Central government budget

Men’s violence against women must stop. This is a priority issue for the Government. In the Budget Bill for 2022, the Government proposes a range of measures to prevent and combat men’s violence against women and honour-based violence and oppression. This involves permanent funds and government grants, and a sheltered housing reform for adults and children who are subjected to violence.

The Government on instructed the Swedish Tax Agency and Tillväxtverket (the Swedish Agency for Economic and Regional Growth) to make preparations so that as of 1 April 2022, the Tax Agency can be the managing authority for Tillväxtverket’s currently responsibilities under the Act on aid in the event of short-time work.

Today, Minister for Finance Magdalena Andersson presents the Ministry of Finance’s latest economic forecast and the direction of the central government budget for next year. The Ministry of Finance forecasts growth of 4.4 per cent this year and 3.5 per cent next year.

The Swedish economy is recovering rapidly after the deep downturn last year. The Ministry of Finance’s latest forecast calls for GDP to grow by 4.7 per cent this year, which is 1.5 percentage points higher than in the forecast presented in connection with the Spring Budget in April. Public finances are also expected to be stronger than in the previous forecast.

The Government has decided to extend the government credit guarantee scheme, ‘Företagsakuten’, to support small- and medium-sized companies in financial difficulty due to the pandemic from 30 June to 30 September 2021.

The Government has today decided to extend turnover-based support to sole traders and trading partnerships with at least one physical person as a partner to cover the period March–June 2021. This support is based on an agreement between the government parties, the Centre Party and the Liberal Party.

The government parties, the Centre Party and the Liberal Party have agreed on supporting SAS to access liquidity equivalent to SEK 1.5 billion. This support from the Swedish State is subject to the European Commission’s approval of the measures and corresponding support from the Danish State.

The situation for the travel industry remains serious. Earlier in the pandemic, travellers sometimes accepted replacement holidays instead of a refund when package tours were cancelled due to the outbreak. Many of these replacement holidays are now also being cancelled. The Government is therefore working on a proposal that will give package tour operators the option of taking government loans to refund money to travellers. The proposal is based on an agreement between the government parties, the Centre Party and the Liberal Party.

In the spring amending budget, the Government announced that the central government rental support scheme would be extended through the second quarter of 2021. Following an agreement between the government parties, the Centre Party and the Liberal Party, the Government now intends to examine the conditions for extending the scheme through the third quarter of 2021.