Legal prism — 2026-09-26

Under Section 5 of the Rent Negotiation Act, a negotiation order imposes an obligation on the landlord to negotiate a rent increase, while Section 15 of the same Act requires a negotiation meeting to be held within three weeks from the date on which the counterparty received the written request for negotiation.

In the event of an invalid agreement, the landlord is obliged to repay the amount overcharged, together with interest under Section 6 of the Interest Act (1975:635) from the date of receipt (Section 23).

Core issue

When the parties in Värmland fail to reach a rent agreement, they are not left without legal recourse but are instead directed into a regulated procedure: negotiation under the Rent Negotiation Act (1978:304) and, ultimately, determination by an arbitrator or the Rent Tribunal. The opinion piece, signed by the head of business policy at Fastighetsägarna Värmland, seeks to change precisely this legal position through legislation. The exact legal issue is whether the landlord can compel a determination of the rent without the tenant organisation’s consent, and what time limits apply to the negotiation. However, the Act contains no ultimate time limit for the total duration of negotiations, which is the core of the reform sought in the article.

Legal assessment

The parties’ obligations and rights follow from the negotiation order, which arises either by agreement or by decision of the Rent Tribunal under Section 1 of the Rent Negotiation Act. In practical terms, the system means that:

• The landlord must, on its own initiative, negotiate a rent increase, unless the increase concerns an optional add-on and does not exceed the price recommended by the parties (Section 5).
• A request for negotiation must be in writing, specify the issues and propose a time and place; the meeting must be held within three weeks (Section 15).
• Agreements entered into directly between the landlord and the tenant are invalid if negotiation under the negotiation order has not taken place (Section 23).
• In a rent dispute, the Rent Tribunal may not examine a claim for a higher rent unless negotiation under the negotiation order has taken place (Section 11a of the Act (1973:188) on Regional Tenancy Tribunals and Rent Tribunals).

The material contains no case law, decided cases or precedents. It does, however, show that the Rent Tribunal examines disputes concerning rent terms under Sections 22 and 23 of the Rent Negotiation Act, as well as repayment liability under Section 23 (point 2a of the jurisdictional provision in the Act on Regional Tenancy Tribunals and Rent Tribunals). In the case of a retroactive increase or reduction, the fifth to eighth paragraphs of Section 55e of the Land Code apply, and an order for repayment of rent may not relate to a period more than two years before the application (provisions of Chapter 18 of the Land Code cited in the material). The arbitration procedure which the article proposes should become available without a separate agreement is not mentioned in the material as an existing statutory possibility; it is a reform proposal, not current law.

Consequences

For tenants in Värmland, the current legal position means that they continue to pay rent that may later be adjusted retroactively, while property owners bear planning uncertainty during the negotiation period. Realistic scenarios include:

• If the parties reach agreement, it applies as a negotiated agreement under Section 2 and is incorporated into the tenancy agreements through a negotiation clause.
• If no agreement is reached, the landlord may not, without prior negotiation, claim a higher rent before the Rent Tribunal (Section 11a), and unilateral agreements with tenants are invalid and entail repayment liability (Section 23).
• The reform proposed in the article — a statutory right to refer a dispute to an arbitrator, a limited negotiation period and simplified procedure — requires a decision by the Riksdag and lies in the future, with no specified timetable.

This has practical significance for tenants who need to know their rent for household budgeting, for property owners’ maintenance and investment planning, and for tenant organisations and property-owner organisations as negotiating parties.

Under Chapter 15, Section 4 of the Gambling Act, marketing that contravenes Section 1 is, for the purposes of Sections 5, 23 and 26 of the Marketing Act (2008:486), to be deemed unfair towards consumers.

As a benchmark, in the case against the credit intermediary Advea, the Patent and Market Court attached an interim conditional fine totalling SEK 3.5 million to its decision.

