# Kerstin Lundgren

# Kerstin Lundgren

**Kerstin Margareta Lundgren** (born 14 January 1955 in Lugnvik, Kramfors) is a Swedish politician of the Centre Party. She has represented Stockholm County in the Riksdag since 30 September 2002, in a mandate running to 23 September 2030, and has been Third Deputy Speaker of the Riksdag since 24 September 2018. Since 2006 she has been the Centre Party’s foreign-policy spokesperson and a member of the Committee on [Foreign Affairs](/organizations/foreign-affairs).

Her parents were the police officer John Lundgren and Ester Lundgren, née Magnusson. She received a bachelor’s degree in political science from Uppsala University in 1978 and also studied at Umeå University. She lives in Södertälje and has two adult daughters.

Before parliament she was group secretary for the Centre Party in Södertälje from 1978 to 1980, political secretary at Stockholm County Council from 1980 to 1987, and press secretary to the national party leadership from 1987 to 1991. She later worked as a political adviser at the Ministry of the Environment, as the party’s local-government secretary and as secretary of Centre Women, and from 2001 as an investigator at the Swedish Association of Local Authorities and Regions, on leave of absence after her election to the Riksdag. She was a member of Södertälje municipal council from 1982 to 2010, chaired the Centre Party in Stockholm County from 2001 to 2011, and sat on the party’s national board from 2004 to 2011.

In her first term she sat on the Committee on the Constitution. From 2006 to 2018 she served on the Swedish delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the [Council of Europe](/organizations/council-of-europe), for part of that time as a full member and later as a substitute, and held office in the assembly’s [Alliance of Liberals and Democrats](/organizations/alliance-of-liberals-and-democrats) for Europe group. On 24 September 2018 a secret ballot elected her Third Deputy Speaker by 272 votes to 69 for [Björn Söder](/people/bjorn-soder) of the [Sweden Democrats](/organizations/sweden-democrats), with seven blank ballots. After the 2026 general election she was returned to the post in a secret ballot against Håkan Svenneling of the Left Party, with support from the [Social Democrats](/organizations/social-democrats). She is a member of the Riksdag delegation to the [NATO Parliamentary Assembly](/organizations/nato-parliamentary-assembly) and chairs the Riksdag steering group for bilateral democratic development cooperation.

## Early life and education

### Childhood and family

Kerstin Margareta Lundgren was born on 14 January 1955 in Lugnvik, in Kramfors Municipality. Statistics Sweden places that municipality in Västernorrland County. The municipal site describes Kramfors as lying in the High Coast, in the Ångermanland river district, and lists boating on the Ångermanälven among local activities.

The biography in the Riksdag publication *Fakta om folkvalda* is information the member has supplied. It names her parents as the police officer John Lundgren and Ester Lundgren, née Magnusson. The same note, and the CVs the Riksdag publishes, do not name a spouse and do not record which schools she attended in the Kramfors area or later. A local sports club in Lugnvik, founded in 1923, has described the village’s former school building as a community centre, but nothing in the public record ties Lundgren to that school or to any other named school.

She lives in Södertälje, in Stockholm County. The Riksdag CV states that she was born in 1955, lives in Södertälje and has two grown-up daughters, who are not named. The parliament’s open-data register gives the same birth year and lists her title as *utredare* (inquiry officer or analyst). The first dated post in the member-supplied biography is group secretary to the Centre Party group in Södertälje from 1978 to 1980, the year she took her degree. That is the earliest published point at which she is placed in the Stockholm region rather than in Västernorrland; the profiles do not describe the move itself.

### University studies

*Fakta om folkvalda* records a *filosofie kandidatexamen* (*fil.kand.*) from Uppsala University in 1978. A shorter résumé issued by the Riksdag specifies that the degree was in political science (*statsvetenskap*). The political news site Altinget lists the same qualification, a *fil.kand.* in political science from Uppsala. In Swedish usage the *fil.kand.* is the bachelor-level degree in the humanities and social sciences; the Riksdag materials do not set out her course list, thesis or grades.

The longer parliamentary CV describes her as a political scientist with an international focus who studied at Uppsala and at Umeå University. It does not say which courses were taken at Umeå, or whether they formed part of the Uppsala degree or stood apart from it. The résumé, which mentions only Uppsala for the *fil.kand.*, adds that she is particularly interested in international relations, security policy, constitutional questions and climate policy.

Uppsala’s Department of Political Science is built around the Skyttean professorship in eloquence and political science, endowed on 1 October 1622 by Johan Skytte and described by the university as the oldest continuously existing professorship in the subject. Umeå’s department was established in 1965, among the first at the new university, with three teachers and with Per-Erik Back, who had taken his doctorate at Lund, as professor. During the 1970s it expanded its teaching and developed research on local and regional politics, comparative politics, parties, and policy and implementation. Lundgren’s published biographies do not name teachers, programmes or student organisations at either university. By 1978 she had moved from study into [Centre Party](/organizations/centre-party) employment in Södertälje.

