Response to interpellations 2022/23:3 and 18 on the political responsibility for the pension system

Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)

Madam Speaker! It is a privilege to once again, after twelve years, take the rostrum in the Riksdag and actually have my first interpellation debate. I extend a big thank you to Martina Johansson and Kalle Olsson for the interpellations they have submitted to me regarding the political responsibility for the pension system.

Martina Johansson has asked me what the reasons are for the government now abandoning the agreement on the current pension system. The interpellator also asks what the reasons are for the government inviting parties that do not stand behind the basic foundations of the pension system to negotiations and what the government hopes to achieve by inviting all parties to the talks. The interpellator also asks which additional parts of the agreement the government is prepared to abandon and how I intend to ensure a pension system that guarantees financial security in old age for young and working people.

Furthermore, Kalle Olsson has also asked me how the government intends to proceed to ensure continued long-term rules regarding the design of the pension system. He has also asked whether I and the government consider that the five parties that entered into the original pension agreement have a special responsibility to maintain the agreement and how I intend to act based on my standpoint on the issue.

Madam Speaker! The cooperation in the Pensions Group functioned well at the beginning and has been a guarantee for the pension system's financial stability and ability to provide secure pensions. The overall purpose is to maintain and develop a long-term sustainable pension system. The pension system and the fundamental and long-term principles have been protected while necessary reforms have been implemented.

But as both the interpellants state, the cooperation in the Pensions Group has not functioned quite as well in recent years as it did in the beginning. This is, among other things, a consequence of the Social Democrats making a deal with the Left Party regarding the basic pensions, in order to seek support for the formation of the government of the then Prime Minister Magdalena Andersson at the end of 2021.

The Pensions Group is a parliamentary working group that over time has consisted of representatives from the five parties that stood behind the 1994 pension agreement. The Government wants to be clear that the pension agreement remains in force.

The government is now opening up for a rethink to try to ensure that we can once again achieve a well-functioning cooperation on pensions. This benefits the pension system, the pension savers, and the pensioners. We will hold talks with all parties in the Riksdag and ensure that the forms for the cooperation on pensions work well also in the longer term and in a changing time.

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Martina Johansson (C)

Madam Speaker! Thank you for the answer, Minister! And welcome back to the Riksdag! As someone coming from the neighboring municipality, I find it particularly amusing.

It has been a mandate period where pensions have been discussed and a period where these discussions have partly been difficult. I will admit that it is never anyone's fault when two parties disagree on whether a system works or not. All of us who are part of the Pensions Group have, in different ways, contributed to the discussions landing as they did in the spring. We have both an income pension supplement and a guarantee supplement and the reaction to the guarantee supplement. There, all parties have in some way been and buckled at the border.

I have, however, all the time, during the relatively short period that I have devoted myself to these issues, felt that among others the Moderates have been careful to protect the Pension Group. That has been my experience. Therefore, I was very surprised when I sat here in the chamber and listened to Ulf Kristersson's government statement.

At the same time, I am pleased that the answer I am now receiving is that the pension agreement from the 90s applies. But we must remember that that agreement has its political basic principles when it comes to the pension system. It is about that each generation shall provide for its own pension, that it shall be separated from the budget, and that it shall be economically sustainable and predictable when it comes to lifetime income and individually. But we also have an agreement that there shall be consensus between us five parties who are tasked with safeguarding the system.

I would have wished for greater humility precisely in the matter of unilaterally opening up for an agreement where all parties are invited. That it comes as a surprise to me. I sometimes wonder where it came from and why it appeared in the government statement specifically. It is about today's pensioners, but it is also about the future's pensioners, about my children and others' children, who are working today.

We agree that we need to talk. It is needed. I would have preferred to see step one being that we in the Pensions Group had met and that was where the discussion had started. My expectation was that the Moderaterna would quickly invite the Pensions Group and that from there we would have a discussion about working methods, how the cooperation has been, why we have ended up where we have ended up and where we have lost the sense of consensus, which I have been told existed previously, before I started working with these issues. From there we would discuss what we should do differently to take the step forward and safeguard our system.

I am a bit worried about the idea of inviting all parties. The intention with the pension agreement and the Pension Group is to safeguard a system. But it is not all parties that safeguard the basic principles of today's pension system.