Core issue

Postkodlotteriet now faces a procedural settlement posture before the Patent and Market Court, where the Consumer Ombudsman seeks an injunction against a specific Instagram advertisement, subject to a conditional fine. What is at stake is not merely a single video, but a precedent on the meaning of the moderation requirement under the Gambling Act for marketing on social media. The precise legal question is whether the video — featuring raining prize cheques, SEK 101 million in gold-coloured text, and a time-limited half-price offer — is moderate within the meaning of Chapter 15, Section 1 of the Gambling Act (2018:1138). That provision requires moderation in the marketing of gambling to consumers and prohibits targeting persons under 18. The Consumer Ombudsman’s objective is clarification: the court should establish what moderation means where the formats are short, visual and algorithmically distributed. The material indicates that case law remains limited, and in autumn 2022 the Riksdag rejected the proposed adjusted moderation requirement in the bill A Strengthened Gambling Regulation precisely because practice was still being established.

Legal assessment

The Consumer Ombudsman’s objection is twofold and must be assessed through an overall assessment, as required by KOVFS 2025:2 (general guidelines on the marketing of gambling):

• The video presents the lottery as socially attractive, something in which everyone ought to participate — the guidelines in section 2.2.1.1 require factual and balanced marketing that must not make gambling appear risk-free.
• The time-limited half-price offer with a final purchase date creates an impression of urgency — section 2.2.2 addresses exhortatory messages that may encourage an ill-considered decision to gamble.
• The guidelines require information to be limited to facts about the lottery and presented as objectively as possible, and require that marketing not give the impression of greater chances of winning (section 2.2.1.1).
• The overall assessment covers the presentation itself, the content and the design in the chosen medium (section 2.1). According to the Consumer Ombudsman’s claim, the amount of the conditional fine should be related to lottery revenues of just over SEK 3.5 billion according to the 2025 annual report, which supports a relatively high fine. The Swedish Consumer Agency’s general guidelines from 2025 are only guidelines; a court judgment would carry greater weight as a source of law.

Consequences

For Postkodlotteriet: if the claim is upheld, the video will be prohibited, likely with a conditional fine scaled by reference to billion-krona revenues, and a normative standard will be set for all future gambling advertising on social media.

• For the gambling market as a whole: a ruling would fill the gap left by the Riksdag’s 2022 rejection and would have effects far beyond the individual advertiser, as in the misleading job advertisements case against the law firm.
• For the Consumer Ombudsman: a precedent would strengthen the enforcement toolkit against other licence holders, because marketing that contravenes Chapter 15, Section 1 is automatically deemed unfair under Chapter 15, Section 4 of the Gambling Act.
• The next procedural step is for Postkodlotteriet to respond to the Consumer Ombudsman’s objections before the Patent and Market Court.

In such a case of circumvention, the tenant has the same rights against the property owners as if the tenancy had been granted directly to him.

The Supreme Court’s refusal to grant leave to appeal does not constitute a substantive examination of the arguments, but it renders the Court of Appeal’s judgment final.

Core issue

The tenant may remain in occupation with the same legal status as a first-hand tenant, as the Supreme Court has now refused Ibrahimovic and Seger leave to appeal. The Court of Appeal’s judgment has therefore become final and constitutes the definitive outcome of the case. The precise legal issue was whether an arrangement involving a letting company interposed between the parties could nevertheless confer possessory protection on the tenant directly against the property owners. The Court of Appeal applied the provisions of Chapter 12 of the Land Code, which afford tenants security of tenure and the right to a reasonable rent. The decisive question was whether the legal relationship had been used to circumvent those protective provisions, which exist for the benefit of the tenant.

Legal assessment

According to the District Court’s judgment, with which the Court of Appeal agreed, there is a community of interest between Zlatan Ibrahimović and Helena Seger, on the one hand, and the letting company, on the other.

• The tenant relied on Supreme Court case law concerning nominee arrangements and on the fact that he had paid excessive rent which allegedly benefited the property owner.
• The Supreme Court’s refusal to grant leave to appeal renders the Court of Appeal’s judgment final. The Court of Appeal based its judgment on the finding that a community of interest existed between the owners and the letting company. This means that the intermediary’s partial function cannot be used to deprive the tenant of the protection afforded by Chapter 12 of the Land Code. The rules on agreements under Chapter 12, Sections 45a and 56 of the Land Code (Ordinance 2005:1148) demonstrate that a waiver of security of tenure is valid only in the forms and situations prescribed by law. No such procedure was effected in the case to the tenant’s detriment. Security of tenure and the right to a reasonable rent under Chapter 12 of the Land Code were therefore applied to the relationship between the tenant and the couple.

