The Swedish authorities have lowered the intelligence requirement for new police officers to make it easier for people to qualify, following a shortage in eligible recruits coming forward.
In the forty years since the Swedish government decided to turn Sweden into a multicultural society, the rate of violent crime, and rape in particular, has soared to unprecedented levels. According to the Gatestone Institute, Sweden is now number two on the global list of rape by country, hitting 66.5 rapes per 100,000 people in 2012, second only to the tiny south African nation of Lesotho.
In 2014, some 6,620 rapes were reported in Sweden, up from 421 reported to the police in 1975, an increase of 1,472 per cent. Violent crime meanwhile has risen by 300 per cent in the same period.
The Swedish government has accordingly recognised that they must hire thousands of new police officers over the coming years, but struggling to find the recruits they are having to lower their entry standards.
Last year the authorities had 300 places to fill at its national police academy, but could only find 266 recruits who made the grade. Stefan Annell, a psychologist at the Swedish Defence Recruitment Agency which handles the recruitment process for the police, has admitted that to fill the remaining places the authorities will be lowering the pass mark on its admissions exam.
“What has changed is that the minimum requirement is reduced from a four to a three. That means there will be more people who go on to interviews and to take the personality test,” he told Swedish Radio.
“This will mean applicants can have lower theoretical capacity, or general problem solving ability.”
And the rules have also been relaxed to allow applicants who fail the test to reapply immediately, rather than having to wait a year or two to resubmit an application.
Despite these changes, officials have insisted that the department is not making it easier to become a police officer by lowering the bar, as the exam is only one part of the admissions process.
“You need to look at the entire admission process to the police academy,” said Bengt-Åke Nilsson, head of human resources at the police force.
He insisted: “To say that the requirements are lowered is a little too hard. It does not reflect the entire admission process.”