I therefore repeat some of my questions. What is the reason for and the purpose of, in a government statement, before we have met and discussed in the Pensions Group, starting by inviting all parties to talks?

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Kalle Olsson (S)

Madam Speaker! I also would like to take the opportunity to welcome the Minister back to the Riksdag.

From the government statement until today, about four weeks have passed. During that time, there has been complete silence from the government regarding what the "re-adjustment," as the Minister calls it in the interpellation response, will actually mean. Given that we are talking about one of the welfare society's perhaps most important systems, our pension system, and furthermore political agreements that have applied for nearly 30 years, it is somewhat important to get this clarified. How does the government envision the work with the pensions will look moving forward?

Madam Speaker! It is the background to my interpellation.

The only ones from the right-conservative bloc who until today have actually said anything about the announced changes are the party that is not part of the government, namely the Sweden Democrats. This is possibly telling regarding the internal dynamics within the government support. In last week's budget debate here in the chamber, we could hear an almost triumphant Oscar Sjöstedt, SD's economic-political spokesperson, state that the, as he expressed it, "somewhat bizarre" Pension Group was finally rejected. These are statements that align well with how SD has previously expressed itself regarding the Pension Group. It has been called obsolete and directly harmful to the country's pensioners. There is, therefore, no doubt about what SD thinks about these parts.

But what the Moderaterna and the other parties that actually are part of the government consider is more unclear. In an interview in Svenska Dagbladet today, the minister answers the question of whether the Pensionsgruppen should be phased out or not: We will see. It thus goes from SD's death sentence of the Pensionsgruppen last week to the minister's answer today: We will see. For me, it is not entirely clear what this means.

In response to my interpellation, the Minister otherwise states that she considers that the cooperation in the Pensions Group has functioned well over time, that it has been a guarantee for the financial stability of the pension system and so on. The Minister also points out something else important: that the parties in the Pensions Group during these nearly 30 years have taken responsibility for the long-term principles in the pension system.

I will not put words in anyone's mouth. But from the Minister's answer, I nevertheless think I can discern a positive judgment from the Minister regarding how the Pensionsgruppen has functioned over time. Nevertheless, we stand here today.

I wonder - a bit like my colleague touched upon in the previous speech - why it is so important to invite parties that do not stand for the basic principles of the pension system to deliberations.

My second question is: Will the government demand, as a form of foundation for future discussions, that all parties gathered around the table agree on the long-term principles, which are the very anchor of the pension system?

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Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)

Madam Speaker! I want to begin by once again underlining that the government is clear that the pension agreement continues to apply. We are not abandoning it, nor are we abandoning certain parts of it, but the basic principles that we have agreed upon continue to apply.

I, however, would like to look forward. I understand that it is definitely not your fault that we have strayed, but perhaps we have achieved that together. In that case, I am eager that we also solve it together.

For the meeting next week, on November 23, I have invited the parties that traditionally are part of the Pensions Group, and my thought is that we should have the conversation that Martina Johansson mentioned in her speech. We are going to have a high-level discussion and talk about what has been good, what has been less good, and how we can move the work forward together.

I want to be clear that the work of the Pensions Group and the pension system as such affects, I believe, 2.3 million pensioners in Sweden today, but it affects many more pension savers and, as Martina Johansson pointed out in her interpellation, also the future pension savers. This is something that must hold up over time.

It is a long-term system, and we have a long-term responsibility to ensure that it holds. Therefore, I am keen to also speak with those parties that stand outside the agreement and who are not part of the Pensions Group, in order to create both a greater understanding and, hopefully, a greater breadth in the positions we have taken historically and which we must also take moving forward. I safeguard the agreement and the principles on which it rests.

Next week, the Pensions Group will have its first meeting. I understand that the interpellants have been eager to see the invitation in their respective parties' mailboxes, and I am sorry if it has taken a bit too long. It is the Pensions Group's original parties that are invited to the meeting. I hope for a pleasant debate and discussion there, but this does not exclude that conversations are held with all parties.

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Martina Johansson (C)

Madam Speaker! I thank you for the answer.

Of course we have received an invitation for next week. It arrived yesterday or this morning. I appreciate that, but I would have liked to see it before I heard in the government statement that we are to consult with and invite all parties. This does, as I mentioned earlier, create a concern about what it is that we want.