## Local politics and party staff

### Södertälje

Lundgren has long lived in Södertälje Municipality, in Stockholm County, and her early public roles were in the local Centre Party. In 2018 she described the municipal school board as her first assignment of trust. She was a member of that board from 1980 to 1988 and its second vice chair from 1986 to 1988. From 1982 to 2010 she was a member of the municipal council. From 1989 to 1991 she chaired the district committee for Brunnsäng-Grusåsen, a sub-municipal board. She stayed on the council after entering the Riksdag in 2002 and, from 2003 to 2006, sat on the urban planning board.

The municipal executive board is required by the Local Government Act to lead and coordinate the administration of the municipality's affairs and to oversee the other committees. How long Lundgren served on Södertälje's board is not the same in the two Riksdag accounts. The biography she submitted to *Fakta om folkvalda*, and which the Riksdag publishes on her member page, gives 1995–2002. The shorter curriculum vitae gives 1988–2002. Both end the assignment in 2002, the year she became a member of parliament.

Before those elected posts she was employed, in 1978–1980, as group secretary of the local Centre organization, Södertäljecentern. The curriculum vitae instead records the employer as Södertälje Municipality.

### County and national party roles

From 1980 to 1987 she was a political secretary at Stockholm County Council (Stockholms läns landsting). The curriculum vitae describes the same employment as county secretary and first secretary of the county council. In 1989–1991 she was a substitute member of the county council and a member of its gender-equality committee.

At national level she was press secretary to the Centre Party leadership from 1987 to 1991. The member-submitted biography adds a separate post as information secretary in 1991, which the curriculum vitae does not list. She was afterwards the party's local-government secretary (*kommunalsekreterare*), a staff appointment rather than an elected municipal seat: 1995–1999 in the biography and 1994–1999 in the curriculum vitae.

The curriculum vitae, and a short résumé issued by the Riksdag, record her as district chair of the Centre Party in Stockholm County from 2001 to 2011 and as a member of the national party board from 2004 to 2011. The résumé sums up those periods as ten years as chair of the party in the Stockholm region and seven years on the party board. Neither office is included in the *Fakta om folkvalda* biography.

### Government and association work

In the government of Prime Minister [Carl Bildt](/people/carl-bildt), *Sveriges statskalender* lists her as a political adviser (*politiskt sakkunnig*) at the Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources, then the environment ministry. The editions for 1993 and 1994 place Kerstin Margareta Lundgren, born in 1955, among those advisers and give 1991 as the year of appointment. The minister and head of the ministry in both volumes was [Olof Johansson](/people/olof-johansson). The ministry's information secretaries in the same lists were other officials. Her biography instead dates the adviser post to 1992–1994 and reserves 1991 for the information-secretary role; the curriculum vitae gives 1991–1994 at the ministry and does not mention an information-secretary title. Both later accounts end the government post in 1994.

She was then federation secretary of Centerkvinnorna, the Centre Party's women's organization. The biography dates that employment to 2000–2001 and the curriculum vitae to 1999–2001.

From 2001 to 2018 she was an investigator at the national association of municipalities and county councils. The curriculum vitae adds that she was on leave from 2002, when she took her seat in the Riksdag, and her member page still lists her title as *utredare*. The biography names the employer Sveriges Kommuner och Landsting; the curriculum vitae uses Sveriges Kommuner och Regioner. The association's statutes were adopted on 27 October 2004 by extraordinary congresses of Svenska Kommunförbundet and Landstingsförbundet. Congresses held under the name Sveriges Kommuner och Landsting revised them, and the name Sveriges Kommuner och Regioner was in use by the ordinary congress of 27 November 2019, after the employment recorded for Lundgren had ended. The 2001 start therefore falls before the joint body existed under either later name.

## Member of the Riksdag

### Constituency and terms

Kerstin Lundgren has been an ordinary member of the Riksdag for the Centre Party since 30 September 2002, for the Stockholm County constituency (Stockholms läns valkrets). The register records uninterrupted terms opening on 30 September 2002, 2 October 2006, 4 October 2010, 29 September 2014, 24 September 2018, 26 September 2022 and 28 September 2026 — the 2002 to 2026 electoral periods — the last running to 23 September 2030. The member page gives her title as analyst (utredare).

The chamber’s 349 places are fixed by constituency rather than by party. Her place number was 61, 143, 83 and 53 across the four terms from 2002 to 2018; from 2018, when the register also lists her as Third Deputy Speaker, it has been 3. The 2026/27 seating plan lists “Lundgren, Kerstin (C), 3” for Stockholm County and marks places 1–3 as the deputy speakers’ seats, to the left of the Speaker’s rostrum.

### Committee on the Constitution

She was a full member of the Committee on the Constitution (konstitutionsutskottet) from 8 October 2002 to 2 October 2006 and a deputy from 10 October 2006 to 4 October 2010. The committee examines whether ministers have followed the rules for government work, and it handles the fundamental laws, broadcasting and press support. Each of the 15 committees has an odd number of members, at least 15 and currently 17, plus substitutes; the Nominations Committee, chosen at the new Riksdag’s roll-call, proposes the slate after each election.

