Swedish News:

Healthy and rich ministers. Village in Skåne inherited millions.  

  • Sweden has some healthy political ministers — none of them ever gets sick! Or, rather, none of them call in sick, and thus receive full salary. However, Mats Odell, Financial Markets Minister, says he will pay back the money he owes Swedish taxpayers as he was out sick in 2007 but never called in sick.

  • Healthy and rich ministers
    Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt, Annie Lööf, Birgitta Ohlsson and 14 other Swedish ministers have stayed away from their jobs without calling in sick, according to Dagens Nyhether. By doing so, they’ve received thousands of Swedish crowns.
    Not a single Swedish minister has called in sick since 2010.
    The law requires political ministers to have payroll deductions when they're sick, but the law has obviously not been applied here. In January of 2012, Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt suffered a stomach flu and could not participate at the preparatory meeting with the Parliamentary Committee on EU Affairs. Instead, he got a Secretary of State to replace him. Had he called in sick, he would’ve lost 4,645 SEK ($713) the first qualifying day (”karensdag”). However, Reinfeldt took a full fee from his next salary. Reinfeldt is not alone, though. DN’s review shows that all 17 ministers, from all the parties in the Alliance, have been ill without calling in sick. Nobody’s been calling in sick since Minister for Finances Anders Borg called in sick two days in December 2009. When he was sick in March of 2012, no deduction was made. Still, it is evident through ministers’ posts on social media, articles and protocols that there are times when they have been unable to fulfill their duties due to illness. According to the rules, Swedish ministers have no right to vacation and must be on duty 365 days per year. However, it is up to them to decide when they want to take time off for ”rest and recreation,” but they must register this to Statsrådsberedningen’s Minister for Legal Affairs Christina Weihe. Weihe says all ministers are always on duty, even when sick. ”The ministers and the Prime Ministers work around the clock all year. Even if they cannot participate in a meeting, regardless of reason. The term has looked like this for a long time, and I can say that exceptions are rarely seen, that is ministers are always on call,” Weihe tells DN. When the paper contaccted Local Government and Financial Markets Minister Mats Odell (from the Christian Democrats), regarding him not participating at an interpellation debate on February 13, 2007 ”due to illness,” Odell said he doesn not remember ever being sick as a minister. ”But if this is true, then it is obvious I was in the wrong. And if so, I will of course pay back,” he told DN.

  • Actress Mary-Anne Gyllenstierna and ...

  • Village in Skåne inherited millions
    Mary-Anne Gyllenstierna who was a model, film and stage actress of nobility, and her husband Bertil Weitz, a tie factory owner, has willed 22 million SEK ($3.3 million) to the small village of Öved near the Vombsjön’s eastern shore in Skåne. Only 309 people live in that village. Now a foundation has been formed to manage the money, and the return is to be distributed primarily as study grants but also in the shape of aid for the sick, the disabled and others in need, according to Sydsvenskan. The couple, who had no children, lived in Malmö and Helsingborg, but Mary-Anne’s parents had a summer home in Öved, and she spent time there as a child. The Gyllenstierna family grave is located in Öved cemetery, where both Bertil, who died in 1997, and Mary-Anne, who died in 2012, are buried.
    For more information: www.gyllenstierna-weitz-stiftelse.se