The party filed a motion in the Swedish parliament on Friday, stating that transitional rules were "essential" to protect applications that have already been submitted.
If they are not put in place, the party argued in the motion, there was a "great risk of a further increase in processing times" for citizenship cases, which risked doing "serious damage" to public confidence in the Migration Agency.
If the bill is passed, it will increase the residency qualifying period for citizenship from five to eight years, and bring in new requirements around Swedish language, civic knowledge, and income. In its motion, the Social Democrats said they supported all of these reforms.
If transitional rules were included in the bill, it would mean that anyone who submitted their application to the Migration Agency before the new law comes into force on June 6th, would have their applications assessed according to the previous requirements.
However in its current state the bill does not include any mention of transitional rules, meaning even those who submitted their applications months or years ago would have to meet the stricter requirements.
The motion comes in the wake of a campaign led by the Fair Transition Sweden campaign group, and sees the Social Democrats joining forces with the three other opposition parties – the Green Party, Centre Party, and Left Party – all of whom have already filed motions calling for transitional rules.
Migration Minister Johan Forssell told The Local earlier this month that the government opposed allowing transitional rules because it would reduce the number of applications subject to the upcoming stricter requirements.
“We want these changes to take place as soon as possible for security reasons," he said. “Having no transitional rules is also in line with most legislation that has been put into place. The odd thing would rather be to do it the opposite way."
In its motion, the party questioned this justification: "The bill lacks a more detailed analysis of how the security aspect and the general interest in the regulation taking immediate effect should be weighed against the need for pending cases and appealed decisions to be determined in accordance with the current regulatory framework."
However given the government and the Sweden Democrats have a three-seat majority in parliament, the bill is likely to pass in its current form without amendment.
The opposition would need two members of parliament for a government party to abandon their party's line and vote with the opposition (unlikely, given that in Sweden, MPs very rarely rebel), or for the entire Liberal Party to break with the rest of the government on the issue.
The Social Insurance Committee is due to make final amendments to the bill on April 14th. It will then go before parliament for a debate and vote on April 29th.
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