Response to interpellation 2025/26:190 on any potential plan for a review of the Gender Identity Act
Translated from Swedish by AI; the translation may contain errors. The Swedish text is the original.
Summary AI, written in advance
KD informs that the government will not initiate a review of the legislation to make it more difficult to change legal gender during the current parliamentary term 1 2 3. KD emphasizes that the government makes decisions collectively and follows the Riksdag's decision regarding the improved opportunities to change gender that entered into force in 2025 1 2. KD agrees that the waiting times are long and that the care for gender dysphoria needs to become better 3. KD states that the Agency for Health and Care Analysis shall follow up on the announcements regarding the application and consequences of the new law 4.
Written by AI in advance and may contain errors. The numbers lead to the speech a statement builds on; check against the text below.
Sjukvårdsministern Elisabet Lann (KD)
Madam Speaker! Ulrika Westerlund has asked the Minister for Social Affairs if he intends to take the initiative for a review of the legislation with the aim that it should become more difficult to change legal gender. The work within the government is distributed in such a way that it is I who shall answer the interpellation.
On April 17, 2024, the Riksdag voted yes to the Social Affairs Committee's proposal for improved opportunities to change gender. The proposal that formed the basis for the Riksdag's decision was a so-called committee initiative. This means that it is a committee in the Riksdag that has taken the initiative for it and that it is not based on a government proposition or motions from members, which is otherwise the norm. The laws began to apply on July 1, 2025.
The Riksdag also directed four announcements to the government regarding the need for regulations, national knowledge support, prevention of criminal activity, and follow-up of the application. The government has complied with all announcements.
The Authority for Health and Social Care Analysis shall, during 2025–2029, follow up on the application of the new Act (2024:238) on the determination of sex in certain cases and evaluate the effects of the Act. The Government will follow the work closely.
The Government will not take the initiative during the current parliamentary term to conduct a review of the legislation with the aim of making it more difficult to change legal gender.
Ulrika Westerlund (MP)
Madam Speaker! Thank you, Minister, for the answer! It was a correct account of what led to the fact that Sweden now, after about 15–20 years of work with various inquiries, finally has an updated gender identity law.
In addition to that account, the minister answers that the government will not take the initiative for a review of the legislation during this mandate period. That was not my question, because I asked whether the minister or any other Kristdemokrater minister will take the initiative for a review of the Gendered Identity Act at all, in light of what the Kristdemokrater's party leader and Sweden's Deputy Prime Minister said at the party's national convention – that is, at all, because what was said at the national convention can indeed be interpreted as such a pledge.
The Vice Prime Minister is not the only Christian Democrat who has raised the idea that the gender identity law should be torn up. Other members from the party have also done so, among others in motions to the Riksdag. I believe that statements from representatives of one of the governing parties must be taken seriously.
Therefore, I want to ask what this tearing up of the law means from the minister's perspective. Are we not to have any gender identity law? Or shall the law revert to the state it was in before the latest revision, i.e., the one we just carried out and which entered into force this summer? Or shall it become as it was before the modern changes were implemented starting in 2012–2013, when we, among other things, removed forced sterilizations?
I just want to give a brief historical description. In 1972 – it is the same year I was born, so it is quite a long time ago – Sweden became the first country in the world to legislate on the possibility of changing legal gender. For 53 years, it has therefore been possible to have a different legal gender than the one registered at birth.
From the beginning, the new law reflected the time in which it was created. It contained a number of different offensive requirements, for example, requirements for forced sterilization and requirements not to be married. Since then, the law has been gradually changed.
The biggest change, I still think, was made by the judiciary. In December 2012, the Court of Appeal in Stockholm ruled that the forced sterilizations violated the European Convention and the constitution. In February 2013, they were supposed to have ceased as a result of this judgment, but at least one person was forcibly sterilized after February 2013. They were removed from the law on July 1, 2013.
After the Swedish law was introduced in 1972, many other countries have introduced laws that provide the same opportunities to change legal gender, with different requirements. Some of the laws have the same type of offensive requirements as the Swedish law had from the beginning, while others, which have been added later, have different starting points and are based on the individual's right to have their gender identity legally recognized rather than from the state's right to set conditions for giving people this opportunity.