On 1 November 2004 she joined the Grundlagsutredningen (Ju 2004:11), the parliamentary review of the Instrument of Government, and on 17 December 2008 she signed its report, SOU 2008:125, *En reformerad grundlag*. Her Riksdag biography records the post as the Grundlagskommittén, 2004–2008. A deputy spell from 18 March to 3 September 2020 was an extra substitute place created during the [COVID-19 pandemic](/drivers/covid-19-pandemic).

### Foreign affairs and other committees

From 10 October 2006 she was an ordinary member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs through five electoral periods, most recently 4 October 2022 to 28 September 2026. It prepares the chamber’s decisions on Sweden’s foreign relations, deployments abroad and aid. In early October 2026 it was not a current assignment, and the register had no Foreign Affairs seat for the term that opened on 28 September 2026.

She was a deputy on the Committee on Defence, which handles military and civil defence and crisis preparedness, from 12 October 2010 to 29 September 2014, 7 October 2014 to 24 September 2018, and 12 October 2022 to 28 September 2026. On the Committee on European Union Affairs, which gives the government a mandate for Council negotiations rather than preparing chamber decisions, she was a deputy from 29 November 2006 to 12 October 2010, 19 October 2010 to 7 October 2014 and 14 October 2014 to 2 October 2018, and again from 12 October 2022. The open-data record ends that appointment on 6 October 2026; the member page in early October 2026 still listed it as current, without an end date.

Two or more committees may sit as a temporary joint committee; the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defence is the standing example. She was a member of the Joint Committee on the Constitution and Foreign Affairs from 18 February to 20 November 2003 and from 27 March 2007 to 6 May 2009, and the register shows many short member or deputy spells on the foreign-affairs and defence joint committee from 10 October 2006 to 4 June 2026. From 10 October 2006 to 7 October 2014 she was a deputy on the Advisory Council on Foreign Affairs (Utrikesnämnden), where the government consults the Riksdag, under the King’s chairmanship, before major foreign-policy decisions.

The War Delegation, the Speaker plus 50 members chosen for the electoral period, can replace the Riksdag if Sweden is at war or in danger of war. Lundgren was a member from 9 October 2018 to 9 October 2022 and from 11 October to 8 December 2022, then third deputy chair from 8 December 2022. The open-data record carries that chair appointment to 13 October 2026, and the member page still listed it as current. She sat on the Nominations Committee from 2 October 2006 to 24 September 2018, and on the Election Review Board as a member from 10 December 2002 to 5 April 2011 and as a deputy until 18 February 2015. The board, whose chair must be or have been a judge, hears appeals against general elections and national referendums; its decisions cannot be appealed.

In March 2020, with chamber votes limited to 55 members, the Riksdag added more than 300 substitute places. Lundgren’s deputy entries of 18 March 2020 are those places, including European Union Affairs until 4 October 2022 and Transport and Communications, where she had also been a deputy from 15 October 2002 to 2 October 2006. Extra substitutes on the constitution, foreign-affairs and defence committees were released in early September 2020 over classified material; her entries there end on 3 September 2020, and the other extra places lasted until 26 September 2022.

## Foreign policy

### Russia, Ukraine and European security

As the Centre Party’s foreign-policy spokesperson since 2006, and a member of the Riksdag’s Committee on Foreign Affairs in the same years, Kerstin Lundgren has treated Russian policy toward its neighbours as a break with the European security order. At the party congress in Falun on 25 September 2015, delegates voted 273–157 to work for Swedish membership of NATO, preferably with Finland and on the basis of broad political consensus. Lundgren told them that the old line had become “a security-policy risk” for Sweden and its neighbours, and called for membership “without nuclear weapons or stationary foreign troops on Swedish territory.” MP Håkan Larsson warned of a split, and 166 delegates had wanted further study. The [Moderate Party](/organizations/moderate-party) and the Liberals already favoured membership; the Social Democrats, [the Greens](/organizations/the-greens), the Left Party and the Sweden Democrats did not.

In January 2018 she and defence spokesperson Daniel Bäckström wrote that “it is not NATO but Putin’s Russia that is the problem,” citing nuclear forces and Iskander missiles in Kaliningrad, and said Sweden should apply “as soon as possible” rather than rely on the UN nuclear-weapon ban. The next month she asked why Sweden should only hope for help from the European Union and northern neighbours. Foreign Minister [Margot Wallström](/people/margot-wallstrom) answered that military non-alignment contributed to stability in northern Europe. After five parties backed a Finnish-style NATO option in December 2020, Lundgren said it had to appear in the foreign-policy declaration.

