Who bears most of the debt can be discussed. In any case, one thing is clear: the joint custody of the pension system that S, M, C, L, KD and – in recent years – MP has been responsible for is over.
It started with Magdalena Andersson (S) promising Nooshi Dadgostar (V) a “guarantee supplement” to take over this autumn.
The Moderates, Christian Democrats and Liberals really only wanted to vote it down, but they also wanted a joint spring budget reservation with SD, which, like the V, demanded higher pensions. The result was a separate alternative – with, among other things, an increased guarantee pension and a “gas” that means larger payments when the system’s reserves are large.
The Center Party has since tried to come up with a compromise that all parties in the pension group can support. It failed.
S was persuaded admittedly to release the guarantee surcharge, but was never prepared to completely dump V. M, KD and L did not seem particularly interested in settling at all.
The consequence is that the three together with SD come forward with their original proposal. C and S, as well as MP and V, support a similar alternative, with a slightly larger increase in the guarantee pension.
Surely it should have been possible to agree. Basically, it just seems to have been more important for M and S to keep SD and V in a good mood, respectively.
We can probably count on bidding on pensions for future elections. In the long run, it will be expensive.
The pension system does not stand or fall with these factual proposals – even if it is unfortunate that the link between work and pension is weakened and badly timed to introduce a “gas” just when we are heading into tougher economic times. Worse is the precedent set when V and SD were allowed to take the other parties hostage.
We can probably count on bidding on pensions for future elections. In the long run, it will be expensive. Someone will have to pick up the bill – either future pensioners or taxpayers of working age.
What a suggestion – and what budget – which will eventually become a reality, we still do not know. S, MP, V and C collect 174 seats; M, KD, SD and L have 173. The question is what the two savages, Amine Kakabaveh and Roger Richthoff, choose to do. Both have expressed uncertainty about how they will vote.
Maybe also never get the proposal that S, C, MP and V stand behind a chance in the House. The Finance Committee, where M, KD, L and SD have a majority, refused on Monday to take the proposal to the Riksdag.
The political game thus reaches a new level.
That this will happen is a reminder of the bad solution to last summer’s government crisis – where the government is supported by parties that do not actually have a majority in the House, and which also do not want to cooperate.
The parliamentary position is locked. Given that S and M do not want to take joint responsibility, in practice the January agreement was the only alternative to bring about a strong government. When L abandoned it, it would have been reasonable with an extra choice.
Before the autumn has the situation with this in any case in any way clarified, some claim. Perhaps. But not quite in the way that the moderates who want to claim that there are now two teams, with C as part of the left.
That is a strange conclusion after the tours about the pensions. The Center Party wanted to get the Social Democrats to settle with M and the other parties in the pension group – get Magdalena Andersson to dump the Left Party.
Most likely, given that the voters do not give a majority to the right-wing nationalist bloc where SD holds the baton, is that Annie Lööf (C) after the election asks the S-leader that she extend a hand to Ulf Kristersson (M).
The question is what he does then – and whether he is the adult in the room who puts factual politics first.