Part of the pension agreement is, as has been said, that we are tasked with safeguarding the system we have and that we shall have consensus. What has been so good is that we have discussed and finally landed on consensus. All parties have had to give and take. What we have seen during the last year, also in other types of parliamentary deliberations in different areas, is that it becomes a very large political debate conducted in a way where one locks oneself into different issues and different parts, which makes it difficult to land and let go of some principles, which one must do in order to be able to reach consensus. That is why I think it has been so good with the Pension Group and that this has been the purpose.

But, again: It is very good that we are to meet next week. I look forward to it and will make room in the calendar and fit it into the time so that we can have good conversations, which I hope they will be.

I would like to take the opportunity to remind us of the pension system that we have and have had since the 90s. It has very good basic principles. Then one needs to tweak all systems so that they become even better, and I say nothing other than that we need to do this. The system has, however, provided sustainable pensions and long-term perspective, and above all, it has raised pension levels. We have gone from 72 percent relatively poor pensioners to approximately 15 percent relatively poor pensioners today. One can take another figure. We have gone from approximately 1.1 million relatively poor pensioners to approximately 300,000 relatively poor pensioners. I am proud that Centerpartiet has been involved in safeguarding this system.

We made the agreement because we had a recession that made it difficult to balance the state finances and safeguard the pensions, and there was a need for sustainability and predictability that would ensure the pensions hold even in difficult times. Now that we are heading into a new recession, it is a bit difficult for me to understand that we are to depart from that basic foundation that has existed to safeguard the system and to withstand even bad times. This is what worries me.

But I, as I have said, look forward to a conversation and hope that we can land on something that reduces my concern, because I think it is important for pensioners and for future pensioners to safeguard the way of working that we have had.

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Kalle Olsson (S)

Madam Speaker! I truly agree with the Minister regarding the importance of a pension system that holds up over time, but a part of this is precisely that we have had parties that for nearly 30 years now have agreed on a number of rules for how we should work with the pension system.

In my previous post, I asked the direct question of how the Minister views including parties in the dialogue when these parties have not, in a corresponding manner, signed on to the basic foundations or principles that we all here, I believe, agree are important.

Sweden fundamentally has a robust pension system that for a long sequence of years has delivered stable, predictable and fiscally sustainable pensions. As a Social Democrat, I can think that we have far too many elderly today who have far too low pensions and for whom we need interventions. We also have challenges when it comes to ensuring that future generations of retirees receive pensions that are livable.

It is no secret that we Social Democrats believe that pensions need to be raised and that the long-term sustainable way to do this is to look at the fees and contributions to the pension system. We need to reach the levels that we once agreed that we would reach.

Speaking of the Pensions Group and the work that has been carried out there over the past few years, there is today a negotiated agreement between the five parties to conduct a review of the fee levels. This was what was next in line in the Pensions Group's work. My second question is whether the government now intends to proceed with the question of a review of the fee levels or if the plans are being scrapped.

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Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)

Madam Speaker! I want to begin by landing on the question of whether we five parties have a common responsibility, or a particular responsibility, which Kalle Olsson raised in his interpellation. Obviously, a special responsibility rests on the five parties that have been involved for a longer period and who have signed the agreement on the basic principles. Precisely for that reason, I think that when some parties become smaller and others become larger, and one has a long-term perspective and a common safeguarding of our pension system and the principles and cornerstones that it rests on, it would have been good if more parties shared this responsibility and signed on to these principles and the agreement.

I understand that I have not been involved during the last 30 years in these contexts, and I understand that it is complicated. I also understand that not all parties may be willing to sign the agreement or the basic principles. I may express a somewhat personal opinion, but I do not want to anticipate the discussion that you will have in the Pensions Group next week. It is still reasonable to assume that it is important to be on board with the basic foundations. But it does not hurt if there are then more parties that are willing to step in, take responsibility, and sign these principles in order to then, in the future, be involved and take responsibility for the pension system as such.

As I have said, I do not want to anticipate too much of the discussion that you are going to have. But I still become a little curious when both interpellants point out that the Pensions Group has not functioned particularly well. Member of Parliament Martina Johansson points out that she would like to see us have consensus again after some parties - perhaps on both sides - have maneuvered, fixed, and added some different parts without consensus having been reached.

