Migration Agency explains why it overruled police on detained foreign workers

Swedish police raided SSAB's steelworks in Oxelösund on 7 October with seven government agencies and detained 19 Filipino electrical engineers, believing a three-country staffing arrangement, a Dutch company leasing them to an Italian firm that posted them to Sweden, was designed to dodge Swedish labour rules. The Migration Agency overruled the police: official Sara Isman said the structure was legal under exceptions in the EU's Posted Workers Directive, provided conditions on employment, housing and insurance in the Netherlands were met, and called the rules “very complicated.” Police said they “do not share that assessment,” though Isman said officers had acted “with good intentions to ensure that people aren't exploited.”

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