On 16 February 2022, eight days before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, she asked Foreign Minister [Ann Linde](/people/ann-linde) where any deal on non-alignment stood, called Russian threats contrary to the European security order, and asked about sanctions and defence materiel. Linde said the line remained. Lundgren linked the crisis to the 2008 war in Georgia and argued for nuclear cuts through the [Non-Proliferation Treaty](/facts/treaty-on-the-non-proliferation-of-nuclear-weapons), not a ban that could leave Russia or North Korea armed. In the 10 June 2022 debate she said reluctance to “provoke” Russia had encouraged the war, that the party had changed course after 2014, and that Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova should get EU candidate status. The same sitting recorded Swedish and Finnish applications lodged with NATO on 18 May. Sweden became NATO’s 32nd member on 7 March 2024.

On aid she argued that Sweden lagged its neighbours. In April 2022 she called the expulsion of only three Russian diplomats “weak”; party leader Annie Lööf said identified Russian and Belarusian intelligence officers should go at once. In February 2024 she proposed borrowing about 1 per cent of GDP, roughly 65 billion kronor, for a Ukraine fund through 2026. Foreign Minister Tobias Billström preferred an EU scheme; Social Democrat Morgan Johansson rejected special borrowing. Europaportalen, citing the Kiel Institute, put Sweden’s national support to 31 October 2023 at about 0.47 per cent of GDP, below Denmark, Norway and Finland. In January 2025, with Martin Ådahl and Mikael Larsson, she called for at least 75 billion kronor a year, including paid donations of JAS 39 Gripen aircraft, rather than waiting on [Donald Trump](/people/mig-donald-trump). In June 2026 she backed a tribunal for the crime of aggression, noting that an International Criminal Court warrant for [Vladimir Putin](/people/vladimir-putin) did not cover that crime.

### China and the Indo-Pacific

Lundgren has described China under [Xi Jinping](/people/env-person-xi-jinping) as using trade and party control to rewrite rules rather than adopt them. Before the EU–China summit of 9 April 2019 she wrote that strategic investments were meant to tie other countries to Chinese choices, that social-credit pilots and a security law requiring citizens to support the security services erased lines between civilian, military and private activity, and that the EU had to insist on transparency instead of letting members “become the Communist Party’s vassals.”

On individual cases she has wanted public, coordinated pressure. In March 2017, about 500 days after [Gui Minhai](/people/gui-minhai) was abducted from Thailand, she said Sweden and the EU should “show that we do not tolerate Swedish citizens being held without trial.” Other opposition spokespeople agreed; Moderate [Karin Enström](/people/karin-enstrom) defended quiet diplomacy. In July 2020, with Liberal Fredrik Malm and Nordic colleagues, she wrote that the national-security law for Hong Kong abolished democracy there. The piece also cited a million Uyghurs in “re-education camps” in Xinjiang, Tibet, pressure after a Swedish PEN prize for Gui Minhai, and Huawei’s 5G bids. In April 2022, on a parliamentary visit to Taiwan, she proposed renaming Sweden’s Taipei trade office the “House of Sweden.” A committee majority backed the motion, she said, and Sweden could interpret its “one China” policy for itself; the government still had the final say.

### The European Union and the Nordic-Baltic region

She has treated NATO, the EU and Nordic–Baltic cooperation as one line. At Falun she called for “a strong, united Nordic NATO line.” In February 2017, before Wallström met [Sergey Lavrov](/people/sergey-lavrov), she urged sanctions until Ukraine controlled its recognised borders and rejected an order built on aggression “around the Baltic Sea.” Credibility, she wrote, required Nordic–Baltic cooperation, an EU able to act beside NATO, and Swedish membership; weakening NATO, she said, did “President Putin’s bidding.” During Sweden’s 2018 chairmanship of Nordic (N5) and Nordic–Baltic (NB8) talks, she and Bäckström wrote that dialogue on tourism or the environment was not an answer to Russian policy.

In the Riksdag she has called the EU Sweden’s main foreign-policy arena and challenged the Sweden Democrats’ ranking of the Nordics, the Baltic Sea and the Arctic ahead of it, including on unanimity in the Foreign Affairs Council and the rule of law in Poland and Hungary. On enlargement she has argued for merit, not a shortcut. In Skopje on 2 October 2023 she said it was “not a question of if, but when and how,” that Ukraine and Moldova had created momentum, and that North Macedonia should advance on the rule of law without Sweden entering its constitutional debate. In June 2022 she asked the Moderates to back candidate status for Ukraine, Georgia and Moldova before the [European Council](/organizations/european-council).

## International parliamentary work

### Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe

The Riksdag appointed Lundgren to Sweden’s delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe as a member from 1 November 2006 to 31 October 2010 and as a deputy member from 1 November 2010 to 31 October 2018. The Assembly’s record lists her as a representative of Sweden from 22 January 2007 to 12 November 2010 and as a substitute from 12 November 2010 to 20 January 2019. She sat in the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe group. The Riksdag’s English curriculum vitae calls her a vice-president of that group’s bureau from 2006 to 2018; the Assembly’s member page dates the vice-chairpersonship from 12 November 2010 to 20 January 2019.