I become a little curious about what your proposal is on how the cooperation as such shall be re-established - I believe, in itself, that one has had a relatively good tone - and how we shall nurture the work in the Pensions Group going forward. It cannot simply be that one puts a lid on it and lets a dead hand rest over this because one cannot achieve consensus.

In a changing time where we face many different challenges ahead, I believe it is very important that we nevertheless have strength and a capacity for action in the Pensions Group and in these issues and can drive them forward. It is only then that we can truly secure and safeguard our common pension system and create good conditions for our future retirees, for those who are older today, and for savings.

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Martina Johansson (C)

Madam Speaker! I thank you for the answer.

For me, the Pensions Group is about reaching a consensus. We have touched upon that. What surprised me is, as I said earlier, that we did not start with a conversation in the Pensions Group. It is what surprises me most that we do not start where we all actually think we should be.

Then I took up that all parties in some way have been involved in fishing a little bit on the side. The Center Party has also done that. One must always be wise in hindsight. I hope then that what we are going to talk about when we meet next week is what we are going to devote ourselves to and counteract this.

I do not want any more debates similar to the election debate we had in the spring where our party leaders had a debate about the pensions. I don't even remember the figures, if I'm being completely honest. But someone said 400 kronor, someone said 500 kronor. Someone said: You are actually only raising 200 kronor, and I know and so on.

But it is this that we want to counteract. I believe one reason why we ended up there was because we left the security and the consensus work that we have and have had in the Pensions Group. Since then, it has not functioned so well over the last four years. That is probably due to individual meetings. It could also be about individual people's ways of acting in a group. Then I shall not say more than that because I do not want to review individual people. I am still happy that we are meeting next week. But again, I am surprised that it was not there that we started, because then I would not have had to be worried. That is what I am in the current situation.

Regardless of what the Pensions Group is to look like or how it is to work moving forward, the point is that we all must stand wholeheartedly for the basic principles of our pension system.

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Kalle Olsson (S)

Madam Speaker! I do not think one should mess around with the question of the Sweden Democrats in this context. To me, it is not a party among many. It is not just any party. We have just gone through an election campaign where right-wing populism and unrealistic election promises have flown through the air. We were to get a reduced fuel tax of 10 kronor. It landed at 14 öre. I shudder at a situation where that type of political force gets in and practices that type of populism in our work with the pensions. It is important to have this said.

We have five parties that have taken a long-term responsibility - five parties that have looked very seriously at these issues over time. That is what we should be afraid of, I mean.

I would like to thank the Minister for answering the question and say that it is reasonable to demand that the parties sitting at the table nevertheless in some sense share the basic principles. I think that is an important answer in this context.

But it has not been entirely easy to interpret the various messages that have come in the last few weeks, from the government statement up until today. I am therefore glad that we could have this interpellation debate. I look forward to upcoming discussions and debates because not all questions are clarified as a result of today's debate. But I thank you so far for the discussion.

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Statsrådet Anna Tenje (M)

Madam Speaker! I shall begin where Kalle Olsson finished. That in all parts revealing what one's own positions are is a bit like showing your cards in advance and showing what you have on hand before one is to enter the Pensions Group and discuss precisely these issues. That is the very point.

I therefore look forward to the fact that precisely those questions that Kalle Olsson has raised today regarding fee levels and other matters are questions that we must take up and discuss in the Pensions Group moving forward. We must turn them over and over to ensure that we have a secure pension system in the future.

The pension agreement therefore also continues to apply. It is nothing that we are abandoning. We observe overall that the cooperation in the Pension Group has not functioned well lately for one reason or another. Precisely because of that, the government now says that we would like to see a relaunch. The first part of the relaunch is perhaps that I invite the Pension Group to talks to listen to what has functioned well and what has functioned less well, but at the same time also for talks with all parties in the Swedish Riksdag just to create a breadth, a stronger anchoring, and hopefully perhaps get some parties on board when it comes to the basic principles and the agreement that remains fixed and which we therefore do not abandon.

Above all, I truly hope for good cooperation going forward, where we can have high ambitions and highlight these issues which in all respects are very complicated and difficult. But I also hope that it will lead to us continuing to have a good and secure pension system.

I look forward to the continued talks that we will have with all parties in the Swedish Riksdag.

The interpellations debate was hereby concluded.

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