In one summer, 25 refugee families with 8–12 children each appeared in Sarpsborg – without warning, and straight into a municipality that already spends four out of five social assistance kroner on refugees.

It is municipal director Turid Stubø Johnsen in Sarpsborg who tells VG this. The families did not notify in advance. They simply arrived.

– If one knows that there is a large Somali or Syrian community somewhere, it is natural that others also seek out that place, says Johnsen to VG.

The consequences are felt first in the schools. At Sandesundsveien primary school in central Sarpsborg, there are 430 pupils of 45 nationalities. Only 20 per cent of them have two Norwegian parents. Almost half receive special Norwegian language training.
Every autumn, new families with many children appear who have not given notice that they have moved to the town. The school then has to find places for them the same day.

– What am I supposed to do? I have no sanctions, says headteacher Paal Olav Lislerud to VG.

The influx is costly. Sarpsborg’s own investigation from November last year mapped the municipality’s refugee expenditure within Nav, child welfare services, schools, kindergartens, PPT and children with extensive support needs. The price tag for 2024 was around 360 million kroner. Of every krone the municipality paid out in financial social assistance, nearly 80 per cent went to refugees.
By comparison, the municipality spends 680 million on running all its 18 schools.
A large part of the bill is due to family reunification. Sarpsborg accepted unaccompanied minor refugees – and discovered that several of them in practice functioned as anchor children. In one case, one minor was reunited with two parents and ten siblings, the municipal director reports.

– They were mostly here on a mission to achieve family reunification, she says.

The investigation establishes that 33 children who arrived through family reunification alone accounted for 17.6 million kroner in child welfare measures. The municipality is now closing down the staffed group homes for unaccompanied minors.
The backdrop is secondary migration. Refugees are first settled in one municipality, which receives an integration grant from the state for five years. After that, they are free to move – and many do so.
Around 8 per cent of all refugees who leave their settlement municipality end up in Sarpsborg or Fredrikstad. Half of them have a background from Somalia or Iraq. Of those who move to Sarpsborg, 69 per cent end up in the low-income group.
In Sarpsborg, the number of immigrants has increased by 132 per cent since 2010. Immigrants now make up 25.2 per cent of the town’s inhabitants – compared with 21.4 per cent nationally. Half of the immigrants have a refugee background, almost double the national average.
The government has now begun to listen. In June, Minister of Labour and Inclusion Kjersti Stenseng (Ap) announced that the government will investigate two forms of relocation ban: one ban on moving to specific areas, and a general ban on moving from the settlement municipality – both time-limited, with exceptions for those who are self-supporting or moving for work or education. A report by law professor Marius Emberland has already concluded that the state has extensive room for manoeuvre to intervene.
That it is an Ap government that is now considering denying refugees the right to move freely is in itself remarkable.
Fredrikstad mayor Arne Sekkelsten (H) fears the consequences if nothing is done.

– We are terrified of that, he tells VG about the danger of parallel societies.

The final proposal is planned to be sent out for consultation in the autumn.