Annual Report 2018/19. the Swedish Paliamentary Ombudsmen
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Annual report 2018/19 SUMMARY IN ENGLISH the swedish parliamentary ombudsmen observations made by the ombudsmen during the year Annual report 2018/19 THE SWEDISH PARLIAMENTARY OMBUDSMEN 1 observations made by the ombudsmen during the year © Riksdagens ombudsmän (JO) 2020 Printed by: Exakta Print AB 2020 Production: Riksdagens ombudsmän (JO) Photos by: Pernille Tofte (pages 4, 14, 22, 30) and Anders Jansson 2 observations made by the ombudsmen during the year Contents Observations made by the Ombudsmen ....................................................................4 Chief Parliamentary Ombudsman Elisabeth Rynning ................................................. 4 Parliamentary Ombudsman Lars Lindström .................................................................14 Parliamentary Ombudsman Cecilia Renfors .................................................................22 Parliamentary Ombudsman Thomas Norling ..............................................................30 OPCAT operations ................................................................................................... 39 International cooperation .........................................................................................49 Summaries of individual cases ...................................................................................51 Chief guardians .................................................................................................................52 Courts..................................................................................................................................52 Public courts ..................................................................................................................52 Administrative courts ...................................................................................................53 Education and research ....................................................................................................54 The Enforcement Authority .............................................................................................54 Evironmental and health protection ..............................................................................54 Health and medical care ..................................................................................................55 Labour market authorities/institutions .........................................................................58 Migration ............................................................................................................................59 Cases involving police, prosecutors and custom officers ............................................61 Prison and probation service ..........................................................................................67 Public access to documents and secrecy as well as freedom of expression............... 70 Social insurance ................................................................................................................72 Social services ...................................................................................................................74 Social Services Act ........................................................................................................74 Care of Young Persons (Special Provisions) Act (LVU) ..........................................77 Care of Abusers (Special Provisions) Act (LVM) .....................................................79 Family law ..................................................................................................................... 80 Support and service for persons with certain functional impairments Act (LSS) ....81 Taxation .............................................................................................................................82 Other areas .........................................................................................................................82 Statistics ..................................................................................................................... 85 3 observations made by the ombudsmen during the year Elisabeth Rynning Chief Parliamentary Ombudsman The supervision in my supervisory area comprises the Prison and Probation Service, the Armed Forces, the health and medical care services as well as taxa- tion and population registration. The area also includes a number of government agencies, such as Finansinspektionen (the financial supervisory authority), the Competition Authority, the Equality Ombudsman and the National Board for Consumer Disputes. The two largest case groups within my supervisory area, the Prison and Proba- tion Service and the national health services, cover a large number of activities through which people can be deprived of their liberty. I.e. correctional facilities and detention centres as well as institutions for compulsory psychiatric care and forensic psychiatric care. I must therefore pay particular attention to the Parlia- mentary Ombudsmen’s commission as Sweden’s national preventive mechanism pursuant to the Optional Protocol to the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (OPCAT), which has largely been implemented with the help of our OPCAT Unit. This unit is also or- ganised into supervisory area 2, whereas the inspections of the OPCAT Unit are always carried out on behalf of the Ombudsman supervising the authority where the inspection is to take place. A more detailed presentation of the OPCAT Unit’s operations is provided in the section “Opcat operations”. My supervisory area received 2,057 new complaints in the operating year 2018/2019, which is 300 more than the year before. The increase is partly due to me assuming responsibility, in February 2018, for the case group taxation and population registration, but also to the increased number of complaints con- cerning the Prison and Probation Service. During the year, a total of 2,087 supervisory cases were decided on at the divi- sion. However, 291 of these were cases that were deemed, already upon arrival to 4 observations made by the ombudsmen during the year Areas of responsibility • The Armed Forces and other cases rela- companies and partnerships, trade ting to the Ministry of Defence and its names, trade registers, patents, trade- subordinate agencies which do not fall marks, registered designs, and other within other areas of responsibility cases pertaining to agencies subordinate • The National Fortifications Agency. to the Ministry of Industry, Employment and Communications which do not fall • Prisons and probation service, the within other areas of responsibility. National Prison and Probation Board and probation boards. • The Agency for Public Management; the National Financial Management Authori- • Health and medical care as well as dental ty; the Legal, Financial and Administrati- care, pharmaceuticals; forensic medicine ve Services Agency, the National Appeals agencies, forensic psychology agencies; Board, the National Claims Adjustment protection from infection. Board; the National Agency for Govern- • Income and property tax, value added ment Employers, the Arbitration Board tax, fiscal control, with the exception, on Certain Social Security Issues; the however, of the Taxation Authorities Cri- National Property Board; the National minal Investigation Units as laid down in Government Employee Pensions Board, the Act on the Participation of Taxation the National Pensions and Group Life In- Authorities in Criminal Investigations surance Board; the Financial Supervisory [1997:1024] ); tax collection. Authority, the Accounting Standards • Excise duties and price-regulating Board; the National Institute of Economic fees, road tax; service charges; national Research; Statistics Sweden; the National registration (including cases concerning Disciplinary Offense Board. names); other cases connected with the • The Equality Ombudsman; the Board Ministry of Finance and its subordinate against Discrimination. agencies which do not fall within other • Cases that do not fall within the ambit areas of responsibility. of the Parliamentary Ombudsmen; • Public procurement, consumer protec- documents containing unspecified tion, marketing, price and competition complaints. within industry and commerce, price • The Opcat unit regulation, cases concerning limited the office of the Parliamentary Ombudsmen, to fall outside the scope of the Par- liamentary Ombudsmen’s supervision, for example, complaints against private operations, these complaints were consequently delegated to a head of division for dismissal. A total 20 per cent of the cases in supervisory area 2 were delegat- ed to heads of division. Within my areas of responsibility, 25 inspections were carried out during the year, of which 20 were within the scope of the OPCAT Unit’s operations. Togeth- er with colleagues from the division, I have inspected the correctional facilities Tidaholm and Salberga, the detention centre Salberga, as well as the Regional Forensic Psychiatric Clinic in Vadstena and the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry Service (BUP) in Malmö. I also commissioned a head of division to inspect the Probation Service in Skövde. I inspected the Regional Forensic Psychiatric Clin- ic in Växjö and the detention centre in Växjö together with the OPCAT Unit. On my commission, the OPCAT Unit carried out another 18 inspections, of, among other things, the conditions for inmates at various detention centres but