Swedish PM vows to implement ‘legislation never seen before in Sweden’ after callous murder

Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson and several other politicians, including opposition leader Magdalena Andersson, on Thursday evening visited Skärholmen, a suburb of Stockholm, where a father was gunned down in front of his 12-year-old son, reportedly after telling off a group of young men. The man’s family told Swedish media that he was “completely innocent”.

“I wanted to meet the family and show my respect. But also listen to what they’ve been through and what their thoughts and feelings are right now,” Kristersson told Swedish news agency TT. 

The murder sparked outrage in Sweden, which has been struggling to crack down on a wave of gang violence. It’s the third shooting in Skärholmen in a short period of time. 

“It proves that this is going to continue until we put an end to it. Either the state takes back control through legislation or we give up. I have decided, we’re taking back control and we will implement legislation that we’ve never seen before in Sweden,” said Kristersson.

Swedish vocabulary: to tell off – att säga till

Lind only candidate left in race to become Green Party leader

Former culture minister Amanda Lind is the only candidate left standing after her only remaining rival pulled out of the race to become the Green Party’s next co-leader.

“We now need stability, faith in the future and focus – above all on the EU election campaign,” Janine Alm Ericson told Aftonbladet after she decided not to go up against Lind at the party’s upcoming conference to elect a new leader.

Lind, who has the backing of the party’s election committee, is set to be voted in at a special additional party congress on April 28th, joining Daniel Helldén as co-leader of the party.

But who is Amanda Lind and why shouldn’t you underestimate her? The Local’s Nordic editor Richard Orange explains in the latest issue of Politics in Sweden.

Swedish vocabulary: to pull out – att dra sig ur

Swedish nurses and midwives threaten to refuse overtime

A Swedish healthcare union is threatening to refuse to work overtime in a strike set to break out on April 25th if no agreement is reached.

The Swedish Association of Health Professionals represents nurses, midwives, biomedical scientists and radiographers, and the strike threat affects around 63,000 of its members across Sweden.

Negotiations with SKR, the umbrella organisation that represents Swedish regions, who are responsible for healthcare, fell through the other week after the parties were unable to reach agreement on issues such as salary and schedules.

“We haven’t had any unreasonable expectations. We want to be able to have the energy to work fulltime, we want sustainable schedules and four weeks of continuous vacation in summer. We want higher wages so that it’s equal,” said union chair Sineva Ribeiro in a statement.

“During the pandemic we were called super heroes and went to work on our days off to save lives. We were applauded then, but today we have to choose between falling ill ourselves or reducing our hours to parttime to be able to cope. At the end of the day, patients take the hit,” she added.

She said the categories of workers they represent in total worked 3 million hours in overtime last year.

Swedish vocabulary: overtime – övertid

Tell us: What’s your best Swedish celebrity encounter?

We’re collecting stories of readers’ encounters with Swedish celebrities. If you have a great, bad, embarrassing, mundane, funny or just incredibly random story of bumping into a Swedish celebrity, we’d love to hear it. Click this link to get to The Local’s celebrity survey.

Swedish vocabulary: a celebrity – en kändis