October 2019 • Page 3 of 3 • SwedeInternational

6 Oct. – electricity bills are coming

It’s been written about on this blog before (this, this and even this), but here it is again. Electricity prices. Why are they so high? Who’s in charge? And why are the bills so hard to understand? Has anyone seen where Sweden is on a map?

All these questions have sort of a “Nobel prize in economics” character. But it’s being taken up again today, because although the electricity network fee you pay is likely to be lowered this year and the next few, the Swedish Kraftnät is about to raise their prices. This will affect you and your wallet, and not in a good way.

Kraftnät (“powernet” is the closest translation) is the state-owned enterprise that is responsible for the country’s national electricity grid. Its customers are electricity producers and grid owners who pay for transporting electricity on the national grid (svk.se). Electricity producers are actors like Vattenfall, E.On, Fortum and Sydkraft. Regional grid owners, like E.ON Distribution, Vattenfall Distribution and Ellevio pass on electricity to local grid owners or directly to large consumers. All in all, there are about 170 variously-sized grid companies, one of whom sends you a bill (swedishsmartgrid.se).

Of the ten different items your electricity bill is made up of, only one of them is your actual usage. Four other items are dependent on how much you use and 5 items are set fees you have no control over (I got this info here).

This isn’t wrong per se, of course – if complicated, and if the prices are justified. Because the Swedish government didn’t think the prices were justified, they stepped in earlier this year and told the local electrical companies they had to lower their prices. Some people could get up to 20% off their 2020 bills. But wait, there’s more.

First off, the EU is not at all happy about the government getting involved with market prices. The government might get slapped on the wrist and have to take it back.
Second, the electricity companies are not at all happy about the government getting involved in market prices and are suing (like they’ve done before, and won).
Third, now that Kraftnät is going to raise their prices, any reduction in price that might have happened may be moot (because the other companies aren’t going to just sit back and take it).

All in all, your coming winter electricity bills might not be the save-fest they might have been.

The meteorological winter in Sweden started already the 18th of September of this year (five days, no above-zero temps, in Tarfala, Norrland). According to the Farmer’s Almanac, thick hair on the nape of a cow’s neck is a sure sign of a hard winter on the way. Barring that, you might look for ants marching in a line, rather than meandering like it’s Sunday morning. Alternately, look for an unusual abundance of acorns. Whatever method you choose, in the immortal words of the Snows (see: Game of Thrones): Winter is coming.

4 Oct. – Ancient history’s back, but no one’s saying sorry

After widespread and ferocious critique, the Swedish National Agency for Education backed off on its proposal to scrap teaching ancient history. They’re not saying “sorry, our mistake, we take it back” though. They’re saying, instead, that “the support for the proposal wasn’t there” and that “the time problem remains.”

Although the debate was officially welcomed, Anna Westerholm from the National Agency thought it was a bit blown out of proportion. Some of the critics, she said, had an unrealistic picture of what students learn during the 11 or so hours in 7th grade when history is discussed. “It’s been like, this is how students learn about ancient history’s contribution to justice, drama, civilization and architecture – Which is quite an unrealistic expectation” Furthermore, she said, “elementary school is not the only time students study ancient history – it comes back in high school” (Svd.se).

As Maria Schottenius at DN points out, both shop (craft and woodwork), and art, get each 180 and 80 hours of instruction while history gets 70 hours. Perhaps there is something there we can have a debate about.

Since both math and physical education were given more hours of instruction fairly recently, the idea is now to increase the hours of history instruction. “History is a subject that only gets bigger with time” said Westerholm. ”More history means more hours, but that’s up to the government.”

The minister for Education is Anna Ekström, if you want to get in touch.

3 Oct. – Torell tragedy court outcome

“The violence used was not manifestly unjustifiable.”

With these words, SvD reports, the Stockholm county court decided that the three police officers charged in the Eric Torell case (see this blog post) were not guilty. Two officers had been charged with misconduct, one for shooting after Eric Torell had allegedly already started turning away, and the other for the way in which the response was handled. The third officer, whose bullet was the one which allegedly killed Eric Torell, had been charged with involuntary manslaughter. The case centered on how the police understood the situation, and if their actions were motivated. The prosecutor argued in court that the police officers ought to have stopped to see what effect their shooting had had after the first 23 bullets had been fired, before firing the two others, of which one killed Eric Torell.