Consequences

Ibrahimovic and Seger can no longer pursue the claim for eviction or for the tenant to be deprived of his rights.

• The tenant continues to have the right to reside in the apartment with the same status as a first-hand tenant, including security of tenure and the right to a reasonable rent.
• The legal principle may be significant for other property owners who let premises through companies sharing a community of interest with the owner.
• The tenant may further pursue claims concerning excessive rent and repayment.

Correction. The article reproduces the District Court’s wording that the couple, through a nominee structure, had “attempted to circumvent the Tenancy Act”, which could easily be misunderstood as meaning that subletting through a company is in itself legally prohibited. That is not the case: subletting is permitted under the Land Code, but subject to restrictions, above all that, when reasonableness is reviewed, the rent may never exceed what the landlord itself pays, plus additions for furniture, equipment and other utilities, and that the subtenant has weaker security of tenure. The correct position is that the nominee structure is not unlawful as a form of letting; rather, the true configuration of the parties means that the full protective rules of tenancy law apply to the underlying relationship. The article also fails to explain that the parallel proceedings before the Rent Tribunal concerning termination remain undecided, and that the Supreme Court’s refusal of leave to appeal is formally not a judgment on the merits, but merely means that the Court of Appeal’s judgment stands.

Core issue

The legal position in the tenancy dispute is now final: the Court of Appeal’s judgment stands, as the Supreme Court has refused leave to appeal.

• This means that the tenant has the same rights as a first-hand tenant in the Östermalm apartment, and that Ibrahimovic/Seger must pay SEK 422,000 in legal costs for the District Court and the Court of Appeal.
• The remaining legal issue does not concern the courts but the Rent Tribunal: the tenant has been given notice, and the matter has not yet been determined.
• The decisive issue on the merits concerns the rules on nominee arrangements — renting through an intermediary in order to circumvent tenancy law — which the courts applied in the tenant’s favour.

Legal assessment

The District Court found that the couple had rented out the property through an intermediary, a so-called nominee arrangement, and had thereby attempted to circumvent tenancy law.

• The tenant was therefore granted the right to remain in occupation with the same rights as a first-hand tenant, rather than as a subtenant with limited protection.
• The tenant based his claim on the widely discussed Supreme Court judgment on nominee arrangements, which the courts accordingly followed in this matter.
• The rental company originally leased the building’s apartments and sublet them to the tenants; when Zlatan Ibrahimovic took over the building, he terminated the rental company’s lease in 2023, which also resulted in the tenants being given notice.
• According to the District Court, the arrangement meant that the actual tenants are protected as if they had rented directly from the property owner, depriving the owner of the ability to end their occupation by terminating the intermediary’s lease.
• In the Rent Tribunal, where the tenant’s termination is still under review, the final and binding judgment strengthens the tenant’s position, according to his counsel Roland Sjölin.

Consequences

For the tenant: he retains the apartment under the confirmed judgment and, according to his counsel, has an improved prospect of success before the Rent Tribunal as a result of his first-hand tenant status.

• For Ibrahimovic/Seger: SEK 422,000 in legal costs must be paid, and the termination before the Rent Tribunal risks being rejected on the basis of the same nominee-arrangement reasoning.
• For landlords who rent out through intermediaries: the judgment shows that nominee arrangements may give tenants full first-hand tenancy protection even where an intermediate landlord is put in place.
• For other tenants in the building: terminations effected through the rental company may be caught by the same prohibitive rules if they bring similar claims.
• Follow-up point: the Rent Tribunal’s decision on the tenant’s termination remains pending.

Core issue

As of 1 July 2027, individuals and companies seeking to influence decisions of the Riksdag or the Government will be subject to a registration obligation under the newly adopted Act (2026:1459) on transparency in communications intended to influence political decisions. The new development is that the Riksdag has approved the register, but its scope is narrower than many stakeholders had wished. The legal question determining who is covered is what constitutes “influence communication” under Section 2 of the Act, and to whom the contact is directed under Section 3. The rules are set out in Sections 1–10 of the Act, and supervision is assigned to the Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency.

Legal assessment

Under Section 2, influence communication means contact by a natural or legal person with a political decision-maker or that person’s staff for the purpose of influencing the preparation or determination of a matter before the Riksdag or the Government. Providing advice or support, on assignment, to someone making such contact is also covered.

