Archive:Public employment - Sweden
This Statistics Explained article is outdated and has been archived.
- Source: Ministry of the Spanish presidency 2010, publication "Public employment in the European Union Member States" .
This article is part of a set of background articles and introduces public employment in Sweden.
Regional and administrative organisation
Introduction
The Kingdom of Sweden is a Scandinavian country in the north of Europe and is a member of the European Union. It is a democratic state, with a monarchic, parliamentary system of government and strong municipal self-government.
In addition to the 1976 sonstitution, Sweden has a further three fundamental laws: the royal succession act, the freedom of the press act and the fundamental law on freedom of expression.
System of government
The king or queen occupying the Swedish throne under the act of succession is the country’s head of state. The Swedish head of state, since September 1973 king Carl XVI Gustaf, exercises no political power and does not participate in political life. As head of state, he or she is the representative of the country as a whole, and in that capacity performs only ceremonial duties and functions. The head of state pays official visits to other countries and acts as host to foreign heads of state on official visits to Sweden. The head of state also signs the credentials of Sweden’s ambassadors to other countries and receives foreign ambassadors to Sweden. Another official duty of the head of state is to open the annual session of the riksdag. The head of state does not participate in the deliberations of the government and does not need to sign any government decisions. In 1979, the act of succession was amended to give male and female heirs equal rights to the throne. As of 1980 this right belongs to the first-born, regardless of gender.
The parliament (riksdag) is the supreme representation of the people. It enacts laws, determines taxes and how state resources should be invested and supervises the government and public agencies in Sweden. Its members are directly elected every fourth year by national and proportional voting.
The government is made up of the prime minister (statsminister) and the other members of the council of ministers (Statsråd). There is a government office (Regeringskansli) responsible for preparing council matters. The ministers are appointed by the prime minister. The public administration is currently divided into thirteen ministries led by a minister, although there are also ministers who are not heads of ministries. The government takes all decisions collectively.
The judicial system: The Swedish supreme court is the third and final authority in all civil and criminal cases. It is independent from the parliament and the government. The supreme court (Högsta domstolen) is the highest general jurisdiction court and the government council (Regeringsrätten) is the highest administrative court. Nobody may serve as a member of the supreme court or the government council unless he/ she has been appointed a permanent magistrate.
Regional Organization
It is a unitary state, divided into twenty-one counties (Län) of which two are large regions merged from several smaller counties. Each county or region has a county administrative board or länsstyrelse representing the central government administration in some matters (the first administrative board was set up by Swedish Prime Minister, Axel Oxenstierna, in 1634). As political body, each county has a council or landsting, directly elected by the people. There are also a third political level, the municipalities or kommuner, and there is 290 municipalities.
The municipal government is made up of a municipal legislative assembly, called kommunfullmäktige, whose members (always an odd number) are elected by popular vote every four years. In turn, the municipalities are divided into a total of 2,512 parishes or församlingar. There is an ongoing political process going on in order to merge further counties into larger regions.
Public Administration
1. Central administration state administration is organized into two levels: a) Government offices b) Central government agencies. a) The Swedish government offices (ministries) employ only a relatively small number of staff, and government agencies enjoy a relatively autonomous status. The government offices work mainly with supporting the government in its operations, including starting investigations, perform follow up and formulate operational goals for the central government administration.
b) Most experts are working in the government in agencies, which may have central, regional and local offices. Agencies are joint entities responsible for most operational activities of the Swedish public administration. Each of them is managed by an executive manager and normally has a board of directors appointed by the government. Agencies belong to a ministry department but have a high degree of autonomy in terms of decision-making regarding their organization, resources and personnel in order to fulfil the objectives set out in their statutes or regulations. Under the Swedish constitution, individual ministers are not permitted to intervene directly in the day-to-day operations of government agencies. This type of organization dates back to the XVII century.
2. Regional Administration. Regional Central Government Administration is divided between County Administrative Boards and other state authorieties with regional organisation (such as the Social Insurance Board, The Police, The National Employment Authority and more). The County Administration Board acts as the regional authority for various central authorities. Apart from the state there are two political levels: County Councils, providing regional transport and hospitals etc, and Municipalities, providing all kinds of local services and policies. This sub-division dates back to the XVII century. Nowadays, the County Governor (Landshövding) is responsible for state administration in the county when this function is not conferred on another authority, etc.