The court decided that it was not sufficiently determined in what order the shots were fired, what exactly Eric Torell’s movements were in the inner courtyard where he was shot and what his movements had been when he was shot. The court also determined that the sequence of events on that tragic night were not as the prosecutor had presented: “It is not reasonable to ask that the police stop and check the effect of their shooting in the manner the prosecutor contended.” The court also denied the request for compensation (skadestånd).

The court’s decision was not unanimous: one of the three lay judges (nämdemän) said that the violence used against Eric Torell was “clearly indefensible. It is obvious that Eric didn’t fire a single shot. With that in mind, it is indefensible that two more shots were fired, when Eric had turned his back to the police, without finding out what impact their intensive fire had already had” (DNEricTorell). It was also obvious that the police panicked, wrote the lay judge, in that only one of the total 25 bullets fired hit Eric Torell in the front.

Eric Torell’s mother, Katarina Söderberg, said afterwards that the result didn’t change anything. “Eric’s not coming back. The outcome was pretty expected. When we were following the case it felt like it was going to be this way” (SvdEricTorrell).

DN’s commentator described it as unlikely that the case will be appealed (DNEricTorell).

On a side note: As with other court cases at this level, judgement is rendered by three lay judges (nämdemän) and one lawyer-judge (juristdomare). Even if being a lay judge is not a political position, they are sponsored for the position by a local political party. They are not required to be a member of that political party to be nominated, but if someone is interested in being a lay judge they must apply to a party to be sponsored. If accepted, they are given a course on jurisprudence, and are expected to drop their private political views when judging a case.

2 Oct. – boring, perhaps, but important

Things come up. Dentist appointments, laundry, you have to take your pet to the vet, all of these things happen. They happen to parliament members too: Even when there’s a proposition being put to vote, sometimes a member of parliament can’t make it (even though it’s their job, for which they’re paid a lot of money, and for which they recently gave themselves a hefty raise in 2016).

Similar to the British parliament, the Swedish parliament has a system called vote equalisation – kvittningssystemet – which means that if a parliament member is absent from a vote, another party’s parliament member’s vote isn’t counted. This way, it is thought, the population’s preference expressed in the last election – represented by the number of parliament seats each party gets – is still properly represented: The parties still have the same weight when voting, relative to each other, even though a member of one of the parties (or heck, many members, even all of them) took the day off.

Sometimes, if how individual members vote is particularly important to one party or another, they can request (in advance) that the vote equalisation system not apply for that vote. One reason for doing this, is that the equalisation system creates a way for parliament members to express their personal opinions and avoid voting on an issue where they disagree with how their party is going to vote. If they’re not there, then they personally didn’t vote for, or against, something (just their party did). If another party sees this as likely to happen, for example, they can ask for the equalisation system to be adjourned for that vote.

One example of this was back in 2015. The Social Democratic party, in power then as now, scheduled a vote on requiring ID checks for people coming in to Sweden on trains, buses and ferries. Many Green party members were very opposed to this, but, they were also members of the government which was proposing it. What to do? One solution is to be sick that day. Or maybe their child is sick that day. Then, the thought goes, they haven’t really voted.

Seeing this opportunity to highlight the divisions in the Green party, and possibly the lameness of taking a powder for the day, the alliance parties (at that time consisting of the Moderate, Center, Liberal and Christian Democratic parties) asked for the vote equalisation system to not apply. This way, the thought went, the Green party members couldn’t be absent. They’d be put on the spot, and made to show their true colors. So awkward.

How did it end? All parliament members had to show up for the vote, doctor’s appointment or not. The Green party members who disagreed with their party still had to show up and vote. The government’s proposal passed, and no member of parliament died because they had to vote that day. What they did have to do, was decide to whom they had greater loyalty – their ideals or the party. So awkward. But also important.

Here’s the thing though. This system worked great (well, that depends on your view) when there were basically two blocks. If a vote on one side was away, a vote on the other side was taken away – tit for tat. The government has always had an opposition. But now, the previous center-right block, the previous alliance, is split. If a Center party member is out for the day, from where do the other votes get taken? Plus, and this is huge, where do the Sweden Democrats and their 17% of seats in parliament go? They aren’t a part of any block, and because of this, haven’t even been a part of the vote equalisation system at all.

