For several years, as a reporter at Assignment Review, I have met people in Sweden who live on the street because of mental illness. Sanne, balled around in the care system, was thrown out, and was dying.
A picture I will never forget is when five years ago we caught with the camera how a homeless woman was released in the dirt on the sidewalk, by the police.
Police: We may do that sometimes. Unfortunately.
Then I also met Marika, a person whose life had turned.
2015
Marika Sellgren: You sometimes twist a little soap or you smell so bad. And then you get no service!
Here she is with her friend Ann-Marie. After eight years in homelessness, Marika had been given an apartment contract in Hornstull, at Södermalm in Stockholm.
We start filming, I think it might be a documentary about a life changing direction, a story with a happy ending.
Marika: Well, well, I was lucky, I could have ended up at the bottom of Fittja, a view of a dumpster. Sure I could end up there. But I had taken it too. But I've ended up here! It's fantastic, after all.
Marika: Whatever happens, nothing happens.
Anonymous: Santa Claus.
Marika: Caspar! Caspar!
In her own home, Marika can gather her small circle for birthday celebrations.
Marika: I don't think they want more cake, Mom.
Birgit: But you were great at skating.
Marika: Yes I'm still good, but now I'm too fat. Imagine these moms! They are good. But they are difficult!
Marika: Ann-Marie ...! Are you going home now? I will see you later.
Ann-Marie: Yeah.
Marika: Ann-Marie: Yeah. Bye. Hello Hello. Yeah, the Golden Platter like that. What to say? What? Ammi looked like she was starving to death. A year and a half ago. Her mother had passed away 97 years old mother. Who had taken care of her since the mental hospital was closed down. No one cared about her. Student was turned off and there was chaos in the apartment. I started jawing at her. She had nothing, no one helped.
I feel solidarity with her. She has spent 40 years at Långbro. She got sick when she was 17 just like me. She is 68 years old today. I feel a certain relationship with Ammi. She is the generation before me who sat inside. I was lucky to get out of Becki's rather quickly.
Reporter: Why do you say you were lucky then, who came from there?
Marika: Yes but you know, stay there, and be medicated and then you will be broken by the medication and get brain damage. The old medicines are banned today, or yes, they are still there, some, you can get them on dispensation. They take away the memory. One sabers the memory in the brain huh. After all, you get a lot of brain disorders from these drugs. After all, it is not only the disease that disturbs but the drugs knock out the functions of the brain.
The functions of the brain. Marika's blessing and the curse of her life. In one of the social service's investigations it says psychoses that come in cycles and about severe anxiety and depression. But Marika's intellect refuses to submit to the disease.
Throughout her life, she has been chasing a dream. The dream of living and working like everyone else.
Sometimes things went well. For Marika has been a person that many wanted to listen to. These old recordings were made by filmmaker Maud Nycander.
Marika Sellgren: I've been to Geneva and given speeches to WHO, so I've sat next to Gro Harlem Brundtland, EU Commissioners and the world's foremost brain scientists, and the whole ballet. And then I gave lectures in Paris to the Ministry of Social Affairs when they presented the French psychiatric reform, so I met the reformists, the French reformists, because that's where they just started the job, and there I gave a lecture. As a user.
But Marika's illness continued to add to her. And society does not show the grace she appeals to.
2003
Anonymous man: In this decision, there is a telephone number and an officer at the Kronofogdemyndighet ...
Marika: I don't have a phone!
Marika: What did you say? Yes ... The Crown Chief comes at nine o'clock ...
Marika: Oh I knew it was going to be ...
In 1988, Marika had been evicted for the first time. Here, 2003, it's time again.
Marika: The chancellor arrives at nine. I knew it was going to the forest. Damn it too .. Empty.
Former boyfriend Tore, helps her when she has to leave the apartment at Kungsholmen.
Marika Sellgren: I'm fighting, I'll be back. I'm not going to be a case of care, it's just that I'm developing into it now. Sergel debt collection, yes we can put it in our pocket and then we must try to start a new life.
