Private sewage systems in rural areas

Stop hounding the countryside to fix the municipality's pipes

There is an ongoing, silent witch hunt with no legal certainty against rural residents and holiday home owners in municipalities. Under the guise of ”environmental considerations”, municipal inspectors make five-minute visits and condemn fully functioning private sewage systems based solely on the age of the installation. Subsequently, residents are forced into exorbitantly expensive municipal water and sewerage solutions with mandatory connection fees of up to 400,000 kronor per property. For pensioners and families with children, this is a financial blow that in the worst case leads to the forced sale of their home.

Officials” decision-making data is rarely based on established facts in the form of measurements, but rather on loose guesses. The reports are overflowing with phrases such as ”it can be assumed”, ”it is probable” and ”cannot be ruled out". Is it worthy of a state governed by rule of law to ruin private individuals based on hypothetical risk scenarios?

However, the municipality's own sewage treatment plants overflow millions of litres of untreated sewage directly into our lakes during heavy rain. Yet it is the holiday cottage in the countryside that is portrayed as the environmental villain.

It is not about the environment – it is about money.

Sweden's municipalities have a massive maintenance backlog of approximately SEK 600 billion within the central water and sewage network up to the year 2040. By mandating the connection of rural cabins, current property owners are forced to pay for pipes that are oversized for the municipality's future development plans and growth. Residents are practically forced to give the municipality an interest-free loan to finance an ever-growing municipal administrative apparatus.

Furthermore, this procedure contravenes the law. Parliament tightened the Water Services Act in 2023. The municipality is now obliged to investigate whether residents' needs can be met more cheaply and better through local joint facilities. Yet people are being steamrollered. The Land and Environment Court of Appeal has also established that the municipality may not condemn a sewage system solely on the basis of its age – they must prove an actual, functional defect. Yet the administration is ignoring this.

To our democratically elected politicians on the environmental committees: It is not acceptable to routinely say that ”the documentation is good enough for me” when your decisions crush people's lives and personal finances. You are elected by the citizens, not by the officials. Take control of your administration! Demand that inspectors stop issuing age-based bans, demand real evidence and analytical results instead of subjective guesses. Respect the 2023 law by allowing those who live in the countryside to build their own individual or smart communal solutions.

Mikael Richter

Ambition Sverige

Anneli Kullberg

Ambition Sverige Mark