In a series of articles, The Local interviews foreigners voting in the Swedish election for the first time. Here's our last interview with Irish citizen Warren O'Neill – and here's our guide to voting in Sweden.
Can you tell me a little bit about yourself?
I moved to Sweden in 2020, just before the Corona pandemic, which was amazing timing for an international move. I moved from Poland and I came with a degree in Japanese combined with ethnolinguistics, a lot of experience of work in service industries, but no Swedish, so my prime focus in the first few years was to learn Swedish fluently.
I'm now studying CNC and 3D printing, and maybe also a little bit of modelling, so I'm going in on the engineering side.
So how does it feel to be voting in a Swedish election?
I'm only going to vote locally because I cannot vote nationally yet, and it'll be my second election, since I already had a chance to vote in the previous election. It feels good, because I believe that you feel this sense of community when you vote regionally and vote for the things that are closest to your heart.
I'm in Norrköping now and in the last election I was in Linköping.
What are the big issues in Norrköping?
I think that, compared to Linköping, there is a problem with industry, because Linköping has Saab, so there are huge companies that are investing millions in setting up production sites which employ people and it's the same for Finspång – there's a lot of good industry there. But Norrköping is kind of lacking. It mostly has companies in support services which are usually less well-paid, and it's weird because it's closer to Stockholm.
In my case, both the local and the national issues are in alignment, because I'm going to vote for the Centre Party. I believe that, both locally and nationally, they reflect what I believe in and what I would like to achieve.
I support immigration, but with limits, because I believe that right now Sweden has a lot of people, a lot of potential, and that taking in more people that are uneducated or who in various ways will have a harder time integrating in Swedish society, will just cause problems, as we have seen, frankly.
And did you previously vote for another party?
Yes. I voted for the Moderates. I was a member of the Moderates just like right now I'm a member of the Centre Party. It's great in Sweden that you don't have to be a Swedish national to join a political party. It helps you understand better what they want to achieve and how they want to achieve it, so I really recommend anybody who is in any way interested in politics, to join a party because you learn a lot about how everything works.
What prompted you to leave the Moderate Party?
It was the recent changes to immigration policy. In Poland we are very strict about the law not applying retroactively to also applications that have already been made. Usually there is a deadline, so applications up until such and such a time will be handled according to the previous law.
This means that there is no problem predicting the outcome, because in my case I would never have applied for citizenship over a year ago if I had known that the changes to the law would be so drastic that I would no longer qualify. I would have just waited and I got refused because of the changes to the law.
Their slogan is ansträngning ska löna sig – if you make an effort that should be rewarded – and in my case I did make an effort. I was studying, I was working – OK, part-time, but it was around 70 percent to 80 percent.
I was working part-time as a cleaner and studying Swedish at the same time, and then I got the opportunity from the Swedish Labour Markets Authority to do a CNC course.
I took it because I was interested in this sort of stuff before, but in Poland there's this climate that, if you're a woman, you should work in an office and should not do these so-called "dirty" jobs.
I was trying to contribute to the country that I was living in. I was doing my best to get proficient in the language. I always looked for opportunities to improve myself, so I felt betrayed.
So why did you choose the Centre Party?
Because I'm still on the right when it comes to economic issues and that's why the Centre Party appeals to me, because they also are like, "you should be able to support yourself, you should do your best to find a job and to be productive" and I believe it fits better with my point of view.
There was a meeting of the Fair Transition group in Norrköping and there was a representative from the Centre Party there.
I had looked at them before too, but I felt like their impact was a little bit too low. Previously they were very small, but they have grown quite a lot recently because the recent reforms do not really adhere to the Moderate view of world.
The Moderates are losing votes who are conservative but who have a lot of business. They want to have top quality workers, and without immigration that gets very hard, so it's not good for their companies and they leave the party because it is infringing on their interests.
How easy have you found it to inform yourself about Swedish politics?
Being fluent in Swedish helps a lot – that's the first thing. Of course, I read The Local. I am a member of the Centre Party so I get a lot of information from there: there are meetings and discussions.
I also sometimes go on Facebook too. I am actively fighting the trolls and asking them questions, because I believe that so many people do not fact-check what they're saying. The narrative can get so twisted that it has nothing to do with the world around us.
I also learned a lot from the Fair Transition campaign.
What are your thoughts on the Swedish election campaign so far as it's played out?
I believe it's going closer to Poland, where there are a lot of memes and so on, which ideally I wouldn't like to see, because the biggest threat to democracy is that people become so overfed with political memes that they start to laugh or fight instead of having a discussion.
This is what we see right now, this strong polarisation. I don't want to see that happening in Sweden at the rate that it's happening in my home country in Poland. But frankly I am seeing it more and more and I don't like it. That's why I actively try to stop it with fact-checking. I say "these are the facts, can we stop like misinforming people?" Because not everybody's checking.
What do you want native Swedish voters to know about immigrant life in Sweden?
I think they should make one immigrant friend and ask them what it is like to go through all of these procedures because it's perceived that it's easy. But it's not. The paperwork is tedious. Sometimes you just forget to supply one piece of paper that is critical to your application and then you have to reapply. That happened to me with my personal number, for example, and I was waiting half a year. As a working European citizen, technically you should be able to get it immediately.
Also having a bank account: for European citizens it should be easy, but it is not. Banks are asking for employment when, according to European law, it should be enough to demonstrate a strong connection with the country. I was living here with my ex-fiancé. I moved here for someone. It should be proof enough.
What do you want to say to foreigners who are voting in Sweden for the first time?
Choose wisely and no matter whether it's left or right, choose something that you believe in because that's democracy. Check the facts, inform yourself, read, and if you have a chance, talk to somebody from the party.
Maybe go to a party meeting and listen, because it's very important in democratic countries that people who vote are informed.
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