Municipal Self-Government: Municipalities (Kommuner) have extensive powers, such as tax regulation and collection, so most citizens only pay taxes to the Municipalities. The decision making assembly, the Municipal Council (Kommunfullmäktige) is elected by citizens. The powers are executed in the Municipal executive board and the different technical offices headed by appointed politicians and staffed with municipal employees. Municipal competencies are regulated in the Local Government Act.
The Swedish Constitution contains provisions defining the relationship between decision-making and executive power. The 1992 Swedish Local Government Act regulates division into municipalities and the organisation and powers of the municipalities and county councils. It also contains rules for elected representatives, municipal councils, executive boards and municipal offices.
Structure of Public Employment
Legal Basis: Generally, the same employment rules are applied to public sector employees as those applied to the private sector. Although state employees carry some special conditions, there is no formal legal status for them. The 1994 Civil Service Act stipulates the basic regulations for public employees (rights and obligations of public employees) and the 1994 Public Employment Act sets out the disciplinary measures.
Structure: As a general rule, employment rules in Sweden are similar for the public and private sector. Therefore, the main regulations are: the 1976 Act, the 1974 Act, and the 1978 Employment Act. Swedish laws do not regulate many areas of public employment, with the exception of public employee responsibilities. Like other sectors of the labour market, Swedish public employment conditions are based on sectoral agreements which complement legislation in other aspects than specified by law. There is one set of agreements for the regional and municipal sector and another set of agreements for the sector of central government administration.
Public Employment Management Body. In Swedish central government administration, the Government has delegated most public employment management responsibilities to the 250 Agencies. Each Agency recruits, manages and dismisses its own staff, except the heads of agencies who are appointed by the Government. There are few formal administrative career systems remaining (except for diplomats, police and the armed forces).
Each agency is headed by an executive officer appointed by the government, usually for a six-year term. Sometimes a director general is chosen from the political sphere. The board of an Agency consists of the head of the agency and a number of the senior officials or representatives of organizations or population groups with a special interest in the agency’s activities, and sometimes politicians. All board members are appointed by the government. Most other officials are hired by the agencies themselves.
A Cabinet minister or a ministry may not intervene in an agency’s handling of individual administrative items of business. As a consequence of their independent status, the central government agencies are expected to submit proposals to the government on the guidelines they should follow. These often concern adjustments in the laws and ordinances that apply to the agencies’ respective fields. Such agency recommendations are often referred for public comment in the same way as commission reports
The Swedish Government has given the role of coordinating the central administration’s employer policies and negotiating with trade unions on a national scale to Swedish Agency for Government Employers (SAGE), which is a membership organisation for Government agencies.
SAGE was established on July 1, 1994. It has 250 member agencies in the central Government sector. Other members include closely associated organisations, mostly foundations.
The supreme governing body of SAGE is the Employers´ Council, which convenes once a year. The Council is made up of the 250 heads (i.g. Directors General, Rectors and County Governors) of the member agencies.
The Employers´ Council determines employer policy and sets membership fees. It also appoints the 15 members to the Board. The SAGE Board, which plays a central part in pay negotiations with the trade unions, is the supreme sovereign body between Council meetings. Unlike the other executive heads who are appointed by the government, the Board appoints the director general of SAGE.
SAGE is structured into nine sectors, each represented by a sector delegation. Delegations act as advisory bodies to the Board and to the Director General.
Staff Categories: There is no formal group of Senior Civil Servants, but there is a group of senior staff appointed by the government. In turn this group can be divided into two main subgroups:
1. The first group consists of executive staff at the agencies i.e. Director-Generals, County Governors, Heads of Agencies directly under the Government, Vice- Chancellors of universities and other university colleges, Deputy Director-Generals, Deputy County Governors and County Directors (approximately 280 people).
2. The second group also comprises State Secretaries and Director-Generals in the ministries offering administrative, legal support to members of the Government. (approximately 80 people).
Statistics: According to the Swedish Agency for Government Employers, in 2009, there were 236,000 people on the government payroll. The gender distribution is exactly 50/50. Senior Civil Servants comprise about 360 people in all. Moreover there is a group of managers that report directly to their Director-Generals and there are Heads of Departments and Divisions at the Agencies. These managers are recruited by their Directors General with permanent contracts, as are most employees in the Central Administration. The number of people in this group can be estimated to be around 2,600, in all there are about 12,600 managers in the central administration whereby almost 38%, or just over 4,800, are women.
