In January, SVT reported that a majority in the Riksdag consisting of the Moderates, Liberals, Christian Democrats, Sweden Democrats and the Center Party want to abolish secrecy between authorities.
The Social Democrats then replied that they too were open to reviewing the secrecy between authorities, but that they wanted to wait and see what a state inquiry they appointed on the same theme would come to.
The investigation is now complete and it is proposed, among other things, that a new general secrecy-breaking provision be introduced, which means that secrecy will no longer prevent an authority from passing on information that other authorities need.
– This is a big change compared to today, says investigator Kerstin Bynander.
Want to bridge the gap
What applies now is that the authorities must do a confidentiality check every time they want to share information with each other. This is something that several authorities believe complicates their work to combat organized crime, and has led the Swedish Tax Agency and the Swedish Social Insurance Agency, among others, to demand that secrecy between authorities be abolished.
– This proposal bridges the gap that exists between authorities’ tasks and the legal conditions they have to carry out their tasks. Authorities can more easily work against cheating and crime, says Kerstin Bynander.
Risks violating personal privacy
At the same time, the Swedish Bar Association has warned that this type of change risks violating personal integrity. According to Kerstin Bynander, they have taken this into account in the investigation. Among other things, by proposing that only the part of the document that the authority needs should be shared, and that confidentiality in special cases should be able to outweigh the authority’s need for the task, for example when it comes to protecting a whistleblower.
The proposals in the inquiry will now be sent out for consultation to the relevant actors and authorities. SVT has sought Minister of Finance Mikael Damberg who received the investigation for a comment.