Response to interpellation 2025/26:454 on measures to prevent criminals from running HVB homes

Socialtjänstministern Camilla Waltersson Grönvall (M)

Madam Speaker! Mattias Vepsä has asked me what measures I am prepared to take to ban activities that have links to organized crime and to ensure that criminals are immediately stopped from running HVB homes.

That unserious or criminal actors conduct activities with public funding is extremely serious. It means that welfare resources are being misused, but above all, it means that children and young people risk not receiving the care and support they need and are entitled to. It also means that these children and young people risk being drawn into crime or otherwise facing harm. I am determined that these actors shall be excluded from the care system and that the quality of care shall be ensured for all placed children and young people.

The Government has acted and continues to act powerfully on several fronts to prevent unserious actors from operating homes for care or housing, that is to say HVB. The Health and Social Care Inspectorate, IVO, has an important role in the work against unserious and criminal actors through its licensing and supervisory mandate. The Government has given IVO several assignments to improve the authority's conditions to strengthen and develop its work with preventing and countering welfare crime.

Ivo received a specifically targeted assignment in 2024 regarding the supervision of group homes and HVB (residential homes for children and young people) that receive children and young people (S2024/01643). Ivo has now submitted the final report for the assignment, during which the authority closed 39 operations, and states in its final report that the work against unserious and criminal actors within the entire care sector will continue to be strengthened during 2026. The Government is following the issue closely.

In addition to the mentioned assignments, the government decided in May 2025 on an assignment to several agencies to pool resources against organized crime in the welfare sector (S2025/01085). The assignment aims to combat the criminal economy and shut out organized crime from some of the welfare sector's most crime-affected areas.

On January 1 of this year, new rules in the Social Services Act (2025:400) entered into force, which mean that permits for, among other things, HVB homes that have been dormant for a longer period can be revoked, and that the suitability assessment during the granting of permits shall also cover the legal entity, which is judged to make it more difficult to set up front organizations.

The Government has also commissioned a special investigator to propose measures to strengthen Ivo's and the municipalities' possibilities to counter unserious and criminal operators within the care market, Measures for a sound care market (dir. 2025:90). The investigator shall, among other things, analyze and take a position on whether stricter requirements for permits to operate are needed and whether permits should be able to be revoked in more situations, as well as propose how Ivo can access information from the suspicion register in a purposeful manner.

An important part of the government's work is to improve the opportunities for central actors to exchange information. On 1 December 2025, a new rule in the Public Access to Information and Secrecy Act (2009:400) entered into force, which makes it possible for authorities and municipalities to share confidential information about individuals with each other under certain conditions if it is needed to, among other things, counter criminal activity.

The government demonstrates through these measures that the issue is of the highest priority. I also want to mention the municipalities' responsibility in this. They have an obligation both to carefully monitor the care of the children and young people who are cared for in HVB as well as to follow up on the activities that they have handed over to private operators through agreements.

When children and young people need to be placed in a residential care home (HVB), the care there must maintain good quality and meet their needs. In June 2025, the government received the report of the so-called HVB inquiry, Homes for Children and Young People (SOU 2025:83). The report contains proposals that provide staff with tools to maintain safety and security for the children and the young people. The report is now being prepared at the Government Offices. I am keen to do everything in my power so that children and young people in society's care feel safe and receive good care.

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

Mattias Vepsä (S)

Madam Speaker! Thank you, Minister, for the answer! This debate is called for because we have a situation in Sweden where criminals are allowed to run HVB homes. We have a situation where gang criminals can acquire HVB homes through corporate structures. It concerns operations that are supposed to protect the most vulnerable children and the most vulnerable young people from falling deeper into crime.

These environments have in recent years been infiltrated by gangs and have become a place where children and young people risk being recruited into deeper criminality. Let me make a comparison: If we previously had an image of criminals as thugs and bandits in robber hoods, we now have thugs and bandits who dress in healthcare clothing. They are in these homes.

Two years ago, the police issued an alert. At that time, a list had been compiled of homes where suspected criminals were located near the young people. Since then, a struggle has been ongoing to make the list accessible, so that the municipalities can take the responsibility that Camilla Waltersson Grönvall points out in her response. In that part, we agree.

There is a responsibility on the municipalities to ensure that this happens in the right way. The placements must be under control. But above all, the police must do their work. When there is suspicion of serious crime, the police must both investigate crimes and ensure that information reaches the municipalities, so that the municipality finds out that this activity is criminal.

Now the list – at least parts of it – has become known to the City of Stockholm. We heard in Rapport some months ago that the list has been handed over. The remarkable thing is that more than half of the people on the list continue to run operations. They have been suspected of crime, but we do not know how, as we have not received that information. We do not know if it concerns an owner, an employee who remains there, or a person who perhaps was fired or left the operation. But we know that they are on a list.

In that situation, it is a bit difficult to take responsibility. The question is, after all, why these homes are allowed to continue operating. Actually, I would like to have an answer to just that question.

The follow-up question is: How is it that the HVB homes that are on the list are still allowed to operate their activities? Why are these HVB homes still running?