Argentina was first in the world with a gender identity law based on so-called self-determination, which Sweden still does not have but several other countries do, in 2012. Malta was first in Europe in 2015. Now the situation is that all Nordic countries except Sweden have such a law with self-determination as a basis.
Despite the fact that this law and the possibility to change legal gender have existed for 53 years, a number of claims are still being spread about what this law entails that do not correspond with reality. I believe that the leader of the Christian Democrats, the Vice Prime Minister, unfortunately contributed to this in his speech at your party's national convention. Therefore, I want to repeat some of the questions that I asked here. What does "tear up" mean? Should this law not exist, or should it revert to some earlier stage?
The Vice Prime Minister also claimed that the latest change to the law, which the Minister is answering about here now, would lead to "genderlessness" because biological men can now re-register as women. I also wonder what that means. In what way would this change to the law create a completely new situation compared to the one that has applied since 1972?
Daniel Vencu Velasquez Castro (S)
Madam Speaker! I thank you for the opportunity to debate this issue, for like Ulrika Westerlund, I became very curious about what the Christian Democrats' policy is regarding people's possibility to change legal gender after Ebba Busch gave her keynote speech at the Christian Democrats' national convention.
When we look back, not as far as Ulrika Westerlund but to 2022, we see that Ebba Busch and Kristdemokraterna were in favor of implementing changes in the then current gender identity law – this primarily in relation to the treatment in healthcare for specifically trans people.
During the first half of this parliamentary term, the former Minister for Health and Social Affairs Acko Ankarberg Johansson repeatedly stated that the government was working on a new gender identity law. Then it became clear to everyone that the Christian Democrats and the Sweden Democrats blocked the government's opportunity to present such a bill.
In the debate that took place here in the chamber regarding a new gender identity law, a rarely seen ignorance with offensive arguments was displayed. From the Sverigedemokraterna, arguments were presented that compared trans people with animals and costumes. From the Kristdemokraterna, a fairly large ignorance was displayed when it came to which law we were actually discussing. There were very many members who thought that we should investigate the issue further, even though this is perhaps the question that has been investigated the most in Sweden.
It also seems to be the case, judging by Ebba Busch's policy speech, that the Christian Democrats have not only dropped the question of which age should be covered by the change of legal gender but also completely reject gender identity as an entity in society. Ebba Busch argues that the gender identity law has some form of normlessness that is wrong and that the law is not about biology but about ideology.
For me, this becomes very strange, Madam Speaker. I must nevertheless say that such a statement is outrageous, because it means in practice that the Christian Democrats and the Vice Prime Minister of Sweden completely deny that gender identity exists and thus mean that trans people in reality do not exist either. The law is not normless if one acknowledges gender identity. Then it has very clear frameworks. The individual's experience and self-esteem weigh heavily within a legally regulated system in order to be able to change legal gender.
It is very difficult to understand what the Christian Democrats mean. I would like to have an answer from Elisabet Lann, who is the representative here for the Christian Democrats, as to whether it is the case that gender identity is recognized and what is meant by that the law has a normlessness and is not about biology but only about ideology.
The Minister for Health and the Christian Democrats must realize what the situation has become for the country's trans people after the debates and rounds regarding a new gender identity law. After being compared to animals in the Riksdag chamber, one does not feel very safe in society. We know that trans people are overrepresented in suicide statistics. We know that they are particularly vulnerable to hate and threats in society. We also know that the queues to specifically trans care are unreasonably long.
I would like to know what the Minister's view is. Do the Christian Democrats deny people's self-perception of gender? And what concrete measures can she present to improve the situation for Sweden's trans people?
Sjukvårdsministern Elisabet Lann (KD)
Madam Speaker! One can, of course, discuss the care of gender dysphoria in general. There is much to discuss here.
I am not here today to represent my party and my party's positions, but I represent the government. The government makes decisions collectively.