Rights, Obligations, Principles And Values
Swedish public sector employees have the right to union membership but do not enjoy guaranteed employment. Redundancies are possible if there is a “just cause” (for example departmental reorganisation). Since 1991 the Job Security Foundation has requalified employees who have been made redundant and guides them in their search for new employment on the labour market as whole.
Public and mass media are entitled to transparency of operations, except information designated as confidential. Public access to information provides citizens the opportunity to read documents held by agencies and, thereby, examine the organisation.
Government employees have a broad freedom of expression. This means the right to inform outsiders of the operations of agencies, as long as it does not concern information designated as confidential. This also entails the right to submit information to the mass media. This is known as the freedom to publish for civil servants and others.
The right to collective bargaining, trade union freedom and strike is recognised for public sector employees.
Career-Based System
In most agencies the formal career systems were abolished already in the 1990s. Instead position based systems are used, where new appointments are made in competition with the skills that are available on the labour market. Still career systems exist though in the foreign office, the national defence and the police.
Training: on average, Central Government sector employees receive more staff training than employees in the labour market as a whole. In 2008, 3.6 percent of the total working hours in the Central Government sector were spent on staff training, whereas the corresponding figure for the entire labour market was 2.1 percent. The number of employees who participated in training was also relatively high in the Central Government sector. About 57 percent of Central Government sector employees participated in staff training compared to 46 percent for the entire labour market. The average length of the staff training was 6 days in the Central Government sector and 4 days in the labour market as a whole. Statistics Sweden publishes this survey only every other year, measuring the first 6 months of one year. Since 2006 the share of working hours, share of employees participating in staff training and the average length of the staff training, has decreased on average for all sectors of the labour market, except for the county councils
Remuneration
There is no central pay system, so each of the Agencies managing public employment is responsible for managing its own budget, assigning a part to staff salaries.
However, collective agreements are initially negotiated at central level, then within each agency and finally individually. The aim is to ensure that remuneration is competitive to the labour market as whole when performing the same kind of activities.
Therefore, the Government decides only on Senior Civil Servant salaries. The general pay framework agreement is determined at a central level by national social partners whilst more detailed negotiations take place in each Agency at local level.
The salaries of the Heads of Central Government Agencies are decided on with regard to their qualifications and experience. Salaries are also based on the size of the workforce, budget, complexity, results obtained, annual appraisals, etc.
Social Dialogue And System Of Representation
A 1966 Agreement granted civil servants the right to negotiate salaries and working conditions. The State is represented by the Swedish Agency for Government Employers (SAGE), which is an independent national agency responsible for Agreements with employees.
All State Agencies are compulsory members of SAGE, which is fully funded by membership fees. Central government staff are represented by the three trade union organizations.
The Basic Agreement and the Cooperation Agreement are established between SAGE and the unions for the central government sector, and must be approved by the Government. These agreements regulate the processes of negotiating pay levels and general conditions of employment and set out how the parties may act in the event of industrial action. These agreements also establish basic regulations to govern such action.
The framework negotiations about pay and working conditions are first carried out at central level between SAGE and the unions. The parties conclude a central collective agreement, which sets out the framework and preconditions for local pay negotiations for the relevant period. Central agreements provide a wide scope for parties at agency level to adapt the terms to their own conditions in local collective agreements. With the signing of the central agreement, the parties undertake to refrain from industrial action.
The conclusion of the central agreement is followed by local negotiations between the employer and the local unions. No industrial action may be taken while these negotiations are underway. New pay levels for individual employees are decided in a pay-setting dialogue between employer and employee, or after negotiations between the employer and the local trade union. Furthermore, other employment conditions may be adapted to local conditions through collective agreements, e.g. working hours, health benefits, etc. Local collective agreements specifying forms of co-operation between the employer and the local unions in more detail may also be concluded.
Other directly binding central agreements are also concluded covering job security, pension regulation, and other general employment conditions.