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Socialtjänstministern Camilla Waltersson Grönvall (M)

Madam Speaker! Thanks to the member for the question!

The Speaker and I are in complete agreement that children and young people in social care have an absolute right to feel safe and secure. That is why the government has carried out such intensive and proactive work to ensure that this also becomes the case.

I want to look back a few years in time, because it is relevant to see how this situation has arisen. During 2015 to 2019, when the Social Democrats, the member's party, were in power, we saw a fairly strong increase in the number of private HVB homes. This naturally meant that the authority responsible for issuing permits for private operators received an increased workload. But other things were also seen. Welfare crime was seen. It was also seen from the authority's side that they did not have the tools to meet this problem. Therefore, the authority submitted to Ivo a list of no fewer than 40 different legislative proposals that they believed they needed to take up the fight against the welfare criminals.

When this government took office, we unfortunately found this list. It was a petition with 40 proposals that was in the office drawer. The Social Democrats had chosen not to act in order to give the authority the tools that the authority actually needs.

I believe the member agrees with me that it is very difficult for an authority to guess who the criminal actors are, but one really needs the right tools. Therefore, some of these tools have been able to be put in place and become sharper through the proposition that entered into force on January 1 this year. This concerns, among other things, dormant permits.

We have, therefore, from this government's side, pushed through the legislation that was needed to be able to carry out this work. We have also given the authority resources. It is difficult to work effectively if one does not have strong resources. It is many hundreds of millions that the authority Ivo now receives through the various supplements that this government has ensured they receive.

Already when this so-called list appeared – I can return to it – a specific assignment was given. One received 6 million to, in addition to the annual supervision that already takes place of HVB homes, carry out a special supervision of all HVB.

So this is about legislation, resources, tools and mandates. Ivo has previously not had the prerequisites to, together with the Police Authority, the Economic Crime Authority and the Swedish Tax Agency, carry out effective work in the hunt for just welfare criminals. This government has ensured that they have received them.

Not a day goes by without me wishing that this had happened earlier. I believe that the situation would not have escalated as it did if the previous government had complied with the demands and requests that Ivo put forward.

Now we have had the job done and are in full swing with handling the problems. 39 homes have had to close since we intensified the supervision. This government gets things done, and children and young people should, of course, be able to feel safe.

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

Mattias Vepsä (S)

Madam Speaker! We naturally welcome stricter requirements regarding permits. We also welcome the review and establishment of lists of which homes exist in Sweden, so that there is control over which ones are on this market. We also welcome ownership screening and enhanced ownership screening. It is a task that was initiated during the previous parliamentary term, and we welcome that the work continues. It is important.

When it comes to this, I share the Minister's view that we need to review legislation regarding the breaking of confidentiality so that authorities can share information. Not quite two years ago, I had a debate here with the Minister's colleague Gunnar Strömmer about how confidentiality assessments and rules for breaking confidentiality must not be one-sided. It should not only be the police who should be able to obtain information from the public sector, but the police must also be able to share information with other involved actors, for example, municipalities. Otherwise, problems arise like the one we are discussing today, i.e., that it took two years before the police could provide information about these HVB homes so that the municipalities could act.

Here we are in agreement. What we have more difficulty agreeing on is probably the fact that we are in a market and thus have a market model. A bit further back in time, we did privatize large parts of our welfare.

It is clear that we can discuss the pros and cons of the privatization of the entire welfare system. But I still believe that many agree with me and see the problems regarding the freedom of choice to open private HVB homes while the state has a rather limited possibility to set reasonable conditions, work with follow-up, and prevent crime. I believe that most would agree with us Social Democrats that there is a simple and good proposal: A municipalization of HVB operations is the right way to go.

Then we would increase the control and avoid risking that tax money, billions, leak out to unserious actors and to criminal schemes that one has to have a rather wild imagination to understand how they work. It is stooges and shell companies and movements of ownership structures. They move both the residents in the homes and the staff between each other almost as if they were pieces of land – this in order to maximize their profit. It is a completely insane system.

I do not think we agree here. I think the Moderaterna and SD government need to give it some serious thought. Is it most important to maintain the market model, or is it most important to protect the children?

We have more proposals that I think are important to point out in this debate. During this mandate period, we have done work to review our policy. An important proposal from us in the Justice Committee and us Social Democrats concerns a mafia law. It is about exactly what Camilla Waltersson Grönvall points out: the importance of cooperation. It would be even better if we could have mafia units that, together with the judicial authorities, can strike against this type of crime. It would then become much more powerful and unified.

This requires stricter laws. I note that yesterday we could read that the EU Commission criticizes Sweden and the Swedish government for the fact that the penalties are not sufficiently severe when it comes to crime such as serious economic crime. There is also a proposal that we Social Democrats are driving in the large criminal justice reform investigation.

One can ask why it is important not to tighten the penalties for particularly serious economic crime, which would hit very many of those actors who hide tax money and cheat in order to maximize their profit.

The question is reversed here: Is the Minister also ready to consider the proposals that I have just presented?

