Legal prism — 2026-11-01

Correction. The article claims that "the current rules make it possible to prolong rent negotiations without any real consequences". This is incomplete: the underlying material shows that the Act on Rent Negotiations contains concrete legal effects — the right of action may be lost if a claim is not referred in due time, the Rent Tribunal's decision may be appealed only within a strict three-week period under Section 31, and the arbitration procedure under Section 23 a is already a statutory route for resolving deadlocked negotiations. Moreover, the reference to the Land Code shows that delayed negotiations can have direct financial consequences upon renewal: if no renewal is agreed, the tenant is entitled to compensation under Chapter 12, Section 58 b of the Land Code. A more precise formulation would be that the system lacks effective incentives for prompt agreement during the negotiation phase, but that statutory time limits, rules on loss of the right of action and entitlements to compensation already exist which limit — though do not eliminate — the effects of late decisions.

Under Section 24 of the Act on Negotiations Concerning Rents, both landlord and tenant have the right to apply to the Rent Tribunal for a change of the rent terms where negotiations under the negotiating agreement have been concluded without agreement.

Decisions of the Rent Tribunal under the Act may be appealed to the Svea Court of Appeal within three weeks pursuant to Section 31 of the Act on Negotiations Concerning Rents.

Core issue

When the parties under the negotiating agreement fail to reach agreement, tenants in Värmland face not a legal vacuum but a review before the Rent Tribunal or, in certain cases, an arbitrator. The news item is an opinion piece by Fastighetsägarna Värmland; the legal position is governed by the Act on Negotiations Concerning Rents (1978:304) and the Act (1973:188) on Tenancy Boards and Rent Tribunals. The precise legal question is which routes to a binding rent determination are opened once negotiations have been concluded without result.

• The same right applies where negotiations have been obstructed for reasons not attributable to the party requesting the change or that party's organisation.
• Matters under the Act are examined by the Rent Tribunal under Section 30 of the Act on Negotiations Concerning Rents; the organisations are not parties in such cases.
• Under Section 11 a of the Act (1973:188), the Rent Tribunal may not, in a rent dispute, consider the landlord's claim for a higher rent unless negotiations under the negotiating agreement have taken place concerning the matter in dispute.

Legal assessment

The statutory framework imposes no time limit on the negotiations themselves – and that is the core of the opinion piece. The application is as follows:

• Under Section 5 of the Act on Negotiations Concerning Rents, the landlord is obliged, on its own initiative, to negotiate rent increases that do not concern optional additions and do not exceed the price recommended in the negotiating agreement, and – pursuant to the system of Chapter 3, Section 14 of the same Act – to negotiate concerning the rent terms, the condition of the building and common facilities.
• Once negotiations have concluded, the Rent Tribunal examines the dispute; the procedure is governed by the Act (1973:188), under which the Tribunal may impose a fine for failure to appear and, in similar mass disputes, may decide the remaining cases without a hearing after examined test cases.
• Alternatively, the dispute may be referred to an arbitrator; in proceedings before the arbitrator, the Act (2022:1657) on dispute resolution within the framework of certain collective rent negotiations applies pursuant to Section 23 c of the Act on Negotiations Concerning Rents.
• The material contains no case law, so no specific judgments can be cited. The article's proposals – a statutory right for landlords to refer disputes to an arbitrator without a separate agreement, a limited negotiating period and simplified procedure – are calls for legislation, not current law. Today, the parties must therefore reach the Tribunal or an arbitrator through the existing channels.

Consequences

For tenants: continued uncertainty as to which rent applies, with a risk of retroactive increases once the Tribunal or arbitrator finally rules.

• For property owners: unclear revenue for large parts of the year, which, according to the article, complicates planning of operations, maintenance and investments.
• For the parties jointly: the next real step is for one of them to apply to the Rent Tribunal under Section 24, or for the parties to refer the matter to an arbitrator.
• For the parliamentary parties: the article is a call to reform the legislation on dispute resolution in collective rent negotiations.

According to KO's argumentation, the conditional fine may be set at a level commensurate with the company's financial scale — lottery revenues amounted to just over SEK 3.5 billion in 2025.

