The government’s policies are making things worse
Published 2023-09-20 06:00
Aftonbladet’s editorial page is independent social democratic.
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Justice Minister Gunnar Strömmer called a meeting with the country’s heads of authorities to discuss gang violence and break new recruitment into criminal groups. The police have become more efficient, cooperation works better and more crimes are solved, but the violence continues and the police point out the great need to stop recruitment to gangs, which is a responsibility for the entire society. Aftonbladet’s editorial page thinks that Strömmer and the government are missing the fundamental driving force behind the violence. The government’s budget will not contain any major investment against the growing poverty and vulnerability in many residential areas, which contribute to crime.
Gunnar Strömmer’s advice against organized crime has important tasks. But to get at the causes of the violence requires political will, which the government lacks. Photo: Jonas Ekströmer/TT
It would be easy to rant about yesterday’s meeting with Minister of Justice Gunnar Strömmer. High-ranking authorities who have been specially summoned to Rosenbad to talk about a “situational picture” and measures “intended to break new recruitment” to the criminal gangs.
On the way to the meeting, the heads of, among other things, the police, the Swedish National Agency for Education, and the National Board of Health and Welfare noted that two more apartments had been shot at during the night.
Fortunately, no one died that night, but recently seven people have lost their lives. Among them a 13-year-old boy and a 60-year-old woman. Shots have been fired in Uppsala, Stockholm, and Norrköping.
The violence has also spread to Turkey, where several of the leaders of the gangs are hiding.
And at Gunnar Strömmer’s, people meet to discuss the situation. Afterwards, he spoke of “a very clear pressure” on our system.
As I said, it would be easy to make fun of. In particular, as Strömmer just over a year ago gave the impression that gang crime would be a difficult thing to solve.
Danish penalties and the problem would soon be gone.
But the meeting with the National Council Against Organized Crime is nothing to joke about. Violence is a social problem that is rooted in other social problems.
The police have become more effective in their pursuit of the guilty. The problem is that the violence continues.
The police leadership has long said that recruitment to the gangs must be stopped, and that it is a task for the whole society. Arresting and sentencing perpetrators of violence has little meaning as long as there are new children waiting to take their place.
That harsher punishments would deter is ridiculous. Young people are drawn into crime even though they know that life in gangs is literally life-threatening.
Strömmer’s “situation picture” will not change anything. But cooperation can take us some way. The school, the municipalities’ social services, and others who meet the young people are necessary if the killing is to end.
Yet Gunnar Strömmer and the government he represents miss the most fundamental driving force behind the chaos we see around us. The day after the meeting at the Ministry of Justice, the government presents its budget.
It contains tax reductions for people with organized relationships and increased tax deductions for those who own their home. But it does not contain any major investment to reduce the gaps, against the growing poverty or the vulnerability of many families. On the contrary.
The fundamental causes of criminality remain and are strengthened.
The heads of the country’s authorities cannot do anything about it. It’s politics, and right now we have a government that is deepening the divides.