Marika Sellgren: I was deeply depressed and had a lot of panic anxiety. I was so bad so I did. I was so scared so I did, anywhere in town it could happen. And then when the social services do not help then when you are in such a crisis, when you ask for help. So it ended up that I stopped paying the rent because I was no longer in the apartment, I just walked around like an ailie, huh.
Marika is referred to different shelters, but it does not work.
Marika: Hi Ulla. I should have called you earlier, so terribly apologize for my behavior, I was so terribly despairing about the whole situation. But hear you have this with Anna Lind, how ... of course it's terrible! It is so awful that it is not. It's like Palme, yes .. I just hope this is not a political murder, I hope it's a lunatic then.
The police came and Securitas came, I am really afraid of the police after I felt so harassed by them. I threw myself from there, home to Olof then. And then I couldn't come back because they thought I was intimidating. They were afraid of me. And I have such a loud voice.
Now it's a bit messy here ...
Anonymous man: I haven't had time to do things in order ...
Marika: We've talked so much. We have talked and talked ...
This is what is the beginning of eight years of homelessness. Eight years of humiliation on the street. Before she gets the keys to her own home again, one in Hornstull, 2010. Marika's psychologist Lars Erdner helped her with applications and appeals.
Lars Erdner: That she got this accommodation, it was a huge job behind. We had been working for many years to make it possible and you didn't want to arrange any accommodation from the social services ... She was dying.
The apartment that the social services arranged became the rescue. Here she tries to deal with the trauma of the years in homelessness.
The fear of getting there again does not leave Marika. It chases in nightmares and anxiety forest.
And it should prove that she has reason to be worried.
Marika: Yeah, yeah, no fuck I'm going to clean up after me this time, no fuck I wanna care about these bastards ...
Time passes. Every time I talk to Marika, I hear about new things that go wrong. Neighbors complain that people are standing outside the house shouting to Marika. Marika, she's getting more and more stressed.
Marika: Here you will see. Damn what I'm doing. Damn what I'm doing. Here's the best thing I've done. Damn took that road now. It has broken. Here is Einar Heckscher and I in Geneva. November 7, 2001. Then you made a success, you know.
It's so unnecessary ... No, but I don't want to deal with that bitch!
Anonymous Woman: Can I get in for a cup of coffee?
Marika: No, unfortunately, it's not possible today. I can not take it. She comes here, she usually sleeps here, but she pisses down the armchair when she sleeps here ... I usually help her. She is kind, she is homeless, well it is.
There has been conflict in the stairwell and neighbors are reporting screams from inside Marika's apartment.
Marika: I have a trauma and I try to deal with it. I'm terrified, huh. She sits and lies!
Marika feels harassed by neighbors and drinks wine against the anxiety. She threatens a neighbor for life. For her, it is a nightmare that is back. Marika now runs the risk of ending up on the street again.
A medical certificate states that because of her mental illness, she is unable to change her behavior and affect what is happening now.
I receive threats because I say I can't help.
Reporter: You have sent threats to me also Marika, on sms?
Marika: Huh? Have I. I don't remember, huh?
Reporter: That I should fit in and so on.
Marika: Yeah, that's damn good.
Reporter: Don't you remember?
Marika: Nope. I don't remember.
And the worst - Marika is disgusted with the social services. Because when Marika is in the worst, the social services end housing support - according to Marika, she is told that she is a working environment problem for them. And the Social Security Police reports her for threats against an official.
Marika: Satan's damn society! I have been living on SEK 50 a day for 30 years.
Manager: But if you hear these demands you have got Marika, should we clear them up too?
Marika: I go to the law and they are lawless! I can't stand this, that I'm gonna be a damn monster! Because they refuse the call. Where is the call? So I can't fucking ...
Marika's good husband and a lawyer are at Marika's home to try and find out a bit about this which has arisen around her life situation.