The Patent and Market Court attached an interim conditional fine totalling SEK 3.5 million to its decision.

Core issue

Postkodlotteriet now awaits a main hearing before the Patent and Market Court, where the risk is a prohibition of the Instagram advertisement in question combined with a conditional fine (injunction penalty). According to the Swedish Consumer Agency's (KO) argumentation, the penalty may be set at a level commensurate with the company's financial scale — lottery revenues amounted to just over SEK 3.5 billion in 2025. The legal question is whether an advertising film featuring falling money, gold-coloured winning text announcing SEK 101 million, and a time-limited half-price offer violates the moderation requirement in Chapter 15, Section 1 of the Gambling Act (2018:1138). In addition, the Swedish Consumer Agency's general guidelines KOVFS 2025:2 apply, which require factual and balanced marketing and prohibit encouraging messages and intrusive design.

Legal assessment

KO bases its case on an overall assessment of the film, which is the method prescribed by KOVFS 2025:2, Section 2.1: the presentation, the content, and the design in the chosen medium must all be weighed together.

• KO's first objection is that the film portrays the lottery as socially attractive, something everyone ought to take part in.
• The second objection concerns time pressure: the half-price offer with a final purchase date is intended to create the impression of urgency.
• KOVFS 2025:2, Section 2.2.2, provides that marketing should not contain encouraging messages that prompt an unconsidered decision to gamble.
• Section 2.2.1.1 does not permit design that gives the impression that the chances of winning are greater than they are, for example that it is easy to win large sums.
• According to the news report, the Gambling Act requires that information be limited to facts about the lottery and presented as factually as possible.

According to the news report, this demonstrates that the court is willing to impose substantial conditional fines at KO's request, although the amount in the present case has not been publicly disclosed. On the political front, in autumn 2022 the Riksdag rejected the Government's proposal for an adjusted moderation requirement in the bill "A Strengthened Gambling Regulation" (En förstärkt spelreglering), on the grounds that case law was in the process of becoming established.

Consequences

An adverse ruling would first affect Postkodlotteriet in the form of a prohibition of the film and, if KO's claim is granted, a conditional fine of a size adapted to the product's revenues.

• For licence holders in the gambling industry, a judgment would establish what moderation means in social media — formats that are short, visual, and algorithmically distributed.
• The Swedish Consumer Agency's 2025 general guidelines are merely advisory; a judgment carries greater weight and can guide both authorities and marketers.
• As the news report notes, marketing cases can have an impact far beyond the individual advertiser, similar to the sanctioning of a law firm for misleading location-based advertisements.
• If the court acquits, the gap in case law concerning social media will remain — a gap that the Riksdag in 2022 expressly left to the courts to fill.

Correction. The news report presents the rule as if the tenant in all circumstances acquires "the same rights" against the property owner where the legal relationship has been used to circumvent tenancy legislation, but the underlying material shows that the first paragraph is not unconditional: it does not apply either if the property owner has taken reasonable measures to prevent the sublease from conflicting with the provisions on block tenancies. The article fails to mention this exception, which creates the impression that a community of interest alone always triggers the tenant's direct rights against the property owner. A more precise formulation would be that the tenant's strengthened position comes into play where circumvention is established, but that in block tenancy cases the property owner may extricate itself by demonstrating that reasonable preventive measures have been taken – something which in this case was evidently neither negotiated nor successfully invoked.

In the event of such circumvention, the tenant has the same right vis-à-vis Ibrahimovic and Seger as if they had let the premises directly to him.

The tenant may remain in the premises with the same rights as a first-hand tenant, including protection against termination under Chapter 12 of the Land Code.

Core issue

The tenant now stands as the winner: since the Supreme Court has refused leave to appeal, the Court of Appeal's judgment has acquired final legal force, and Ibrahimovic/Seger can no longer bring about any changed outcome in the case. The decisive point is that the courts found a straw-man-like arrangement – i.e., that the legal relationship with a rental company had been exploited in order to circumvent the tenant's security of tenure and right to a reasonable rent. The precise legal question was whether the tenant, whose contract had been terminated by the property owners through the intermediary, may invoke the same rights against them as a first-hand tenant. This is governed by Chapter 12 of the Land Code (jordabalken) and its protective provisions in favour of the tenant, applied through the principle that legislation may not be circumvented.