• Only the following decision-makers are covered under Section 3: members of the Riksdag and government ministers.
• Staff are covered: political secretaries, employees of the Riksdag Administration, state secretaries, political advisers, and investigators, members and secretaries of government-appointed committees.
• Exceptions apply under the operative provisions for ordinary contacts in administrative authority matters, participation in government-appointed working groups with public documentation, contacts with intergovernmental organisations, and political parties receiving state support under the Act (1972:625) or Chapter 4, Sections 29 and 30 of the Local Government Act (2017:725).

The reporting obligation follows from Section 8: reports must be submitted to the Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency no later than 1 June (January–April), 1 October (May–August), and 1 February (September–December). The required content is governed by Section 9: subject matters, names of decision-makers or ministry/unit/committee, method of contact, and scope. Under Section 10, the absence of influence communication must also be reported. A person who has only provided advice or support to another person is exempt from certain information requirements in the report.

Consequences

Tobacco lobbyists and other interest organisations must establish procedures to document contacts directly concerning the Riksdag and the Government, with reporting three times per year.

• The proposed delineation from party-political opinion-forming before formal preparation begins — the criticism raised by Annika Hirvonen (Green Party) regarding the Tidö Agreement and the January Agreement — was not accepted, and such contacts are not covered.
• The Green Party and others seeking to expand the register may return with legislative proposals; the material indicates no majority support for a comprehensive register.
• The Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency will assume the role of registration authority and supervisory authority; the material does not specify any sanctioning provisions, so the sanction levels are unknown.
• Looking ahead: the Act enters into force on 1 July 2027; the date on which the Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency will open registration and the exact start of the first reporting period are not stated in the material — a decision or regulation from the Agency/institute on this is expected before entry into force.

under Section 8 of SJVFS 2021:47, broiler lines with an average growth rate of no more than 45 grams per day are deemed slow-growing, up to and including 1 January 2032

Ross 208, which is ready for slaughter at 35 days, exceeds this threshold and therefore does not fall within the definition of slow-growing.

Core issue

Swedish chicken producers using Ross 208 face a legal situation in which the breed remains permitted, but political demands for a ban may change the playing field during an ongoing election campaign. The crux of the news is that Norway is already voluntarily phasing out so-called turbo chickens, while Sweden has no corresponding measure. The precise legal issue is whether fast-growing breeds such as Ross 208, which are slaughtered at 35 days, may be prohibited within the framework of the Animal Welfare Act (2018:1192) and the Animal Welfare Ordinance (2019:66). The material shows that the legislation regulates animal husbandry, slaughter and transport, but that breed choice as such is not prohibited. The Animal Welfare Ordinance (2019:66) delegates to the Swedish Board of Agriculture the power to issue regulations on conditions for activities requiring authorization under Chapter 6, Section 4 of the Animal Welfare Act. There is therefore a regulatory route, but no current provision in the material prohibits fast-growing breeds in conventional production.

Legal assessment

• Organic livestock farmers must apply for approval from the Swedish Board of Agriculture, providing the information set out in Annex 11 and Annex 12, respectively, to SJVFS 2021:47.
• Exceptions from the requirement for organically reared animals are regulated in Section 7 of SJVFS 2021:47 pursuant to Annex II, Part II, point 1.3.4.3 of Regulation (EU) 2018/848.
• Under Chapter 3, Section 1 of SJVFS 2008:69, slaughterhouses must have a plan for maintaining good animal welfare from arrival to stunning and killing, taking technical failures into account.
• The County Administrative Boards and the Swedish Board of Agriculture have supervisory responsibility; the Act (2009:619) on the Animal Welfare Control Register provides these authorities with a basis for decisions on, and control of, direct payments under Act (1994:1710) and Act (1994:1708).
• Direct payments may be made conditional on compliance with animal welfare rules; SJVFS 2007:22 and SJVFS 2007:39 list Sections 3, 6 and 9-11 of the Animal Welfare Act, as well as DFS 2004:17 on animal husbandry in agriculture, as the basis for control.
• The material contains no case law, and therefore no judicial authorities can be relied upon.
• The importation of poultry is regulated by SJVFS 2000:172, SJVFS 2000:173 and SJVFS 2006:79; day-old chicks must originate from a flock that has been isolated for 14 days and must be free from salmonella or have undergone a Commission-approved control programme.
• Under Section 10 of the same regulations, breeding poultry and production poultry must have been kept in approved establishments for more than six weeks and must have undergone an animal health examination within 48 hours before transport.
• Hatcheries are covered by SJVFS 2024:30, which requires hygiene rules drawn up in consultation with a veterinarian, a visitor log, and one-way circulation of hatching eggs and equipment.