In 2018, Anders Ygeman explained it like this: “Several times, they have voted one way in committee and another way in parliament. Sometimes, they’ve voted first for their own proposition, and then for another party’s. I have a hard time seeing how they can be a part of the vote equalisation system.” Jimmy Åkesson, The Sweden Democrats’ party leader, countered, saying that everyone basically knows how the parties are going to vote before the final vote is taken, so equaling isn’t a problem.

It wasn’t solved then, and it isn’t really solved now. Because there are no longer two distinct blocks, there have been some just slightly unusual votes because the vote equalisation system hasn’t worked. In one case, SvD writes, an Center party member was going to be absent so a Social Democratic vote was taken out. But for issues covered by the January Agreement, Center and Social Democrats vote the same way, they aren’t in opposition. For that vote, one side lost two votes while the opposition wasn’t affected at all. The vote result is skewed. Not so democratic.

On issues where the vote isn’t close, the system can survive even if the results don’t exactly reflect party representation. There’s one vote coming up in November, though – the budget – where every vote counts. The seven parties that are currently part of the vote equalisation system are discussing how to make it work. For reasons that seem good to someone, somewhere, the Sweden Democrats’ existence is still being ignored.

The vote equalisation system is supposed to make parliament decisions more democratic, but recent election results and the fraying of the two-block representation are making the system undemocratic. One result may be that presence at voting will be mandatory at all times – sickness, sniffly child, laundry or awkwardness be as they may.

1 Oct. – the government reshuffles

Two new ministers were appointed in the Löfven government today: one oldie and one newbie. Ardelan Shekarabi takes over as Minister for Social Security (better known here as socialförsäkringsminister) from his previous post as minister of public administration, and a new name for many of us, Lena Micko, has been given Shekarabi’s old job.

Shekarabi made headlines recently with a facebook post saying that Sweden’s migration policy needed to be sharpened up, by quite a bit (see this post). Many observers wondered if it was a play for the position of party leader in the near future. Maybe it paid off, or, he’s being punished for his attention seeking: The Minister for Social Security is a much (much) more visible post, responsible for, oh, little things like health care, elder care, taking care of disabled people and children, and the general health and welfare of society.

Shekarabi has previously publicly shook his fist at the practices of and advertisements for the gambling industry in Sweden, which fall under the purview of the social security department. Perhaps he was then already preparing for this position. He’s not saying. But his facebook post, his efforts to reign in gambling that garnered a lot of air time, and of course his eye-catching bow ties all lead to visibility. His new position will only increase it.

The other new appointment is Lena Micko who will take over as Minister for Public Administration – a position which is almost as exciting as it sounds. Micko comes lately from the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions (Sveriges Kommuner och Landsting, SKL) where she was board member and second vice chair. More importantly, she’s a long term, card carrying social democratic party member.

According to Göran Eriksson at SvD, Micko has long experience of working at the municipal level, and knows how they work and what they want. She is supposed to be of the practical sort, and of the more right-leaning bent – similar to the Liberal and Center parties that were actually once part of the right-leaning alliance but who now are supporting cast members in the Löfven government. Micko and the Center and Liberal parties might get along like a house on fire. There’s going to be an even more unhappy left flank if so, but though they’ve expressed some dismay over a few things, they haven’t caused any real trouble for the rest of the social democratic party.

Micko is sure to fight for more money to the municipalities via the national cost equalisation system (kostnadsutjämningssystemet), discussed in this blog. Another change that might soon come from her appointment is less directed government grants to municipalities. Directed grants more often need to be applied for and are supposed to be used for specific purposes. They also require more administration, read: time and money. If grants are more general they’re easier and can be used how the municipalities see fit. It could be good to remember that directed grants were at one time part of the general grant – they were changed to directed grants for a reason. It might be a good idea to find out why (and fix it) before switching back.

In all, these appointments could be exciting. Or at least interesting. And blog food. There will be plays to the political right and plays to the political left. So far, it must be said that the Social Democratic party has handled the differences without breaking apart in public. It’s impressive, or scary internal control.