Legal assessment

The Stockholm District Court found that "it may be assumed that the legal relationship has been exploited in order to circumvent provisions of the rent legislation that are favourable to N.N."

• The Court of Appeal shared this assessment and found a community of interest between the couple and the rental company vis-à-vis the tenant.
• The tenant relied on case law holding that the payment of an over-rent may indicate a straw-man arrangement.
• The tenant invoked Supreme Court case law on straw-man relationships.

Consequences

• The couple cannot terminate the agreement without, going forward, complying with the conditions applicable to a direct first-hand tenant.
• The question of whether the over-rent paid may be refunded was not examined in this case, but the tenant has asserted that an over-rent was paid under the arrangement.
• For the market, the outcome signals that letting through an intermediary with a community of interest with the property owner cannot be used to circumvent the tenant's security of tenure.

Advocacy communication within the meaning of the Act means that a natural or legal person has contact with a political decision-maker or a member of a political decision-maker's staff, for the purpose of influencing the preparation or decision in a matter before the Riksdag or the Government.

Core issue

Lobbyists will be subject to a registration and reporting obligation with the Swedish Legal, Financial and Administrative Services Agency (Kammarkollegiet) as of 1 July 2027, under the Act (2026:1459) on Transparency in Communication Aimed at Influencing Political Decisions. The question to be determined is which contacts are covered, and it is the definition of advocacy communication in Section 2 of the Act that governs its scope. Under Section 2, the obligation covers contact with a political decision-maker or the decision-maker's staff for the purpose of influencing the preparation or decision in a matter before the Riksdag or the Government, in order to promote a particular interest or outcome. Providing advice or support, on assignment, to a person who has or intends to have such contact is also deemed advocacy communication.

• Political decision-makers within the meaning of Section 3 are Members of the Riksdag and Ministers.
• Staff within the meaning of Section 3 include, inter alia, political secretaries, employees of the Riksdag Administration, State Secretaries, political advisers, and special investigators and committee members appointed by the Government.
• The Act enters into force on 1 July 2027 pursuant to its entry-into-force provisions. The register will be limited: contacts concerning party-political strategy prior to the formal process, such as agreements of the type of the Tidö Agreement, are not covered. The Green Party's criticism calling for a more comprehensive register did not gain support in the Riksdag.

Legal assessment

Under Section 4, the registered party must apply for registration, and the reporting obligation follows from Section 8.

• Under Section 9, the report must contain the subjects of the advocacy communication and, for each subject, the names of the political decision-makers contacted or information on the ministry, unit or committee of the staff contacted, as well as the principal means of contact and the approximate extent of the contact.
• If the communication was carried out on behalf of another party, this must be stated, together with information on the principal.
• A person who has only provided advice or support to another need not provide this information.
• If no advocacy communication has been conducted during the period, this too must be reported under Section 10. Certain exceptions apply under Section 4: customary contacts within the framework of administrative matters, and participation in working groups or inquiries appointed by the Government where the participation is documented and made publicly available. Contacts with political parties holding a mandate and with intergovernmental organisations within diplomatic relations, among others, are likewise not covered. Kammarkollegiet serves as both the registration authority and the supervisory authority. The material contains no case law on the Act, which has not yet entered into force.

Consequences

Tobacco lobbyists and other interest organisations must, from July 2027, register and comply with the quarterly reporting deadlines, failing which they risk supervision by Kammarkollegiet.

• Organisations such as Tobaksfakta obtain a tool for tracking which Members of the Riksdag and Ministers are contacted in tobacco-related matters, but not party-political negotiations.
• Members of the Riksdag, Ministers and their staff become identifiable in the reports when they have received advocacy communication.
• Companies and consultants providing advice on assignment are covered and must report their principals.
• Next step: the Act applies from 1 July 2027; what regulations Kammarkollegiet will issue regarding the registration procedure before then is not apparent from the material.