Marika Sellgren: I said I get blood taste from my mouth. I can not stand it anymore. Then they took it as a personal attack and although it is a Swedish way of speaking. Then they took home service, housing assistance, though I was deeply depressed. Everything from me! It was chaos! And then psychiatry comes here and then they turn their heads and they do nothing because they don't want to mess with soc. And then soc strikes with the MANAGER! And I get mad at a neighbor and now I've been sentenced to supervision and a large fine!
Marika: You have to deposit money for me tomorrow because I have to have food money and what is left is 100 SEK a day.
Good man: Yes it is a completely different thing .. Marika ..
Marika: I'm getting sick of this, I'm getting sick of this ... Now you put in so I have tomorrow.
Barefoot Attorney: I'm not taking care, I'm a little cold.
Marika: When there is no danger. See you..
Barefoot Attorney: Yes we do.
Marika: See you. Hi.
Barefoot lawyer: Hello.
Marika: Hi, hello. Do I have to sit down ... I do not understand what is happening, why am I so exposed? What if I knew? The only thing I do is assert my legal right. Then you wonder what is wrong.
It will be winter 2019 and it is clear that Marika will be out again. The rental committee has made the eviction decision.
Marika: This time it doesn't matter if I kill myself, I get no apartment anyway. They are just waiting for my death. But they are not welcome at the funeral. I can tell you that.
Caspar the little guy. Little friend. At least I've cooked fish for you. Little Caspar, come on. Come on, well, come on then. Little friend, that you need to be involved in this.
This is how they want it! I know I sound violent. But it is such a social violence this. And this is not the first time.
When Marika began to lose her grip on living in the apartment building, her old psychologist tried to help again. All to prevent Marika from having to survive being thrown out and thrown back onto the street.
They apply for a housing for her to move there before the evacuation is put into operation. But the social service gives off. Marika does not have enough help for it to be granted, they reason.
She is welcome to position herself in the housing queue and look for housing in the secondary market or rent a room.
The decision of the social services is determined by the administrative law.
Mats Fors: I agree that it sounds strange and we get, the social services need to find different ways to get around, to get into things and help people. And the social service never aims to block people from our help.
Marika Sellgren: I need security! I need a home! And not having to be afraid of my neighbors.
Lars Erdner, psychologist: Marika has her problems and difficulties, but if we put her in situations that she can't handle, then we are well involved. Then we are responsible, or involved in finding another accommodation before it goes so far that she is expelled from there.
Reporter: Can there be any other reason why you make a decision where you refer Marika to the regular housing market? Than she is healthy enough?
Mats Fors: No, so .. It may be that we do not have ... any suitable accommodation for her.
Reporter: So can it be?
Mats Fors: Mmm.
The chancellor comes at two o'clock. Then Marika will leave the apartment.
She can't pack her belongings.
She wanders around, waiting for time alone.
Marika: 40 minutes left ...
Only we from Assignment Review are here.
After all, the social services have rejected Marika's application for housing assistance. The only thing that exists now is a place in a shelter called Rysseviken.
It is a place known among drug addicts in Stockholm. Because on the Russian Gulf you have to stay but still continue to cope.
But Marika is neither a drug addict nor an alcoholic. She is mentally ill.
Marika: I don't want to be dumped anywhere. And be forgotten as well. And walk me down among those people who are crap jobs.
Reporter: Here is a picture of Marika, it is very beautiful, when she reads ...
Birgit: Yes, and this must have been in the early eighties. Dad Erik, he doesn't think it's fun to watch. He keeps it away. I got a phone signal from a social secretary in Stockholm, they had taken care of Marika and she was at Beckomberga. Just this with Beckomberga. I come there and it was terrible then. It was awful to imagine that she had been belted and that it was so violent. She didn't say ... she didn't tell much. She was shocked herself, I think.
Birgit: And when she was psychotic, psychotic, well then I was at a distance, then I was definitely kept at a distance.
Reporter: By the doctors?
Birgit: Yes, of the medical profession. I didn't know anything.
Later, Marika came back to life, in her own home. But she suffered from anxiety.
