Week 14: Continued lively debate about Swedish climate policy

Climate policy has, as in previous weeks, continued to influence the Swedish opinion pages as well of the material moisture meter shows you the walked weekn. Among other things, the government has been allowed to continue harsh criticism from the opposition for not doing enough to reduce climate-damaging emissions. Also Dagens Nyheter's editorial staff, the Public Health Agency and the opposition have been criticized by this week's editorial writers and debaters.

The week after the UN climate panel, IPCC, released its climate report, the Climate Policy Council also issued its annual evaluation of the government's overall policy in relation to the climate goals that the Riksdag and the government have decided on. This report has further fueled the debate on Swedish climate policy, above all because of the results in the report which indicate that the government is currently pursuing a policy that will in the near future increase, instead of reduce, emissions, writes Dagens Nyheter.

- The last few weeks have not gone the government's way. At least not from a climate point of view, writes DN's editorial staff.

It is not only DN's editorial board that has been critical of the government's climate policy in the past week.

- For the first time in two decades, we have a government that increases emissions. The climate minister has become the emissions minister, writes, among other things Aftonbladet's editorial writer Noor Karim.

Helena Storckenfeldt (M), on the other hand, has faced criticism from, among others, the Social Democrats and the Center Party. In his debate article she writes that Sweden must reach the climate goals, but that growth and climate ambitions must go hand in hand and that sacrificing living standards is the wrong way.

- To claim that we are unambitious or don't care is an outright lie, writes Storckenfeldt.

Mattias Svensson, editorial writer at Svenska Dagbladet, criticizes both the government and the opposition. He believes that they have failed to note the EU's ongoing work with a regulation on the net-zero industry. The EU proposal is about setting quotas for how much of the inputs for selected green technologies are to be produced in the EU in the future. According to Mattias Svensson, this proposal is both bad for the climate, safety and our wallets - and should therefore receive more attention in Sweden.

However, it is not only the government and the opposition that have received criticism after the IPCC's report. 132 researchers, doctors, healthcare staff and more have also directed sharp criticism at the Public Health Agency - which they believe is not making any efforts to convey the health effects of the climate crisis to the Swedish population.

Another person who has participated in the climate debate during the week is Christofer Fjellner, opposition councilor and group leader for the Moderates in the city of Stockholm. In a reply in Dagens Nyheter he criticizes DN's editorial staff for having adopted too narrow a national perspective on the climate issue. He believes instead that the climate issue must be handled with common EU solutions.

- It is through the EU that we can influence other countries to take their share of the responsibility for a global climate and it is in the EU that Sweden receives both binding climate targets and the main tools to achieve the targets, writes Fjellner.