Consequences

For producers continuing to use Ross 208, the current position entails no immediate legal sanction, but a politically driven ban proposal may lead to new legislation after the election.

• For organic producers, the 45-gram threshold in Section 8 of SJVFS 2021:47 is binding up to and including 1 January 2032; transition to slow-growing lines is therefore a requirement, not a choice.
• For retailers and consumers, the practical consequence is that Danish or Norwegian chicken may outcompete Swedish chicken if Sweden does not transition, as SLU researcher Jenny Yngvesson points out.
• Procurement requirements imposed by municipalities and regions may be used as a non-legislative tool, including in relation to turbo chickens.
• Direct-payment controls under Act (2009:619) mean that animal welfare non-compliance on farms may have consequences for producers’ support payments, in addition to any interventions by the County Administrative Board.

A person who unlawfully uses another person’s identity data and purports to be that person, thereby causing harm or inconvenience, may be sentenced to a fine or imprisonment for up to two years.

Providers of an AI system that generates deepfakes must disclose that the content is artificially generated, subject to exceptions for satire or artistic works and for law enforcement.

Core issue

The five members of the Riksdag are not facing any legal proceedings; the person or persons who may be prosecuted are those who generated and disseminated the AI-generated image. The immediate legal question is whether an AI-created image depicting identifiable persons in a situation they never experienced is punishable under Swedish law, and whether the EU AI Act imposes transparency obligations on the disseminator. The material contains no information that any notice of suspicion has been served on the image’s creators.

Legal assessment

• The image does not purport to be an act of the members themselves, but it depicts them in a falsified context; the question is therefore whether the AI-generated depiction constitutes “use of identity data” within the meaning of the provision.
• Chapter 4, Section 6 c of the Criminal Code on unlawful invasion of privacy covers dissemination of images concerning sexual life, health status, victimisation by crime, highly vulnerable situations, or nudity; a posed AI image by Lake Mälaren falls outside all the categories specified in the cited passages.
• Chapter 4, Section 6 a of the Criminal Code on intrusive photography concerns images taken in a protected space; an AI-generated image is not a “technical recording” of a real situation, so the provision is not clearly applicable.
• The prohibition in Article 5 of the AI Act on prohibited AI practices does not cover the image at issue: points 1 ba and bb concern sexually explicit content and material under Directive 2011/93/EU, for which the material provides no indication.
• The criminal-law consequences are limited by Chapter 4, Section 11 of the Criminal Code: some of these offences require a complaint and may be prosecuted only if the injured party reports them or if prosecution is called for in the public interest.
• The material contains no case law or precedent concerning AI-generated images of public figures; in Sweden, the freedom-of-expression assessment is governed by the Fundamental Law on Freedom of Expression (1991:1469), whose protection covers publication in periodicals and similar contexts.

Consequences

The realistic course is for the affected members to file a police report, after which an assessment would be made as to unlawful use of identity and whether the prosecution requirement in Chapter 4, Section 11 of the Criminal Code is satisfied.

• Even if criminal liability cannot be established, the transparency obligation under Article 50.4 of the AI Act remains; a disseminator who fails to disclose deepfake content risks regulatory measures under the Regulation’s enforcement system.
• For the four parties and five members depicted, the practical significance lies in documentation and reporting, particularly because the dissemination has been linked to the police investigations concerning electoral fraud in Borlänge and Ilyas Hassan’s personal election campaign.
• The Moderate Party member of the Riksdag and the accounts that shared the image in a negative context are covered only indirectly; dissemination of an existing AI image is assessed under the same provisions, but with a possible assessment of justifiability under the cited paragraphs.
• The next step in the procedure, if the injured parties act, is a police report for unlawful use of identity.