The government wants to review the law – the police must be covered by the discrimination law

The law gives the police the right to search people within a defined area without concrete criminal suspicions. The Discrimination Ombudsman, DO, warns of the risk of completely innocent people being searched due to ethnic affiliation and wants the Discrimination Act to be expanded.

– Today, the Discrimination Act does not cover police interventions against individuals. Therefore, it must be extended so that people who are subjected to discriminatory ethnic profiling can receive redress, says DO Lars Arrhenius.

The government is open to change

According to the police, visits will not take place on the basis of people’s ethnic affiliation, but will be based on a collective assessment of, among other things, intelligence information.

But now the government is opening for an amendment to the discrimination law by preparing a bill that will expand protection against discrimination.

– Discrimination protection for individuals needs to be strengthened. When it comes to, for example, the police’s interventions against individuals, our discrimination law does not cover it well and we want to change that, says Deputy Labor Market Minister and Minister for Gender Equality Paulina Brandberg (L).