New breakthrough for the Swedish Pirate Party

Longtime considered a harmless joke, the Swedish Pirate Party gets a massive support for the 2009 European Parliament elections.

"The Pirate Party wants to fundamentally reform copyright law, get rid of the patent system, and ensure that citizens' rights to privacy are respected. With this agenda, and only this, we are making a bid for representation in the European and Swedish parliaments."

Not exactly a political programme that will change the world, but one that has found a great echo amongst the Swedes as the new law threatening their privacy (FRA law) is about to take effect on January 1, 2009.

In a recent poll, 7% of the electors said they will vote for the Pirate Party in the upcoming European Parliament elections and 17% would consider it.

One can however criticize the wording of the question that had been asked to the 970 citizens who had taken part in this poll. "The Pirate Party is a Swedish political party that wishes to put an end to the FRA law and the new laws that threaten privacy. Will you vote for he Pirate Party in the upcoming European Parliament elections? ».

Nothing is mentioned here about the other reforms the party stands for, such as  the limitation of copyright law to 5 years (as opposed to the 70 years after the death of the author, under the current copyright system).

This staggering result also applies to one group category essentially. Whereas 55% of men under the age of 29 would consider voting for the Pirate Party, "only" 37 % of women of the same age category would be willing to do so. The party scores the most poorly among women over the age of 65 : 6 % say they "will" or "would consider" voting for this party.

In order to obtain a seat in the European parliament, the Pirate Party will have to aim for 100 000 votes. The party had captured 35 000 votes (out of 5 600 000 ) in the Swedish General Election of 2006.