Swedish pensioners’ lobby decries piecemeal approach to pension reform

With Swedish politics in disarray following the resignation of its new prime minister on Wednesday, pensioner’s lobby SPF Seniorerna has criticised a pension reform that formed part of the fledgling government’s budget plan.

The leader of Swedish pensioners’ association SPF Seniorerna – a lobby group with 250,000 members – commented on Wednesday on the new agreement that was reached by the Social Democrats and the Left party regarding an increase in income for people on the lowest pensions.

The agreement includes a new pension guarantee supplement, and is part of the budget plan for the new Swedish government that is still being negotiated among the country’s political parties following the formal resignation of former Prime Minister Stefan Löfven earlier this month.

Eva Eriksson, chair of SPF Seniorerna, said the agreement on pensions seemed to be a good addition to income for that segment of the population, but that much remained unclear – including on what grounds the new pension guarantee supplement would be calculated.

“But the new guarantee supplement probably also means that it will pay off even less to work alongside your pension,” she said.

Eriksson said: “SPF Seniorerna believes that it is crucial that a holistic approach is needed to pension issues, the system must be reviewed in all its parts and connections to society.

“Continued patching-and-repairing, with another addition, violates the system’s principles and contributes to the decay of the system as well as the persistence of its fundamental problems,” she said.

On Wednesday, Social Democrat Magdalena Andersson – Sweden’s finance minister under Löfven — was hailed in parliament as Sweden’s first female prime minister, but had to resign later in the day when her party’s Green coalition partner quit in a protest related the budget plan.

Andersson said she was resigning because, according to Swedish constitutional practice, a coalition government should resign if a party left the government.

However, Andersson also announced on Wednesday that she was still ready to become prime minister - but for a Social Democratic one-party government.

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