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Sweden gets three new ministers in government reshuffle

Sweden's parliament officially opened on Tuesday with Prime Minister Stefan Löfven announcing three new ministers.

Published: 10 September 2019 13:50 CEST
Updated: 10 September 2019 17:17 CEST
Sweden gets three new ministers in government reshuffle
Stefan Löfven addressing parliament on Tuesday. Photo: Claudio Bresciani/TT

Foreign trade minister and former EU minister Ann Linde will as expected take over as foreign minister after Margot Wallström announced she was leaving the post, Löfven told parliament in his opening speech.

Eva Nordmark, head of Swedish white-collar trade union organization TCO, will become Sweden's new employment minister, replacing Ylva Johansson who is set to become EU commissioner for home affairs.

And Anna Hallberg, former deputy chair of state-owned business investment organization Almi, will replace Linde as trade minister.


Löfven and his new ministers. From left, Anna Hallberg, Ann Linde and Eva Nordmark. Photo: Jonas Ekströmer/TT

Before announcing the new appointments, Löfven started his speech by vowing to strengthen Sweden's ability to face a changing world and hand over a “sustainable, safe and equal society” to future generations, highlighting global warming, healthcare waiting times and violent crime as some of the challenges.

“Our country – characterized by natural beauty, openness and hardworking people – has enormous opportunities. Only by working together can we realize Sweden's potential,” he told members of parliament.

“We deal with the problems we face together, not each on our own.”

Social Democrat leader Löfven, who returned to government in January this year after a gruelling 131 days of post-election negotiations that ended only after a cross-bloc deal was struck with the centre-liberals, kept returning to the topic of seeking broad consensus across party divides and solving problems together.

READ ALSO: What does Sweden's government deal mean for internationals?

He spoke about Sweden's place in the world and the European Union, underlining his government's commitment to “free, sustainable and fair trade” and saying that Brexit “heightens the need for active and offensive Swedish action in the EU”. He added that he would continue to work to ensure that the UK leaves the EU “in an orderly manner” but said that Sweden was also prepared to face a no-deal Brexit. 


King Carl XVI Gustaf and parliamentary speaker Andreas Norlén arrive in parliament. Photo: Claudio Bresciani/TT

He also addressed the issue of gang crime, singling out a 31-year-old woman who was shot dead in broad daylight in Malmö as a bystander when she was out with her young child – a shooting that shocked Sweden.

“The state can remove hardened criminals from the streets, but stopping the influx of young men to criminal gangs requires efforts by society as a whole. This is emphasized not least by the police. Schools, social services, local businesses and our civic organizations have important roles to play,” said Löfven.

Löfven also spoke of investing more in housing, upgrading the railway, boosting pensions, abolishing the austerity tax and introducing a bank tax to fund defence, creating more jobs and saving the climate.

“Our country will be the world's first fossil-free welfare nation,” he pledged.

Read the full government policy declaration in English here.

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WORK PERMITS

Business leaders: Work permit threshold ‘has no place in Swedish labour model’

Sweden's main business group has attacked a proposal to exempt some jobs from a new minimum salary for work permits, saying it is "unacceptable" political interference in the labour model and risks seriously affecting national competitiveness.

Published: 25 April 2024 17:37 CEST
Updated: 26 April 2024 06:11 CEST
Business leaders: Work permit threshold 'has no place in Swedish labour model'

The Confederation of Swedish Enterprise said in its response to the government’s consultation, submitted on Thursday afternoon, that it not only opposed the proposal to raise the minimum salary for a work permit to Sweden’s median salary (currently 34,200 kronor a month), but also opposed plans to exempt some professions from the higher threshold. 

“To place barriers in the way of talent recruitment by bringing in a highly political salary threshold in combination with labour market testing is going to worsen the conditions for Swedish enterprise in both the short and the long term, and risks leading to increased fraud and abuse,” the employer’s group said.   

The group, which represents businesses across most of Sweden’s industries, has been critical of the plans to further raise the salary threshold for work permits from the start, with the organisation’s deputy director general, Karin Johansson, telling The Local this week that more than half of those affected by the higher threshold would be skilled graduate recruits Swedish businesses sorely need.   

But the fact that it has not only rejected the higher salary threshold, but also the proposed system of exemptions, will nonetheless come as a blow to Sweden’s government, and particular the Moderate Party led by Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, which has long claimed to be the party of business. 

The confederation complained that the model proposed in the conclusions of the government inquiry published in February would give the government and political parties a powerful new role in setting salary conditions, undermining the country’s treasured system of collective bargaining. 

The proposal for the higher salary threshold, was, the confederation argued, “wrong in principle” and did “not belong in the Swedish labour market”. 

“That the state should decide on the minimum salary for certain foreign employees is an unacceptable interference in the Swedish collective bargaining model, where the parties [unions and employers] weigh up various needs and interested in negotiations,” it wrote. 

In addition, the confederation argued that the proposed system where the Sweden Public Employment Service and the Migration Agency draw up a list of exempted jobs, which would then be vetted by the government, signified the return of the old system of labour market testing which was abolished in 2008.

“The government agency-based labour market testing was scrapped because of it ineffectiveness, and because it was unreasonable that government agencies were given influence over company recruitment,” the confederation wrote. 

“The system meant long handling times, arbitrariness, uncertainty for employers and employees, as well as an indirect union veto,” it added. “Nothing suggests it will work better this time.” 

For a start, it said, the Public Employment Service’s list of professions was inexact and outdated, with only 179 professions listed, compared to 430 monitored by Statistics Sweden. This was particularly the case for new skilled roles within industries like battery manufacturing. 

“New professions or smaller professions are not caught up by the classification system, which among other things is going to make it harder to recruit in sectors which are important for the green industrial transition,” the confederation warned. 

Rather than implement the proposals outlined in the inquiry’s conclusions, it concluded, the government should instead begin work on a new national strategy for international recruitment. 

“Sweden instead needs a national strategy aimed at creating better conditions for Swedish businesses to be able to attract, recruit and retain international competence.”

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