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Socialtjänstministern Camilla Waltersson Grönvall (M)

Madam Speaker! It is extremely good that the member welcomes the work that the government has done and is doing, but the question is why this did not happen earlier. Why did Ivo not get the legislation they needed? Why did they not get more resources when they needed it? Why did they not get the assignments on agency cooperation from the previous government? We see what a fantastic effect it has. Why have they not been given these tools? We also see that there was a strong growth of private actors, especially during 2015–2019, i.e., during the years when the Social Democratic government ruled the country.

It becomes a bit weak when the member now knows exactly how to do it and furthermore claims that this government has not acted. It is this government that has acted while the previous one did not. I assert with determination that had more had been done earlier, we would not be in the situation we are in now. This government is working intensively to remove unserious actors. It is extremely important that children and young people who are in need of support also receive it.

It is not true that the confidentiality-breaching information only goes in one direction. It is true that from April 1 last year, authorities have been tasked with providing information to the police so that it can be identified if there is suspicion of criminality. On December 1 last year, it also became so that there can be an exchange of information between authorities when it is seen that this is needed.

We have, therefore, worked intensively, and an important part of the government's work to push back organized crime is to improve the possibility for key actors to exchange relevant information. Therefore, the government has removed secrecy barriers in several parallel tracks.

I really want to point out that there is nothing today that prohibits a municipality from starting an HVB operation. And when I travel in the country, I see no big difference between municipalities governed by my party and municipalities governed by the member's party when it comes to placing children in private versus publicly run HVB homes. Approximately 75–80 percent of children are currently placed by our municipalities in private HVB homes.

I believe the member was present at the Social Affairs Committee meeting where the Justice Committee was also invited and where I described what the government was doing. Also, Ivo and the police were on site. They were crystal clear that resources, conditions, and legislative tools have a completely decisive importance for whether one can fulfill its mission or not. But they were also crystal clear that there is a long row of HVB homes that conduct an operation of high quality, and that is important for me as Minister for Social Affairs and for this government. Children and young people shall receive care of high quality.

To in some way diminish or disparage the HVB homes that today conduct a good operation with high quality and which are to support the children and young people who need it the most, I do not believe is favorable for either the municipalities where the member's party is involved and working or for the children who really need good support.

We instead ensure that we get rid of the unserious actors and that we get quality for children and young people.

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Mattias Vepsä (S)

Madam Speaker! This is how it has sounded for 30 years. We are ready to get rid of the unserious actors in the welfare sector. At the same time, we see how privatization and marketization in area after area creates deviations – it is billions of kronor leaking out of the systems, and criminals can get access to tax money.

In this regard, we have said that precisely the HVB homes are part of the privatization that must be rolled back, if we are to put the child's perspective first of all.

I want to give the Minister the right that the secrecy legislation has been divided into two parts and changed. We pushed in both part one and part two that precisely the reverse exchange of information should be possible. That was what I intended in my previous exchange of remarks, and that was the debate I referred to. It is positive that precisely that part has been put in place. I also believe that it has resulted in us receiving more information in April. This is welcome.

The Minister said in his response that the Minister was ready to do everything in his power to close criminal HVB homes. I have now presented a number of proposals here in the chamber.

In the joint authority report, reference is made to Brå, which in its own report says, when it comes to welfare crimes against municipalities and regions, that the most effective measure against welfare crimes is to never give criminal actors access to the market.

So, I have read out three proposals. It is about municipalizing HVB homes to remove deviations. It is about introducing a Swedish mafia law that could give our authorities more powerful tools to tackle exactly this type of crime. And it is about ensuring that the penalties for particularly serious economic crime are tightened.

Is the government ready to initiate cooperation on the three points? Then we could increase the power and the possibility to reach the unserious actors and put the children's perspective first.

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Socialtjänstministern Camilla Waltersson Grönvall (M)

Madam Speaker! There are several things that the member and I completely agree on, for example, that children and young people who are in social care shall have the right to receive good care of high quality.

30 years of time, says the member. During several of those years, the member's party has led the country, and yet no actions whatsoever have been taken. It is under this government that the mandate has been established, that the tools have been established and that the resources have been established.

The most remarkable thing concerns legislation that an agency submitted to the government in order to be able to push out unserious and criminal actors. Instead, it was placed in a drawer to ensure that the agency received the tools it needed.

For this government, the best interests of the children are at the center. But we also see that we need to take a long series of different measures, which we have done and continue to do. The exchange of information is absolutely crucial. Then I think the member understands that all information during the investigation stage cannot be disclosed. That is the very point when one conducts investigations, in order to be able to ensure whether there is crime or not, that one does not disclose that information so that the criminals can also take part in it.

These must be out. They must be purged from the Swedish system, regardless of which part of the welfare sector we are talking about. But it is particularly urgent and important when it concerns operations that specifically involve children and young people.

That is why we have worked intensively during this period to get all parts in place, and we will not give up until there are no more welfare criminals in any part of the welfare sector.

The interpellations debate was hereby concluded.

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