A profile captured in January 2014 lists her on the Monitoring Committee and as second vice-chairperson of the Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy. Profiles from May 2017 and January 2018 also list her on the Committee on Legal Affairs and Human Rights, as vice-chairperson of the Sub-Committee on the Middle East and the Arab World, and as co-rapporteur on Georgia in the sub-committee on conflicts between member states. On 25 January 2018 that Middle East sub-committee elected her chairperson by acclamation, with Phil Wilson (United Kingdom) as vice-chairperson.

For the political-affairs committee she wrote “The impact of the [Lisbon Treaty](/facts/treaty-of-lisbon) on the Council of Europe” (Doc. 12713, 16 September 2011). Resolution 1836 (2011), adopted on 5 October 2011, welcomed the treaty’s entry into force on 1 December 2009, including the European Union’s obligation to accede to the [European Convention on Human Rights](/facts/european-convention-on-human-rights), and called for a partnership that would not duplicate the Council of Europe’s monitoring. A follow-up of 17 December 2014, on the 2007 memorandum of understanding between the two organisations, became Resolution 2029 (2014) and Recommendation 2060 (2014) and again urged that EU accession to the Convention be completed.

In 2013 she was the Monitoring Committee’s rapporteur on a request to open a monitoring procedure for Hungary (Doc. 13229). Resolution 1941 (2013), adopted on 25 June 2013, recorded concerns about checks and balances, noted that the Assembly’s Bureau opposed opening a procedure, and decided not to open one, while resolving to follow the situation and the Venice Commission’s dialogue with the [Hungarian government](/organizations/hungarian-government).

With Boriss Cilevičs (Latvia, Socialist Group) she was co-rapporteur on Georgia’s honouring of its obligations. Their note on a visit to Tbilisi on 12–14 October 2015 calls that visit the first after her appointment; it covered judicial, police and security-service reform, elections, the Rustavi 2 ownership dispute, and relations with South Ossetia and Abkhazia. They visited again on 3–5 May 2016. On 20–22 November 2017 her co-rapporteur was Titus Corlățean (Romania). Their statement welcomed constitutional changes, regretted the postponement of fully proportional elections, called for parliamentary oversight of the security services, and raised the abduction of the journalist Afgan Mukhtarli. She left the Assembly on 20 January 2019, and the co-rapporteur role did not continue after that.

### NATO Parliamentary Assembly

The Riksdag has listed Lundgren as a member of its delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly since 26 October 2022. At the Political Committee in Madrid in November 2022 she was recorded with Sweden’s associate delegation, alongside Hans Wallmark. Her member page gives the codes GSM, PC and PC/NP: the Mediterranean and Middle East Special Group, the Political Committee and its Sub-Committee on NATO Partnerships. The Political Committee’s remit, as the Assembly describes it, covers NATO’s political role, the transatlantic relationship and the alliance’s partnerships.

Sweden joined NATO in March 2024, after which the delegation sat as full members. At the spring session in Sofia, Bulgaria, on 24–27 May 2024, Lundgren spoke on behalf of the Speaker; the Swedish participants were Hans Wallmark, Håkan Svenneling, Lundgren and Joar Forssell. On 25–26 September 2024 the delegation hosted the Assembly’s Defence and Security Committee. Lundgren held a seminar in the Riksdag on 25 September; the visit also included the Berga and Muskö naval bases, Saab’s headquarters and the air force in Uppsala.

### Observation missions and other forums

[For Georgia](/organizations/for-georgia)’s parliamentary elections on 26 October 2024 the Riksdag named Lundgren among ten Swedish members of a joint mission of about 100 parliamentarians from the [Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights](/organizations/office-for-democratic-institutions-and-human-rights), the Parliamentary Assembly of the [Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe](/organizations/organization-for-security-and-co-operation-in-europe), the [European Parliament](/organizations/european-parliament), PACE and the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. They were to follow voting, the sealing of ballots and the count in Tbilisi and elsewhere, ahead of a preliminary statement on 27 October.

On 2 October 2026 the Riksdag announced that she would observe the general elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina on 4 October as the Swedish participant from the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, with six colleagues going through the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly. Swedish observers were assigned to Sarajevo and Banja Luka, inside an OSCE delegation of about 70 parliamentarians from 25 countries working with ODIHR. She is also listed as a member of the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China, identified there as a Centre Party member of parliament.

## Third Deputy Speaker

### Elections to the post

The Instrument of Government requires the Riksdag to elect a Speaker and three deputy speakers, separately and in that order. No statute assigns the posts to particular parties. Up to 2018 the practice was to choose deputy speakers by party size, without also giving the Speaker's party such a post. A sole nominee is elected by acclamation; more than one nominee allows a secret ballot. From 1 September 2026 a deputy speaker is elected on a first ballot by more than half the votes, or otherwise on a second ballot between the two who led that count. In 2018 and 2022 a third ballot was still held if nobody had an absolute majority.

