Moderates promise full funding for all election pledges

Sweden’s Moderate Party has presented an election manifesto with 226 points and promises to fully finance all of its election pledges, SVT reports.

Many, though not all, of the points are specific pledges. They include cutting taxes for low and middle-income earners, abolishing preschool fees and making employer-paid monthly public transport passes tax-free. Almost all of the pledges have been announced previously.

The manifesto also sets broader targets. Sweden should have the highest standard of living in the European Union within 10 years, while real wages should rise by 50 percent and the number of people receiving financial assistance should be halved.

Another goal is to “eradicate” the power of criminal gangs. “We need four more years to completely eliminate deadly gang violence,” the manifesto says.

Funding the proposals

The Moderates have previously estimated that their combined election pledges would cost about 78 billion kronor. The manifesto says the pledges will be implemented as economic resources become available and will be financed mainly through reprioritisation within the bureaucracy, benefits and foreign aid.

The party plans to propose a budget this autumn that would require savings from almost all government agencies. The military, the justice system and infrastructure funding would be exempt.

The Moderates also expect to create funding for reforms by reducing structural unemployment. They attribute this mainly to stricter migration policy, the full introduction of a benefits reform next year and changes already made to unemployment insurance.

The party wants to strengthen incentives to work further by increasing the phase-out of unemployment insurance and raising the requirements for unemployed people to move in order to take a job. It also proposes abolishing the tax deduction for unemployment insurance fees.

The manifesto says the party will propose a plan in its next budget to gradually redirect resources from foreign aid to “above all Swedish welfare, but also the military build-up and other prioritised reforms”. At the same time, it promises that no savings will increase costs for “hard-working Swedes”.

One of the party’s key pledges is that an ordinary family with two children should have 5,000 kronor more to spend each month by the end of the next parliamentary term.

The Moderates expect their policies to increase economic growth, which would provide more resources for welfare through higher tax revenues. The manifesto says that a one percent increase in growth would create about 30 billion kronor in additional fiscal room for reforms.

Other proposals

The manifesto also includes a special tax cut for working parents, lower taxes on work-related pension income, lower taxes for people working beyond retirement age, and tax-free savings on the first 500,000 kronor in investment savings accounts. It proposes cutting corporate tax and removing the summer income limit in the student finance system.

On crime, the party wants to abolish volume discounts for multiple offences, introduce a protective law for women exposed to violence, increase controls and penalties for violent men, and create the offence of exceptionally aggravated rape with a life sentence. It also proposes tougher penalties for recruiting children into crime and sanctions against gang criminals, including restrictions on movement and access to financial benefits.

Other crime measures include targeted monitoring or electronic ankle tags for children at risk of entering gang crime, security guards with greater powers to supplement the police in streets and squares, at least 10,000 police cameras by 2029, and mandatory background checks for all jobs involving children.

In other areas, the Moderates propose reducing the healthcare guarantee from 90 to 30 days, introducing conduct grades in schools, setting a minimum age of 15 for social media, requiring newly arrived people to sign a “Sweden contract”, and creating integration zones in disadvantaged areas to attract more businesses. The party also wants to raise the age limit for child psychiatry above the current 18 years and lower the age limit for buying beer and wine at Systembolaget to 18.