“Paperslösä in Sweden will be terrified” – reportedly upset aid organizations
The Tidö parties’ proposal on mandatory notification for public employees is now also attracting criticism internationally.
– The proposal is completely inhumane, says Michele LeVoy of the Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants (PICUM) to the British newspaper The Guardian.
The Tidö parties want employees within municipalities and regions to be obliged to report to the police and the Swedish Migration Agency when they come into contact with people who do not have the legal right to stay in Sweden, so-called undocumented.
An investigation into what such a law might look like is currently underway. It was supposed to be presented at the end of September but has now been postponed until November 29.
Demands that the proposal be scrapped
The proposal has attracted strong criticism from both trade unions, regions and municipalities. Stockholm and Uppsala have demanded that the proposal be scrapped completely.
Now the proposal is also being reported abroad.
The Guardian has interviewed Michele Levoy at the Brussels-based organization PICUM, the Platform for International Cooperation for Undocumented Migrants. She says that undocumented people in Sweden will be “terrified” and not dare to go to school, seek care or report crimes they have been subjected to.
– Why would they do that when they know they would be handed over to the authorities, she tells the newspaper.
Undocumented people in Sweden have the right to school and some healthcare.
“Can have the opposite effect”
The government calls the proposal a duty of information, but critics say that it is in practice a whistleblowing law. According to Migration Minister Maria Malmer Stenergard (M), the aim is to reduce the shadow society.
But Jacob Lind, a postdoctoral fellow at Malmö University, tells The Guardian that the shadow society may instead grow from the proposal.
– It can have the opposite effect, society gets even less contact with these people, which makes them even more vulnerable and at risk of being exploited, he says.