On 24 September 2018 the chamber elected [Andreas Norlén](/people/andreas-norlen) of the Moderate Party Speaker, by 203 votes to 145 for [Åsa Lindestam](/people/asa-lindestam) of the [Swedish Social Democratic Party](/organizations/swedish-social-democratic-party), and then chose Lindestam as first deputy speaker by acclamation. The second deputy post was contested. The Sweden Democrats held 62 seats, behind the Social Democrats on 100 and the Moderates on 70, and argued that refusing the outgoing second deputy speaker, Björn Söder, would discard proportionality. The Left Party, with 28 seats, nominated [Lotta Johnsson Fornarve](/people/lotta-johnsson-fornarve), who won the third secret ballot with 149 votes to Söder's 82, with 117 blank. The Centre Party, fourth with 31 seats, nominated Kerstin Lundgren for third deputy speaker, which its group leader called an application of the size principle; the Sweden Democrats nominated Söder again. Lundgren received 272 votes, Söder 69 and seven papers were blank. The Riksdag records her in the office from 24 September 2018.

On 26 September 2022 Norlén was re-elected Speaker by acclamation, Kenneth G. Forslund became first deputy speaker by acclamation, and Julia Kronlid of the Sweden Democrats was elected second deputy speaker. For the third post the Centre Party and the Left Party had the same number of seats. Annie Lööf nominated Lundgren and asked the chamber to decide; the Left Party nominated Fornarve and argued that, with the seats tied, the larger vote total in the general election should decide. The Social Democrats abstained and said the place should otherwise be drawn by lot; the [Green Party](/organizations/green-party) said it would vote for Fornarve on the vote-total ground. Blank papers dominated: Fornarve 46 and Lundgren 37, with 260 blank, then Fornarve 46 and Lundgren 39, with 247 blank. On the third ballot Lundgren received 57 votes, Fornarve 52 and 232 papers were blank, and Lundgren was elected.

On 28 September 2026 the chamber used the two-ballot rule. Of 349 seats, the Social Democrats had 99, the Moderates 70, the Sweden Democrats 62, the Left Party 30 and the Centre Party 25. Norlén was re-elected Speaker by 200 votes to 146 for Johanna Haraldsson, who then became first deputy speaker by acclamation, and Kronlid was re-elected second deputy speaker by acclamation. The Left Party nominated Håkan Svenneling and invoked the size-based practice; the Centre Party nominated Lundgren for continuity. Lena Hallengren said the Social Democrats would vote for Lundgren because she had held the office for two terms, while the Greens said they would abstain. Lundgren received 130 votes to Svenneling's 37, with 179 blank, short of half of 346 valid ballots; on the second ballot she received 126, Svenneling 43 and 178 were blank, out of 347 valid ballots, and she was elected. *Dagens Nyheter* reported that she prevailed with Social Democratic votes while the Greens and several members of the Tidö parties voted blank, although the Left Party was larger. Her Riksdag page lists the office through 23 September 2030.

### Duties in the chamber

The Speaker and the three deputy speakers form the Riksdag's presidium and meet regularly on how its work is to be led. A deputy speaker may, in the Speaker's place, direct that work and preside over chamber sittings. While in the chair, the presiding deputy speaker may not speak to the substance of a matter on the order paper; the same bar applies to the Speaker. Unlike the Speaker, a deputy speaker may vote even when presiding, and otherwise takes part in parliamentary business as other members do. If the Speaker and all three deputy speakers are unable to attend, the member present who has served longest, the *ålderspresident*, takes the chair.

### Representation of the Riksdag

Deputy speakers also represent the Riksdag. Lundgren led the Swedish delegation of seven members to the [Inter-Parliamentary Union](/organizations/inter-parliamentary-union) assembly in Geneva on 23–27 March 2024. She gave Sweden's main speech, condemning Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine and stating that international law does not permit borders to be changed by military force. Bilateral meetings included talks with representatives from Muslim-majority countries in which Quran burnings in Sweden were a recurring subject. In February 2025 the Riksdag announced that she would head a delegation to Malaysia on 25–28 February, with members from the Social Democrats, the Sweden Democrats and [the Liberals](/organizations/the-liberals) and a deputy secretary-general of the Riksdag, to discuss democracy, the green transition and innovation, and to meet a deputy speaker of the Malaysian parliament.

## Development cooperation

### Aid volume and priorities

Sweden’s aid frame had been tied to a target of 1 percent of gross national income until the government of the Moderate Party, the [Christian Democrats](/organizations/christian-democrats) and the Liberals, with the Sweden Democrats, agreed after the 2022 election to drop it. In December 2023 the strategy *Bistånd för en ny era – frihet, egenmakt och hållbar tillväxt* replaced the 2016 policy framework and set the frame at 56 billion kronor a year for 2023–2026, no longer tied to GNI. Ukraine and the neighbourhood were the top priority, alongside jobs and trade, humanitarian relief, links to migration policy, climate, and women and girls. Sweden Democrat Aron Emilsson said Swedish interests would weigh more and that aid would be used as leverage on returns; Christian Democrat Gudrun Brunegård and Liberal Joar Forssell stressed civil society, democracy and education.