Senior Civil Servants
There is no formal SCS status in Sweden. As a result of the decentralisation of public employment, Senior Civil Servants can be divided into two groups. The first group consists of the following posts: Director-Generals, Governors and other senior positions such as Heads of Agencies or University members. The second group also comprises State Secretaries or Deputy Secretaries. (Summary Table)
Recruitment: Recruitment takes place either internally within Government Offices, from Agencies, or from the private sector, focusing on knowledge, leadership and experience to fill a specific post. State Secretaries are politically appointed. At agency level, the Director-General is appointed by the Government and is selected on the basis of his/her skills and merit for the post. In some cases, however, politicians are appointed Director-Generals.
Management: In Sweden, the Government has delegated most of the employer responsibilities to the Agencies that carry out the business of the central administration. Each agency hires its own staff and has a specific budget for this purpose. The Government SAGE a specific role to coordinate public employment for senior positions and to negotiate with the trade unions.
Assessment: The Government’s most recent policy on human resource management stipulates that the relationship between Ministry management and the respective agency heads should be developed by means of regular performance dialogues. The dialogue usually focuses on the analysis of each Senior Civil Servant’s personal and management skills. Each Agency must carry out assessments for each staff category and define the basic parameters for these evaluations.
Training and Leadership Programmes: The Ministry of Finance is responsible for developing diverse leadership and training programmes. These programmes are not Compulsory for Agencies but are usually followed. The courses are developed with the aim of developing the leadership skills of senior civil servants and it is the responsibility of each Agency to provide the necessary guidelines in terms of public employment so that Agency Heads can carry them out. On-going training is organised by each employer at internal training centres or externally.
Mobility: Since all Senior Civil Servants are employed under fixed-term contracts, the issue of mobility is not always easy. An Agency Head, or similar post, is normally appointed for six years and may be extended for a further three years. Upon contract expiry, it is easier to move to another Agency or another employment sector.
Diversity and Equality Policies: In Sweden there is a diversity policy focusing on gender equality between civil servants in general and between Senior Civil Servants. The aim of these policies is to reach full equality between men and women. Work-Life Balance: There is no regulated working time for Senior Civil Servants, as their working time is based on trust, providing flexibility in order to balance private life and work. The average working week shouldn’t exceed more than 39h 45m.
Tele-working: Tele-working facilities are available for Senior Civil Servants, but in practice they have to attend a lot of meetings and conferences which reduces their ability to work from home.
Part-time Work and Flexible Working Times: Part-time work and flexible working times are possible due to favourable legislation and it is usual for public administration staff to make use of this possibility.
Parental leave: A parent (mother or father) is entitled to leave to care for their child. In such cases of leave, compensation is paid by the Swedish Social Insurance Agency. The government employer will pay supplementary compensation, so that the total compensation to a parent is 90 percent of his or her income during the majority of the leave. Parents of small children also have the possibility of working part-time.
Leave for childbirth or adoption – Parental benefit: New parents receive parental benefit from the Swedish Social Insurance Agency in the case of leave for the care of a child. Parental benefit is payable for a total of 480 days. Ten of these days are reserved for paternity leave. For 390 days the compensation is a maximum of 80 per cent of the income up to the income ceiling1. Government employees receive supplementary compensation from the employer for a maximum of 360 of the days with parental benefit. The supplementary compensation means that the total compensation corresponds to 90 per cent of the income. Parental benefit can also be paid for a further 90 days on the lowest benefit level, where the payment is SEK 180 per day.
Care of a sick child – Temporary parental benefit: An employee requiring leave for a sick child receives compensation for the care of a sick child from the Swedish Social Insurance Agency. The compensation is 80 per cent of the pay up to the income ceiling. The government employer pays a supplementary compensation on the income that exceeds the income ceiling for up to ten days per year. This means that the employee receives a total compensation of 80 percent of the income during these days.
Recent Reforms and Prospects
Sweden has based its reforms on social dialogue, promoting cooperation and transparency and reinforcing controls on civil servants. A new public pension system for all the labour market was implemented in Sweden in 1999. This reform created two obligatory contribution systems, so that all public employees born after 1954 reaching the age of 61 after 2015 will come under the new system. The highlight of this system is the automatic pension revaluation mechanism, so that contributions are adapted to current requirements. In 2003 a complementary pension system was implemented by a binding agreement between the social partners for central government administration.