Published : 06-07-2020
Cross-party talks on how to reform Swedish migration policy broke down on Tuesday, reported The Local.
The one thing all parties in parliament seemed to agree on was that Swedish migration law needed a complete overhaul.
Currently, a temporary law is in place, which was introduced back in 2016 after Sweden received record numbers of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers during the crisis of the autumn before.
One change was that asylum seekers received temporary residence permits by default, whereas previously permanent residence permits were the norm. People (not just those who arrived as asylum seekers, but also Swedish citizens and residents) bringing their partners or other family members to live in Sweden had to meet certain requirements around income levels and household size.
Sweden set up a Migration Committee in late 2019, which was given the task of coming up with a new migration policy. This was agreed in the so-called January Agreement, a cross-bloc collaboration between the Social Democrat-Green coalition government and two of Sweden's opposition parties – the Liberals and the Centre Party.
Over the past two weeks, talks have been going on between five parties, the ruling centre-left Social Democrats and four opposition parties (the Moderate, Christian Democrat, Centre and Liberal parties, all right-of-centre). Notably the Social Democrats' junior coalition partner, the Green Party, has not been involved.
On Monday, the parties reported that these talks had collapsed.
The sticking point was discussion of a volymmål (volume goal), a proposed cap on the number of asylum seekers who can enter Sweden each year.
The Green Party, excluded from the negotiations, last week said it could not stand behind a policy with this kind of limit.
Now the five-party talks have collapsed, with the Moderate Party blaming the Social Democrats for siding with the Greens.
"It's abundantly clear that the Social Democrats chose the Green Party over a sustainable, realistic migration policy," the Moderates' migration policy spokesperson Maria Malmer Stenergard told the TT newswire.
Official Swedish statistics have indicated that 3,296 Palestinian asylum-seekers categorized as “stateless” received citizenship documents in Sweden in 2019.
Over the past few years, thousands of Palestinian and Syrian refugees, among other migrants, who have applied for asylum in Sweden were granted two-year visas.
Eligibility criteria set by the Swedish authorities include a well-paid work contract valid for a minimum of two years and which enters into force before the expiration of the temporary visa. The employer should submit a recruitment declaration at the Swedish tax authority, taking into consideration the conditions defined by the national trade unions.
Cross-party talks on how to reform Swedish migration policy broke down on Tuesday, reported The Local.
The one thing all parties in parliament seemed to agree on was that Swedish migration law needed a complete overhaul.
Currently, a temporary law is in place, which was introduced back in 2016 after Sweden received record numbers of migrants, refugees and asylum seekers during the crisis of the autumn before.
One change was that asylum seekers received temporary residence permits by default, whereas previously permanent residence permits were the norm. People (not just those who arrived as asylum seekers, but also Swedish citizens and residents) bringing their partners or other family members to live in Sweden had to meet certain requirements around income levels and household size.
Sweden set up a Migration Committee in late 2019, which was given the task of coming up with a new migration policy. This was agreed in the so-called January Agreement, a cross-bloc collaboration between the Social Democrat-Green coalition government and two of Sweden's opposition parties – the Liberals and the Centre Party.
Over the past two weeks, talks have been going on between five parties, the ruling centre-left Social Democrats and four opposition parties (the Moderate, Christian Democrat, Centre and Liberal parties, all right-of-centre). Notably the Social Democrats' junior coalition partner, the Green Party, has not been involved.
On Monday, the parties reported that these talks had collapsed.
The sticking point was discussion of a volymmål (volume goal), a proposed cap on the number of asylum seekers who can enter Sweden each year.
The Green Party, excluded from the negotiations, last week said it could not stand behind a policy with this kind of limit.
Now the five-party talks have collapsed, with the Moderate Party blaming the Social Democrats for siding with the Greens.
"It's abundantly clear that the Social Democrats chose the Green Party over a sustainable, realistic migration policy," the Moderates' migration policy spokesperson Maria Malmer Stenergard told the TT newswire.
Official Swedish statistics have indicated that 3,296 Palestinian asylum-seekers categorized as “stateless” received citizenship documents in Sweden in 2019.
Over the past few years, thousands of Palestinian and Syrian refugees, among other migrants, who have applied for asylum in Sweden were granted two-year visas.
Eligibility criteria set by the Swedish authorities include a well-paid work contract valid for a minimum of two years and which enters into force before the expiration of the temporary visa. The employer should submit a recruitment declaration at the Swedish tax authority, taking into consideration the conditions defined by the national trade unions.