Birgit: I thought she was kidding. I thought she made herself a little weird when she said I dare not go out, that is. "I'm walking along the walls." I didn't believe it.
For me, it's been five years since I first met Marika, she had just gotten a home and started to feel hopeful about life in the end. But now the hope is off.
Marika: Are they coming now? It sounds like a damn car out there. Why do they come in a blue van? Do they scare me even more ..
Marika: That you get to ruin so much ... Now I'm crashing again.
Reporter: You can do it Marika.
Marika: How many times do they think you can start over! What the hell do you think they are made of? Concrete or !?
Marika: Now they're knocking on here. Where is the cat .. Must fence the cat.
Marika: Yeah hey ..
Chronicle: Hello.
Marika: Why are there so many people here then?
Chronicle: Yes, it is like today's day.
It is the Crown Guardian, two civilian police officers with vans and the social services that are here.
Marika: Well, he does, after all, you opened the door down there.
Police: Don't scream man.
Marika: It's because I'm scared man. I've been through too much.
Police: But take it easy!
Reporter: It might be good if the social services come in and explain to Marika ..
Kronofogden: Today you have to bring sanitation, toothbrush ..
Marika: But I haven't packed ...!
Chronicle: You don't have to pack something you just need to carry the most important thing with you today
Marika: I can tell you that the last time I was evicted then I asked for help I can get some housing support I lie down is so depressed, then I had made a career and been in Geneva, worked for the World Health Organization, and the French Ministry of Social Affairs, then If I get rejected then I slowly break down and pack up, end up in hospital, two unpaid rents, then Stockholm city says she can't handle her own accommodation!
Damn, I thought I would live here in peace and quiet for the rest of my life after eight years ... after living like a hunted animal, as a refugee in my own country.
Police: We have a lot to do with the mentally ill.
Reporter: You got it ...?
Police: We pick up in housing. We are so used to these environments. So it becomes everyday, it just becomes that you have to perform a service assignment in some way.
A routine assignment for them.
And there is nothing special to complain about in this case, either, says Kronofogden. On the contrary. After all, Marika gets a shelter and that's not always the case.
Kronofogden: It is not at all certain that there is any accommodation. Then the police are here and help someone get on the street. And then there's nothing more to it. Here she even gets to bring the cat with her. They have really arranged the social for her, she even gets to bring the cat with Ryssevik.
Reporter: So it's special, to bring the cat with you?
Chronicle: It's special, it's special. It's special. So this, it's really nice.
Marika: Well, it's very hard not to feel grateful anyway.
Chronicle: I think it's nice not to have to kill the cat. Now Marika has to bring the cat.
Marika: Killing the cat? Yes, then I would have taken my own life, you understand!
Police: It's like all missions, you can tough missions, and you can show goodwill: Okay, we try to solve the task.
Marika: Oh what you are happy with now huh. Your fat fucking nasty. You should become homeless everyone, so we can talk about reality!
To prevent the evacuation of the sick, that is the social service's area of responsibility. But they concluded that Marika was able to handle the situation on her own. And the assessment was approved by the court.
But it is only on the court paper that Marika is considered really ready to get and keep a regular apartment contract.
So now she is on her way to the last outpost in the Swedish welfare society.
Marika: Hi Caspar, little friend. That damn cat sand I'm worried about. It is important for him to do his needs as well.
Birgit: It is indescribable. It's indescribable. I think most of it is because psychology has failed her. After 20 years with good support from both psychologist and psychiatrist, and when they retired then it was as if everything fell. Then she was sentenced when she did not behave as she should.
I read in the social services investigation that they tried to get psychiatry to re-contact Marika after she was turned off from the reception where she went for many years, but psychiatry says that Marika should seek care herself, at another reception, which she did not do .
Lars Erdner: Merging psychiatry and social services into one activity. It is not possible to divide it like this. It is a completely failed project. That people would manage the accommodation as if they were any tenant. It's not like that. I mean, this is not just the only person in Sweden who has these problems, it is anyway!