The budget bill for 2025 proposed 53 billion kronor a year for 2026–2028, down from 56 billion in 2023–2025, and kept an 8 percent cap on asylum costs counted as aid. Military support to Ukraine, 75 billion kronor for 2024–2026, sat outside the aid frame. Aid minister Benjamin Dousa said Sweden would remain among the most generous donors, with Ukraine the largest recipient, while domestic spending on the police, defence and welfare also had to be met. Preliminary OECD Development Assistance Committee figures put Swedish official development assistance in 2024 at USD 5.007 billion, or 0.79 percent of GNI, a real-terms fall of 13.4 percent from 2023. Sweden was still one of four DAC members at or above the [United Nations](/organizations/united-nations) benchmark of 0.7 percent.

Kerstin Lundgren, the Centre Party’s foreign-policy spokesperson, co-signed its 2023 motion on the aid expenditure area. It rejected abandoning the 1 percent target, sought 7,114 million kronor more for the main appropriation in 2023, and said aid should follow DAC rules rather than force returns after a refused asylum claim. It argued for concentrating that level on sustainable jobs, the climate transition and green energy, and democracy and the rule of law. In February 2023 she said the government must “manage to see the whole world,” warning that cuts in presence and aid would leave space for China and Russia. On 10 June 2026 she again called for a return to 1 percent as soon as possible, said emergency parcels were displacing long-term programmes, and criticised what she described as monthly directives from the [Ministry for Foreign Affairs](/organizations/ministry-for-foreign-affairs) that threatened the independence of the [Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency](/organizations/swedish-international-development-cooperation-agency) (Sida). The Swedish Social Democratic Party also keeps a 1 percent of GNI goal, but says any rise would be gradual and that it has no proposal to reach 1 percent in the next parliamentary term.

### Democracy support institutions

Lundgren sat on Sida’s board in 2007–2008 and on its advisory council in 2009–2010. Her Riksdag curriculum vitae lists her as a member and chair of the board of the Swedish Institute in Alexandria, in Egypt, from 2008 to 2013. From 2011 to 2022 she was a member of the advisory council of the Folke Bernadotte Academy, the government agency for peace, security and development.

Since 2020 a Riksdag steering group of ten members from all eight parties, led by the Third and First Deputy Speakers and paid for from the Riksdag’s own funds, has directed bilateral democracy support with one or two parliaments in the [Eastern Partnership](/organizations/eastern-partnership) or the Western Balkans. Lundgren was deputy chair from 11 February 2020 to 26 October 2022 and chair from 27 October 2022. The cooperation covered North Macedonia in 2020–2024 and Armenia from 2025. From 26 April 2023 to 31 December 2024 she sat on the all-party committee on Sweden’s engagement in Afghanistan in 2001–2021 (directives 2022:60 and 2024:43). Chaired by Lennarth Hjelmåker, it produced *Sverige i Afghanistan 2001–2021 – erfarenheter och lärdomar*.

## Climate, environment and constitutional questions

### Environment and climate

From 1991 to 1994 Lundgren was a Centre Party political adviser (*politisk sakkunnig*) at the Ministry of the Environment; official accounts do not describe her duties.

In the Riksdag she raised climate policy mainly in private motions. In 2009 she called for energy-efficiency work and extra finance in Million Programme areas, including in Stockholm County, because targets depended on the existing stock; she noted that Stockholm was about to be European Green Capital. The Riksdag rejected the motion, as it did a 2020 motion, written with two Centre Party colleagues, seeking state backing for Region Stockholm's RUFS 2050 aim of climate neutrality by 2045, which she tied to national targets and the [Paris Agreement](/facts/paris-agreement).

In near-identical motions in 2024/25 and 2025/26 she asked for adaptation measures, alongside total defence, against flooding and higher water levels. She wrote that, even if warming targets were met, Sweden could still face sea-level rise of three to five metres and other extremes, and that poor adaptation could leave households and firms uninsurable. Citing an insurance-industry flood proposal and costs to Gävle municipality, she wanted a wider inquiry than the tasks already given to Boverket for the built environment. The defence committee rejected the first motion, and the environment and agriculture committee the second.

### Constitutional questions

While on the Committee on the Constitution in 2002–2006, she argued in motion 2004/05:K369 that popular initiatives for municipal referendums should be taken first in the review of the Instrument of Government, one of Sweden's basic laws, because the issue was not really constitutional and the government had delayed it despite earlier Riksdag criticism. With Mats Einarsson and Helena Höij she said, in a special opinion, that a request from 10 percent of municipal voters should lead to an advisory referendum, but not through a Riksdag announcement while the inquiry was still at work. With Gustav Fridolin and Höij she reserved for municipal powers over congestion charges and emissions to air.

