think that I and the government are wrong, but it is not that we have not thought properly about this issue and gone into depth with it. It is a difficult question, and yes, it is unreasonable. But as I said: Many things can be unreasonable at the same time.
This entire industry and everything that happens with these women is completely unreasonable. The goal must be to help women out of this.
Hanna Westerén (S)
Madam Speaker! I believe we must start talking a bit about objections. I hear that the Minister for Finance raises a number of objections against considering any form of relief. But I think it must be fully possible to find out which funds have come to anyone via prostitution, which is legal, and respectively some other, illegal activity.
I want to emphasize what, among others, Annika Strandhäll pointed out earlier: Prostitution is not a job, a hobby, or something voluntary. Prostitution is an extremely clear example of men's violence against women, and we have agreed to combat that.
Already in the debate a year ago, both I and the Minister for Finance referred to the so-called exit study, and it is absolutely outstanding that from now on there will be better support for women who want to leave prostitution. But we will not escape the fact that we risk fewer women seeking help and that the entire fantastic effort is partially undermined because women are kept in prostitution because they have to pay off their tax debt.
Madam Speaker! In the debate a year ago, I used the term "convoluted", which the Minister for Finance quotes here, and I maintain that formulation. I am perfectly clear that write-downs or forgiveness of tax debts is not something we do lightly in Sweden. Taxation, redistribution, and the state having clear and potent tools are important. I am perfectly clear that we do not do such things with ease.
But not even when a woman leaves prostitution and enters an exit program to leave the violence, the vulnerability, and the exploitation behind, does the government consider it reasonable to consider a waiver or a reduction. For me, this is astonishing and nonsensical.
Annika Strandhäll also raised this regarding the meeting with organizations. In the Finance Minister's response, it is claimed that organizations have advised against introducing tax exemption. Talita was among those present at that meeting. It says in the response. Talita followed the debate here from the gallery a year ago. Their view, that it is unreasonable to tax income from prostitution, has not changed. I really want to emphasize that it is important how we highlight what different organizations actually stand for.
It is not so black and white that we are talking about either a total tax exemption or maintaining the status quo. We have to, for all the world, start somewhere.
Madam Speaker! I believe that at least considering writing off or waiving tax debts when a woman leaves prostitution, so that the exit program can make a real difference, would be a perfectly reasonable first step.
Annika Strandhäll (S)
Madam Speaker! I also agree with what Hanna Westerén has just presented. We are not seeking any increased polemics in this issue, but we are seeking a solution.
It is naturally absurd that the country that was first in the world to ban sex-buying and in international contexts is seen as the country that perhaps stands furthest ahead when it comes to standing up for an abolitionist model regarding sex-buying, while simultaneously engages in collecting tax from this act, which the state knows is illegal. Thus, one risks placing prostitutes in a situation that makes it harder for them to leave prostitution. It sends extremely strange signals.
We naturally should not take money for the state from people who are crime victims. On that, we are in agreement. We have a common view on prostitution.
A year ago, we perceived that we wanted the same thing. We now need to move forward in this issue. I appeal to the government to reconsider its decision and appoint an inquiry that looks at how we can overcome this obstacle and thereby also increase the conditions so that the proposals that are now being drafted based on the exit inquiry can also have full effect.
Finansministern Elisabeth Svantesson (M)
Madam Speaker! Let me briefly summarize what I have said.
The government does not want to worsen the situation for these women. We have delved deeper. We have had conversations where we have encountered different opinions, but we have also received many arguments that mean we do not proceed in the way the interpellator and the debaters desire.
Do we then want the same thing? I mean that we want the same thing. We want these women to leave prostitution, get their own lives and be healed and cured. We want far fewer to enter prostitution. There is much to be done there.
It is much that is unreasonable when it comes to prostitution. That men at all subject women to this is unreasonable. The list of unreasonable things can be made long.
What we are focused on and intend to do moving forward is to work with the exit program. We intend to continue working as we do in the budget for next year and this year and strengthen various activities that concern specifically men's violence against women. It concerns both prostitution and other parts.
I still think it is good that Talita has raised these issues. It has made many of us aware of the problems. Then, one can actually see slightly different views on the solutions. That is something I and Annika Strandhäll have done in other issues before.
I know that we in our parties see things in slightly different ways. From the bottom of my heart, I just want to say that just like you, we want to do better for people, especially people who are vulnerable and have ended up in situations that they cannot get out of.
Sometimes one has different solutions. I believe that many of our solutions are the same. But in this particular case, we choose not to proceed.
However, work is ongoing regarding over-indebtedness. Many vulnerable people have been affected by it. There is important work to be done there that can also include these women.
Hanna Westerén (S)
Madam Speaker! It is depressing to listen to the Minister for Finance. I perceive it as such that there are tools for change. There is an opportunity for relief. But we seem to be in an era of absurdities. It becomes somewhat absurd that we will soon enter a new fiscal year where taxes are lowered without further ado for some already well-off, which is apparently completely uncomplicated and perfectly reasonable, while at the same time it is portrayed as unreasonable to even consider a write-off or reduction of tax debts for some of our society's most vulnerable and risk-associated – risks that are furthermore downplayed in a concerning manner by those who work closest to those affected, women in prostitution.
I am disappointed and frustrated. I still believe that a fantastic opportunity presented itself to make a real difference, to alleviate vulnerability and to truly change people's lives and everyday routines. It does not affect many, but the difference for them would be enormous. Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson is letting this opportunity slip, and I unfortunately think it is weak and completely unreasonable.
Finansministern Elisabeth Svantesson (M)
Madam Speaker! I can state that there are many of us in this chamber who care about people and want many to be able to leave a situation that is completely degrading and sucks the life and strength out of women. This is actually what it is about.
If what Hanna Westerén is now highlighting would truly make a difference for everyone who wants to leave prostitution, it is well clear that we would have proceeded with it. But when we weigh different arguments in the question of taxation, we see that it risks becoming worse for the women. That is what I believe. One can think differently about that.
We are now working broadly to combat violence against women. It concerns prostitution, trafficking and much more. We are taking joint action. Sweden has come a long way, but still, many women are killed in their own homes by a man who is close to them. All of this shall be reversed and changed. I know that there is no partisan dividing line in this. This is also not a right-wing or left-wing issue, but it is about finding the best solutions. In this case, there is no best solution, as I see it, because this is a situation that can never contain a single word that is good.
But we will together do what can be done so that women can leave these situations or never enter them.
Source: The Swedish Parliament. The speeches come from the open data of the Riksdag, translated into English by AI, which may contain errors.