As I assume the members are aware, Madam Speaker, this issue was handled in an unusual way by not submitting a government bill but a committee initiative. After a decision in the Riksdag, the government is to follow the Riksdag's decision. The answer to the question is therefore that the government, or I as minister, will not initiate a review of the legislation aimed at making it more difficult to change legal gender. As is well known, different parties drive different issues before the election, and how the majority in this Riksdag will look after the next election, neither I nor anyone else here knows now. But the answer is fixed: We will not initiate such a review during this parliamentary term.
Ulrika Westerlund (MP)
Madam Speaker! Thank you, Minister, for the answer! I have a few more questions, but before I get to them, I want to continue describing some of the reasons why LGBTQI organizations have pushed for this change.
Living with a legal gender that does not match the gender identity or gender expression creates major problems in everyday life for trans people. Before this latest change of the law was implemented – the one that Ebba Busch spoke about at the Kristdemokraterna national meeting – it could take many years before a change of legal gender could be carried out. This happened after years of contact with healthcare, where doctors spent a lot of time documenting information that was only to be used for the application for change of legal gender. It therefore had nothing to do with gender-affirming healthcare.
This created a limbo for the individual and drained resources from healthcare in a completely unnecessary way. We want doctors to spend time investigating whether a person seeking gender-affirming care will feel better by gaining access to this care, and not on documenting various things so that an application for legal gender can be made further down the line. In practice, it required a two-year contact with healthcare to fulfill the requirements for this type of documentation.
If you live your life with a legal gender that does not match your gender expression, you risk encountering quite a few obstacles in everyday life. If, for example, you are perceived as a man by everyone around you but have a female personal identity number, there is a high probability that authority figures will believe you have a fake ID and that they cannot understand that it is your ID. You may also be forced into privacy-infringing explanations as to how it is possible that you have this ID and that it is yours.
This was nothing that appeared when the Deputy Prime Minister, in his speech at your Riksdag, stated that the change to the law had been carried out because misguided PK-politicians had pushed for it. I naturally wonder which politicians those are – I suspect that I might be one of them. Why would we have done this? Was there no reason? Were there no reasons at all for this change, which concerns the best interests of trans people, to be carried out? And why did this law come into existence in the first place?
The Deputy Prime Minister also presented some theories and argued that there were precisely theories behind this law that we could do without – and I naturally wonder what those theories are.
I understand that it may seem a bit petty to perform a detailed analysis of parts of a speech delivered by a party leader at their own party's national meeting, but the reason is, of course, that this is important from my perspective, because your party leader is Vice Prime Minister in Sweden.
What she said implies a suspicion of trans people and of measures that have been taken to make things better for trans people – who are a very vulnerable minority – and a suspicion of people who work for trans people's rights. This suspicion is part of a global development that is very serious and which exposes trans people to threatening situations.
The Minister mentioned that there is an election next year, and I can then inform that Donald Trump in his latest campaign to be elected President of the USA used approximately 250 million dollars to campaign negatively against trans people in his election campaign. He did this, of course, because he believed that he would win votes on it and that it was possible to mobilize a certain type of voter by presenting unfounded fear propaganda about a small, vulnerable minority that most perhaps have no personal connection to.
I really hope that we will avoid seeing anything similar in Sweden during next year's election campaign. I wonder again: Why does this law exist, according to the minister? Why were the changes implemented? What theories would be the ones underlying its existence?
Daniel Vencu Velasquez Castro (S)
Madam Speaker! Thank you, Minister, for the answer!
I feel that I did not receive an answer to my question. I actually asked about the transition care, and it does lie within the State Council's area as Minister for Health, one might think. I would like to have an answer on what concrete measures the government can take to strengthen the transition care.
We return to what I devoted a fairly large part of my speech to. Hate and threats against trans people are completely central when we discuss trans care, because trans people are not only overrepresented in suicide figures. It is also about the fact that a person, before committing suicide, has probably suffered quite a lot. This means that trans people, because of the hate and the threats they have to endure – including because of what is said in the Riksdag chamber by the Sverigedemokrater who compare trans people with animals – need to have strengthened opportunities to be able to receive care in order to curb suicide.
