Swedish People’s Party want to impose stricter immigration requirements to meet it integration target

Tuesday, 12 June 2012
The issue of immigration and the plights of the immigrants in Sweden has become a talking point in Sweden recently, even with the Prime Minister recently attributing the high unemployment in the country to immigrants who are unemployable. This has increased the debate about the life of the immigrant in Sweden and the reality of their “Swedish dream”.

While other EU countries are crying that immigrants come in and take away their jobs, such is not a very important issue in Sweden. The system here is properly design to weed out outliers such that their supposed effects would not affect the “indigenes”. One of those outliers that can be easily talked about is language barrier – the ability to speak, write and communicate in the Swedish language.

"Learning Swedish is key," the Swedish People’s Party's three ministers, Jan Bjorklund, Erik Ullenhag and Nyamko Sabuni said in a write up published on the Swedish daily, Dagens Nyheter on Tuesday in which the Liberal Party's integration policy program was debated upon.

Among others, the abolition of retrospective parental benefits, more job training and more stringent requirements for grants are some vital of the eight points contained in their proposal for future improvement in integration.

"Most importantly, those who come to Sweden should soon learn Swedish and immediately enter the labour market," the Party's three ministers wrote.

They added that language is a key issue and that integration is one of Sweden's most important challenges for a while. It is clear that many of the Swedish high levels of unemployment and lack of engagement in the society and economic life is seen within the immigrant community – this time not only the black Africans but all other people who are not seen as white enough.

Resistance in the acceptance of the Swedish way of life and maintaining their cultural approaches has made some groups of immigrants so difficult for the Swedish authorities to break down. With the emergence of the Islamic resistance to western approaches in Sweden, it had added more heat to their drive for integration.

The Ministers noted that only 50 percent of those who come to Sweden as refugees and subsidiary protection and their families, have had a crake into the system in way of getting a job - say after seven years. "It's too bad a result," writes Bjorklund, Ullenhag and Sabuni.

The party wants to abolish subsidies for newcomers who turn down work, no matter where in the country in which there is a job offer. This is because immigrants come in and bundle themselves in area where people of the hue have been living irrespective of if that areas offers them any form of opportunity. Given the Swedish centralised control system, people tend to fine a comfort zone around their types and feel “trapped in the poverty puddle,” where just the postal address is a disadvantage for them seeking a career or just work.

The three ministers also suggest the possibility to be able to retain portions of financial assistance given to families when they get a job in order to increase the willingness to move from welfare dependency to work.
Liberals would also introduce an activity requirement for all newly arrived foreign-born persons who receive income support. Task to be equivalent to one full-time job and it should be mandatory for municipalities to organize these activities.

Newcomers will also find it easier to get work experience while they learn the Swedish language. The Liberals would want to award companies that give news comers the chance to practice in their organisations. As of today, Swedish companies have very little experience working with people who look differently in Sweden. According to some recent studies a traditional Swedish internationally facing organisation has zero to 0.0001 percent of its work for made up of someone with a foreign looking structure. Companies such as Volvo cars, Scania, SKF and to some extent Ericsson are some slight exception. This is because these companies have lots of foreign stake holders who can move people as they wish.

It also been said that the Swedish companies themselves do not seem to be interested in attracting non Swedish looking people to work for them. This is why even though these ministers are writing about integration, there are still immigrant born people who are properly educated, speak fluent Swedish, Norwegian, and Danish and have broad international exposures and experiences but are finding it hard to be employable in Sweden

As the Swedish minister write about their quest for better integration, it is true that some immigrants do little to get integrated but majority struggle and the system always shot its door at them. The question should be asked as to why integration is better (not best) in Canada, UK, USA, France, and these days, even in Germany than in Sweden.
By Scancomark.se Team

What do you think about this article and us? Please leave a comment