Sweden can’t agree on a government. It does agree on pouches.

Sweden has been without a new government for seven weeks. On 3 November, the Riksdag votes on a prime minister for the second time.

In six days, EU finance ministers vote on a tax that would hit nicotine pouches across Europe. And Sweden, deadlocked at home, is the one country standing in the way.

Here’s why.

A country without a government

Swedes voted on 13 September. Since 17 September, Ulf Kristersson has been running a caretaker government while the parties try to agree on a new one.

The first attempt failed in October, when Magdalena Andersson (S) lost a vote in the Riksdag. Now Centre Party leader Elisabeth Thand Ringqvist faces the same test, and she’s widely expected to fall. If she does, Kristersson gets the next try.

The Speaker has made the stakes clear. If a fourth vote fails, Sweden goes to a snap election.

A country that agrees on one thing

Swedish parties can’t agree on who should govern. But on nicotine pouches, they sound remarkably alike.

When eight EU health ministers asked EU Health Commissioner Varhelyi for the right to ban pouches in October, Swedish MEPs from four parties pushed back within days. The Moderates. The Social Democrats. The Sweden Democrats. The Christian Democrats. Government and opposition, left and right.

Food workers’ union Livs, which represents the people who make snus, joined in, asking the government to look into what the demands could mean for Swedish jobs.

Politics in Sweden is deadlocked. On this, it isn’t.

Why Sweden cares so much

The answer is in the numbers. According to CAN, Sweden’s alcohol and drug research body, just 3.7% of Swedes smoked daily in 2025. That’s the lowest smoking rate in the EU.

Swedes have had smoke-free alternatives for a long time, first snus and now pouches. Swedish politicians see them as part of how the country got there, and they don’t want Brussels to undo it.

The veto

That’s where the EU tax comes in.

The Irish presidency of the EU Council wants agreement on 9 November on a tax package that includes the first EU-wide minimum tax on pouches. The latest draft already cut the final rate to €50 per kilo, down from €80. That’s still almost three times the roughly €18 Sweden charges today.

Tax rules need every member state to agree. Sweden blocked an earlier attempt this summer, and an EU official says it’s set to oppose the package again. Its argument: countries should be able to tax nicotine products according to their risk.

Back in June, Finance Minister Elisabeth Svantesson put it more bluntly: “We’re going to stop the EU raising the tax on snuff!” She’s still finance minister in the caretaker government.

A caretaker government can still speak for Sweden in Brussels. And it doesn’t need a new prime minister to keep its veto.

What happens next

In Stockholm, the Riksdag decides whether Sweden moves closer to a government or closer to a snap election. In Brussels, EU finance ministers decide whether to tax the smoke-free alternative almost three times higher than the country with the lowest smoking rate in the EU.

Sweden can’t agree on who should lead it. But it knows what works on smoking. The rest of the EU should be listening.