In a comment on Assignment Review, psychiatry says that one does not want to comment on Marika's individual cases.
Marika: Hi. Are they the kind who live here?
Anonymous man: There's nothing wrong with them. I've lived here for eleven years.
Marika: Eleven years, you hear. This is a terminal place here. I do not want that.
Staff: Here we have the food then, the restaurant .. I call it the restaurant.
Maka: What is it today?
Staff: Thursday.
Marika: Chiligryta
Oh what it smells bad here, must have fresh air. Fresh air. He has lived here for eleven years. You see. What shelter do you live in for eleven years? This is a terminal place. I do not want that.
Anonymous man: Here we have it as best we can, you know.
Marika: What it stinks ... I want to vomit. I want to vomit ... It's not possible. I can't breathe here! It stinks so terribly. There is no water!
The whole house smells. But here in the corridor is also a rolled-up mat with stools.
Marika: My God now we're here, so we've landed. The eagle has landed I was about to say. But what it smells like. What a terrible toilet. As disgusting as mine.
The moving boxes are unpacked. There are no wardrobes. Four months after the eviction, I want to see how Marika is doing.
Marika: I am almost even, around the clock here. Here is my home, here are my things. Yes this is really messy etc. I don't really want to show it. There is a pile of clothes here that I haven't washed in a long time. Yes please .. Come in .. These are garbage I have to throw out ...
Reporter: Okay.
Marika: I know I'll throw these garbage out, I haven't been able to.
Reporter: But is this ... Does this work here?
Marika: Yeah like that, barely.
Reporter: But you don't?
Marika: No, I did the last month, I haven't been able to. I've been pretty decent here from the beginning but, it just gets heavier and heavier I think.
Reporter: But what does the staff say then?
Marika: Yeah they don't go in here. They don't see this. It was just something they said.
Reporter: Is this garbage in this bag?
Marika: Yeah, I have to carry everything out like ... Grab ...
Reporter: Oh my gosh
Marika: It's not your job, yes you see I have to ... what should I do now ...
Reporter: I just want to see how you feel.
Marika: I can't think of this. Oh, how awful that is.
Rysseviken AB, it is an accommodation that receives people from municipalities around Sweden. Social service pays. There are 80 rooms, but despite receiving people with HIV and hepatitis, the usual rooms do not have their own shower and toilet. The staff are two people at a time, otherwise there are surveillance cameras. The premises have fallen. You burn garbage in a pile in the yard.
I see a guy that I recognize from when we were here last winter.
Reporter: Eleven years have you lived here huh?
Anonymous: Yes ..
Marika: Here you have the cameras later on. Is this where you live?
Reporter: Have you lived in this room for eleven years?
Anonymous man: Yes
Reporter: In this room for eleven years?
Anonymous man: Yes
Reporter: Do you pay yourself here too?
Anonymous man: Yes the social pays. 28 000.
Reporter: 28,000? In month?
Reporter: What are you living on then, sick ...?
Anonymous man: The pension.
Reporter: Pension. Early retirement?
Anonymous man: I get 5000 over a month. It's not fun when it gets like this. I can't move anywhere either.
Reporter: Do you clean yourself in here?
Anonymous man: Yes.
Reporter: You have no cleaning help or anything?
Anonymous man: No.
Reporter: No. But you have no sheets in the bed and so on?
Anonymous man: No I don't want it, it just comes off.
Reporter: But it's been a long time since you cleaned up?
Anonymous man: A month ago just over.
Reporter: Mmm. What do you long for then?
Anonymous man: I'm waiting to get out of here. I haven't been anywhere in two years.
Reporter: From here? Haven't you been away for two years?
Anonymous man: No.
Those who live here are from 20 years onwards. The Russian Gulf is drug tolerant so you don't have to stop with your drugs. But only in the last five years have four people died here. From January 1 to May 22 this year, the police made 23 calls to the property.
Anonymous man: I'm not afraid. But some do not feel well at all. They send them off to the psyche and then they come back here again.
Reporter: Is that so?
