Sweden’s next Speaker will be elected on Monday, and the choice has become the first significant test of whether the four red-green parties can use their new parliamentary majority together. Nominations are due by Sunday afternoon, while both sides are still discussing who should succeed, or possibly re-elect, incumbent Speaker Andreas Norlén.
The decision matters particularly this year because the Speaker will inherit the ongoing process of forming Sweden’s next government. Norlén has already asked Social Democratic Party (Socialdemokraterna) leader Magdalena Andersson to explore the possibility of forming a government, but she will report back to whoever is elected Speaker by the new Riksdag.
The Speaker election is the red-green parties’ first test
The new Riksdag will meet for the first time on Monday 28 September at 11:00. After the roll-call of the 349 MPs, parliament will elect the Speaker and three Deputy Speakers for the 2026-2030 term. The Riksdag has published the full timetable for Monday’s sitting.
The four parties backing Andersson have 176 seats, compared with 173 for the Tidö parties. The Social Democratic Party has 99 MPs, the Left Party (Vänsterpartiet) 30, the Centre Party (Centerpartiet) 25 and the Green Party (Miljöpartiet) 22.
That gives them enough votes to elect a common candidate if they remain united. But according to SVT’s reporting on the Speaker negotiations, the four parties had not yet agreed on a name as of Wednesday. The Tidö parties had not settled on a common candidate either.
The vote will therefore provide an early indication of whether the new parliamentary majority can coordinate before the much more difficult negotiations over the government itself.
The Social Democrats want a new Speaker
The Social Democrats have made clear that they do not want Norlén to remain in the post.
Lena Hallengren, parliamentary group leader for the Social Democrats, told TT that after the election she sees no reason for the Speaker to continue coming from the Moderate Party.
“For me, it is obvious that Andreas Norlén should not remain.”
Norlén, a member of the Moderate Party (Moderaterna), has served as Speaker since 2018. The Social Democrats supported his re-election in 2022, but Hallengren said the new parliamentary balance should now be reflected in the choice of Speaker.
There is no constitutional rule requiring the Speaker to come from the largest party or from the parliamentary majority. Swedish practice has varied over time. The Riksdag notes that the Speaker is expected to become politically impartial once elected, leaving ordinary party-political work and not participating in parliamentary votes or debates.
Morgan Johansson and Anders Ygeman are among the names being discussed
No Social Democratic candidate has yet been formally announced, but several senior figures are being discussed.
According to SVT, one possibility is Morgan Johansson, the former Justice Minister who first entered the Riksdag in 1998 and served in governments led by Göran Persson, Stefan Löfven and Magdalena Andersson.
Another is Anders Ygeman, a former cabinet minister who is now the Riksdag’s ålderspresident, the longest-serving member present. That gives him an unusual role on Monday: until a Speaker has been elected, Ygeman will preside over the Speaker election itself.
Former minister Jennie Nilsson, currently chair of the Committee on the Constitution, and veteran MP Matilda Ernkrans have also been mentioned as possible candidates. For now, however, these remain names under discussion rather than confirmed nominations.
Norlén could still be a compromise candidate
The simplest compromise between the blocs could still be the incumbent Speaker.
SVT reports that Norlén is seen as a candidate around whom several parties could potentially unite, although it is not clear whether he would want to stand against a common candidate backed by the four red-green parties. Nor is support for another Norlén term necessarily unanimous among the Tidö parties.
Norlén has already begun the post-election government process. After Ulf Kristersson resigned as prime minister, he met representatives of the parliamentary parties and on 18 September gave Andersson the task of exploring whether she can form a government tolerated by the Riksdag. The Riksdag confirmed the exploratory mandate on 18 September.
The new Speaker will take over that process immediately after Monday’s election.
Why the Speaker matters so much now
In most parliamentary work, the Speaker is expected to remain above party politics. During the formation of a government, however, the office has considerable procedural influence.
The Speaker consults party leaders, can give a party leader a defined period to explore possible coalitions and ultimately decides which candidate for prime minister is presented to the Riksdag and when. The candidate is approved unless at least 175 MPs vote against.
This is why some Social Democrats quoted anonymously by SVT describe the Speaker as important to the government negotiations. The office can set the timetable and decide when parties have had enough time to negotiate, although the Speaker is constitutionally expected to exercise those powers impartially.
The stakes are particularly high because Andersson’s possible majority contains parties with conflicting positions on the next government. The Centre Party opposes the Left Party entering the cabinet, while the Left Party has demanded government representation. How much time those negotiations are given could therefore matter.
The deadline is Sunday, but candidates can technically emerge later
The Riksdag has set Sunday at 14:00 as the practical deadline for parties to submit nominations, allowing ballot papers with candidates’ names to be prepared in advance. However, nominations can technically still be submitted until the vote itself on Monday.
If there is only one candidate, the Speaker can be elected by acclamation. If several candidates are nominated, MPs can request a secret ballot. A candidate initially needs more than half of the votes; if nobody reaches that threshold after two rounds, a third vote is held between the two leading candidates and the one with the most votes wins.
The formal rules are straightforward. The politics are not.
Monday’s vote will decide who occupies one of Sweden’s most important constitutional offices for the next four years. More immediately, it will show whether the 176 MPs behind the red-green majority can agree on their first common institutional choice, before trying to settle the much harder question of who will govern Sweden.