It is quite strange not to receive an answer to that question because for me it is completely central for a Minister for Health to take care of those people who are particularly vulnerable in our society and direct interventions to ensure that the regions can also meet the needs that exist when trans people, time and again, year after year, have to endure hate from primarily right-conservative movements.
I would like to have answers on what concrete measures the Minister for Health and Social Affairs and the government can take to strengthen transgender healthcare, reduce the queues within transgender healthcare, and increase the opportunities for transgender people to receive psychiatric help when needed.
Sjukvårdsministern Elisabet Lann (KD)
Madam Speaker! I thank the interpellator and the co-debater again. I agree with and share the concern regarding the mental health of this group and that the waiting times are so long. It is difficult with accessibility. There has been unequal care even in this area, as well as in many other areas.
The government has taken several initiatives, including when it comes to following up on care for gender dysphoria. It needs to become better.
The National Board of Health and Welfare has developed a coherent model with 23 indicators for monitoring care for gender dysphoria. The care is performed to maintain high quality as nationally specialized care at a number of units. It is an area where the care needs to be developed, and that work is ongoing.
This concerns a few different parts. The interpellation is about, as I understand it, specifically the possibility of changing legal gender. My answer there is fixed: I do not intend to initiate a review of that legislation during this parliamentary term.
It is also this legislation that several voices have raised concerns about, and there is a concern that this threatens certain safe environments for women. There are voices within all parties that have highlighted that concern. It is no great surprise that parties raise that question when an election is approaching.
I am here today to answer for the government, which makes decisions collectively. I repeat my answer: I do not intend to initiate a review to make it more difficult to change legal gender.
Ulrika Westerlund (MP)
Madam Speaker! I thank you for the answer! It almost seemed as if the Minister had heard my final point, for I was now going to touch a little bit on some other types of fears that have sometimes been expressed in relation to this law. The Minister addressed this concern regarding women's rights.
It was also something that the Vice Prime Minister touched upon in her contribution at your parliamentary meeting. There, however, she seemed to mean that the law would be about erasing biological differences between women and men. That, of course, made me curious, because this law is not about biological sex. It is about the possibilities to change legal gender, which is something completely different.
The Deputy Prime Minister also argued that the law would reinforce social differences between women and men and also cement these. Here I understand nothing, I must admit. In what way would this happen because we have a law that makes it possible to change legal gender without receiving a diagnosis but still after contact with healthcare? In what way are other people – other women and men – in Sweden affected by this?
The Vice Prime Minister also seemed to mean that the law would contribute to some kind of hostility between men and women. I also have very serious questions about that. What did she mean? In what way would that be possible?
When it comes to the feeling of fear that women's rights would be at risk, I really want to encourage the Minister and other representatives of her party – and perhaps also the government – to look at where such claims come from.
It is quite often and very groundlessly asserted, for example, that the amendment of the Gender Recognition Act would lead to that men who are convicted of rape by some kind of automaticity could be moved to a women's prison instead. That is not the case, as it turns out upon contact with the Prison and Probation Service. It is also not the case that the Swedish Sports Confederation advocates that one should, for example, be given the opportunity to compete in the women's category just because one has just changed legal gender.
It is therefore important to look at the details when discussing this legislation. It is something that I really hope we will see a sense of responsibility for from the government and the various parties involved.
I am glad that the Minister says that this will not be driven during this mandate period. I hope at the same time that this does not become an election issue for the Minister's party.
Sjukvårdsministern Elisabet Lann (KD)
Madam Speaker! I thank you again for the questions.
I did not develop the issue of following up on the law, but the Agency for Health and Social Care Analysis has a mandate. The Agency has already reported on its plan for the implementation of the mandate, and it is to be reported in 2029. The mandate concerns following up on the announcements that the Riksdag has directed to the Government regarding the application of the new law and what consequences it has. The follow-up will be carried out over four years and partially reported in December 2027.
There are reasons to return to the question. The parts that have been raised here will be followed up.
I thank you for the debate and wish the members a Merry Christmas.
Source: The Swedish Parliament. The speeches come from the open data of the Riksdag, translated into English by AI, which may contain errors.