Sweden’s ‘snitch law’ immigration plan prompts alarm across society

Doctors, social workers and librarians are among those in Sweden who have sounded the alarm over a proposal being explored by a government-appointed committee that would force public sector workers to report undocumented people to authorities.

The proposal – which has been referred to as the “snitch law” by some – was among the many measures included in a 2022 agreement struck between four rightwing parties in the country. The deal paved the way for a coalition government involving three centre-right parties with parliamentary support from the far-right anti-immigration Sweden Democrats (SD).

Nearly two years after the SD, a party whose manifesto seeks to create one of Europe’s most-hostile environments for non-Europeans, became Sweden’s second-biggest party, work is under way to turn the proposal regarding public sector workers into law. The committee has been instructed by the government to present proposals on how this could be drafted into law, with plans to present their findings to the government by the end of November.

Despite being in the early stages, the idea, which could result in up to a million workers, from dentists to teachers, being forced to report any contact with undocumented patients, students and authorities, has faced widespread opposition from rights campaigners and professional associations.

“This proposal is utterly inhumane,” said Michele LeVoy of the Platform for International Cooperation on Undocumented Migrants. The impacts could be far-reaching, with people potentially hesitating to send children to school and more reluctant to access healthcare or report crimes committed against them.

“People will be, in a sense, terrified. Why would anyone want to go somewhere when they know that the main thing that will happen is not that they can get care, not that they can go to school, not that they can go to the library – they’ll just be turned in,” she said.

Professional associations have said the proposal could erode the trust they have worked to build and instead fuel racism and amplify stigmatisation.

LeVoy described the measures as part of a growing trend across Europe to criminalise solidarity with people who were undocumented. The Finnish government is also considering expanding obligations to report undocumented people, while in Germany, social welfare offices have for two decades wrestled with reporting obligations.

Another example lay in the measures introduced in the UK by Theresa May in 2012, said LeVoy, citing the “hostile environment” policies that sought to limit access to work, benefits, bank accounts, driving licences and other essential services for those who could not prove they had the legal right to live in Britain.

It later emerged that many who were in the UK legally were unable to prove their status and that the Home Office was frequently misclassifying legal residents as immigration offenders, leading the National Audit Office to conclude in 2018 that hostile environment policies did not provide value for money for taxpayers.

If the Swedish proposal were to become law, Sweden could end up grappling with similar consequences, said LeVoy. “Everywhere where obligations to denounce undocumented people have been applied, the result has been more discrimination, suffering and fear.”

Jacob Lind, a postdoctoral researcher in international migration at Malmö University, said the Swedish proposal was likely to have little impact when it came to reducing the number of people without papers in the country.

“A lot of people are not going to leave,” he said. “They’re just going to end up in further misery. You’ll end up with the opposite effect; society will have even less contact with people who are in this situation, further increasing their vulnerability and making them even more exploitable.”

It is a view that could explain the broad-based opposition to the plan; as of December 2023, more than 150 Swedish regions, municipalities, trade unions and other civil society groups had come out against the idea. “There’s a unique alliance right now around this issue and it’s become a key issue,” said Lind.

Among the groups that have spoken out is the Swedish Medical Association (SMA). “I became a doctor to help people, not monitor and report them,” said Sofia Rydgren Stale, the SMA chair.

For months, the association has argued that reporting requirements would run contrary to the professional ethics rules and principles that state that care must be provided as needed and that patients must not be discriminated against. “We see it as very likely that it will lead to people not daring to seek care for fear of being reported,” Rydgren Stale added.

The Swedish government said the committee looking into how this could become law was also examining whether the duty to provide information would conflict with professional values, such as within healthcare. “To ensure that the regulation is legally sound and does not result in unreasonable consequences for individuals, certain situations may need to be exempted from the duty to provide information,” the minister of migration, Maria Malmer Stenergard, said.

She described the reporting requirements as playing a key role in supporting legal migration by allowing the state to more efficiently deport individuals who are denied asylum. “Unfortunately, many remain and become part of a growing shadow society,” she said. “In such situations the duty to provide information helps in upholding government decisions and does not erode trust, quite the contrary.”

The government’s stance has seemingly done little to quell concerns. In May, the professional ethics council founded by two Swedish unions representing teachers said the obligation to report would put them in an impossible situation. “If the proposal were to become reality, it could lead to such serious ethical problems for teachers that our conclusion is that civil disobedience would probably be the only reasonable way out,” it said on its website.

The idea was also opposed by more than 90% of librarians, said Anna Troberg of the trade union DIK. “Many say they would rather lose their jobs than report those in need,” she said. “If the Swedish government advances this law, the librarians will come out on the right side of history. Ultimately, this is a question of trust, humanity and democracy.”