She represented the Centre Party on the all-party Commission on the Constitution (Grundlagsutredningen) from 1 November 2004 and signed its report *En reformerad grundlag* (SOU 2008:125) on 17 December 2008. The members entered no reservations: the text was a settlement among the parliamentary parties, not her own draft. Chaired first by Lars Engqvist and then by [Per Unckel](/people/per-unckel), it proposed a personal-vote threshold of 5 rather than 8 percent, a mandatory post-election vote on the prime minister, and advisory municipal referendums on a demand from at least 10 percent of voters unless two-thirds of the council objected. Proposition 2009/10:80 followed that line and proposed 1 January 2011 as the start date. The Riksdag elected in 2010 gave final approval in report 2010/11:KU4, which the chamber adopted.

On 16 November 2021, as third deputy speaker, she joined the Committee on preparedness under the Instrument of Government, which on 27 November 2023 presented *Stärkt konstitutionell beredskap* (SOU 2023:75), drawing on the COVID-19 pandemic in Sweden. It proposed adjusted rules for the War Delegation; sittings outside Stockholm or wholly online for compelling reasons; and temporary government regulation of matters normally reserved to statute, activated by a three-quarters majority, with a narrow power to act first if the Riksdag plainly could not be awaited. Annika Hirvonen of the Green Party entered the only reservation. Lundgren signed but, in a special opinion, said that power must stay exceptional, must not replace legal preparedness, and needed parliamentary control; she also wanted more room for fully remote committee meetings.

## Electoral record

### List placements and results

Lundgren has been a Centre Party candidate for the Riksdag in Stockholms läns valkrets at every general election from 2002 to 2026. The constituency is Stockholm County outside Stockholm Municipality, which the Election Authority reports separately. A personal vote is a preference mark for one name; marks for the same candidate on more than one list in the constituency are added. Since 2014 the mark must reach 5 percent of the party’s constituency vote to jump the list; in 2002, 2006 and 2010 the Riksdag threshold was 8 percent. Lundgren has not cleared it here and has been returned in list order.

| Election | Place on the list that supplied the seats | Personal votes | Centre votes | Share | Seats |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 2002, 15 September | 1 | 611 | 16,477 | 2.67% | 1 |
| 2006, 17 September | 1 | 846 | 34,998 | 5.33% | 3 |
| 2010, 19 September | 1 | 928 | 41,369 | 5.77% | 2 |
| 2014, 14 September | 1 | 861 | 38,898 | 5.09% | 2 |
| 2018, 9 September | 2 | below 5% | 69,786 | 8.56% | 3 |
| 2022, 11 September | 2 | 172 | 60,776 | 7.39% | 3 |
| 2026, 13 September | 1 | 1,388 | 69,312 | 7.81% | 3 |

In 2002 she was number 1 on list 0004-02998 (13,794 votes) and received 611 personal votes, a kryssandel of 4.42 percent. The party’s only seat went to her. She headed the constituency ballot again in 2006, 2010 and 2014, with 846 personal votes (2.42 percent), 928 (2.24 percent) and 861 (2.21 percent). In 2014 [Anna-Karin Hatt](/people/anna-karin-hatt), third on the list, had more personal votes, 1,375 (3.53 percent), but still under 5 percent, so Lundgren and Per Lodenius were elected and Hatt was first substitute.

In 2018 and 2022 she was second to party leader Annie Lööf. Lööf alone passed 5 percent, with 18,720 personal votes (26.82 percent) in 2018 and 12,243 (20.14 percent) in 2022, but took her seat in Jönköping County. In 2018 Lundgren was next on comparison number 45,754 and Lodenius on 22,877; Alireza Akhondi filled Lööf’s county place. In 2022 Lundgren’s 172 personal votes were on list 0004-01756 (35,952 votes); her comparison number was 35,952, ahead of Akhondi, and Anna Elisabet Hasund Lasses replaced Lööf. In 2026 she was number 1 on the list that won the seats, ahead of Anna Elisabet Lasses and Rasmus Elfström, with 1,383 personal votes on that list and 5 on another, 1,388 in all. None of the three was personally elected.

### The Centre Party in Stockholm County

From one seat on 2.67 percent in 2002 the party went to three seats on 5.33 percent in 2006, then two seats in both 2010 (5.77 percent) and 2014 (5.09 percent). In 2018 the vote rose by 30,888 and 3.47 percentage points, to 69,786 (8.56 percent), and a third seat returned. It was 60,776 (7.39 percent) in 2022 and, in the final count after 13 September 2026, 69,312 (7.81 percent), up 8,536 votes and 0.42 points, with three seats in a 43-seat constituency. Of the 2026 Centre ballots, 33,067 were for Lundgren’s list, 2,552 for the other candidate list and 33,693 for the party name alone; personal votes for the party totaled 10,384, or 14.98 percent.

At the nominating meeting in Stockholm in early October 2025, members placed then leader Anna-Karin Hatt first and Lundgren second, ahead of Lasses, Elfström and Hanna Stenegren. Hatt announced her resignation on 15 October 2025. The ballot used on election day listed Lundgren first.

## Dated facts

_No published facts on this page yet._

## Methodology

https://factrail.ai/methodology

Canonical: https://factrail.ai/people/kerstin-lundgren