What Swedes don’t say
Sir: Tove Lifvendahl is, unfortunately, exactly right in her analysis of Swedish immigration and asylum policy (‘Sweden’s refugee crisis’, 3 September). Those in Sweden who support free movement and free trade feel it has long been obvious that the consensus in the riksdag would lead to disaster.
Last autumn saw a celebrity-studded ‘Sweden Together’ celebration of the open-border immigration policy. Then, just six weeks later, we experienced the closure of borders and passport controls enforced on the Öresund bridge connecting Sweden to Denmark. The flow of immigrants is now at five per cent of its peak, but the Öresund region, or the Greater Copenhagen area — a trade integration project painstakingly developed over a period of more than 30 years — was put into liquidation overnight. Danes have been selling their Swedish homes to move back to Denmark. Swedes have quit their Copenhagen-based jobs.
It could all have been avoided had a mature and measured policy discussion taken place in Stockholm.
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