Anonymous man: Yes. That girl has gone twice to the psyche?
Reporter: Was she screaming?
Anonymous man: Yes they have sent her here again.
Reporter: What do you think about that?
Anonymous man: I shit in it completely. I've been dealing with psychiatry for 30 years.
Lars Erdner, psychologist: After all, it becomes like a mental hospital without management in any way. There you can walk and trample and nothing happens.
Reporter: Is the new mental hospital?
Lars Erdner: Yes, it's the new mental hospital. Deportation to an isolated place where they can wander around in any way without getting help or support in anything. But…
Reporter: What to think about it?
Lars Erdner: Yeah, what do you think about it ...
Reporter: What do you think?
Lars Erdner: I think it's terrible.
But do responsible managers know how it looks and works here? Marika wants to show, and when I ask unit manager Mats Fors at the social service Södermalm if he wants to come out and meet her - and let us film, he says yes.
Marika Sellgren: You know you get new interests when you stay like this outside so you get dumped in the forest. The strange thing is, you know, there is so much garbage moving around here, like the birds and the birds, they come here and get curious!
Marika will be happy. I join because I am used to those responsible who duck before being challenged in front of the camera. But now it is not my questions that will be the most difficult for the manager.
Without the feelings of her, whose life he has in his hands.
And in my still mind I wonder, will she be able to control her reactions this time?
Reporter: Have you been here before, how was it, have you been here before?
Mats Fors: Yes.
Reporter: How long ago was it?
Mats Fors: Would I believe .. 2014, I have been here once .. I remember ...
Reporter: What do you think about the place?
Mats Fors: Well, I think it's a place that fulfills its function. Hi is it Marika?
Marika: Yes. Mats?
Mats Fors: Mats Fors. Just. Nice to meet you. Should I take off my shoes or?
Marika: Nah ... you probably don't need that.
Marika: We can make coffee, if you want?
Mats Fors: Yes please.
Reporter: What do you say about this?
Mats Fors: I've seen worse ... worse apartments than this one.
Reporter: At the accommodation where you place?
Mats Fors: Well I don't know right now ... I can't remember exactly now .. I can't remember that right now, it's been so long since I was out living now, but ...
Reporter: You've been here for almost four months since you were evicted?
Marika: Yes.
Reporter: But how are you supposed to?
Marika: There is nothing .. Surely there are surveillance cameras two staff, one .. At 50 people. You pay 28,000 a month. Do you understand? It's totally insane here.
Mats Fors: How much contact do you have with those who work here?
Marika: Almost no huh.
Marika: This place is not good. And besides, there is black mold here and I have talked about that but nothing happens.
Marika: It's about fighting to survive now, eh! And this is no exaggeration, I have five serious suicides behind me. And there is no threat that is reality.
Mats Fors: Yes. Yes.
Marika: I am very happy that you are so open with me for such a conversation I have not had with the social service. I've just been told by some kind of eviction prevention "you have to lean in screaming," she screams at me.
Mats Fors: After all, we are people, as well as those who sit on the other side of the desk, who may meet you and later you meet another person who is very angry and upset, it is clear that it will be difficult for them too, and then you should have a new meeting when to talk ... and then you do not know okay, will there be gaps and screams this time also I want this visit? Maybe I should have a guard with me, or need to sit in a room ..
Marika: Or you won't come at all. Just set.
Mats Fors: Yes. How long have you had the cat then?
Marika: Well, since my partner took his life and you simultaneously took away from me my work.
Mats Fors: That coffee looks strong!
Marika: Huh?
Lars Erdner: It looks strong.
Marika: Yeah, it's strong. I have no sugar and no milk .. Strong coffee, it strengthens.
Reporter: So here she gets no help at home?
Mats Fors: No.
Marika: People die here! They die here, you know? Because there is no control over how people feel. They kill themselves here. A guy is comatose now, because the staff does not go and check how these old guys are doing. They have cameras everywhere but they have no staff. But I don't want to be here! I can't stand this. Do you understand?
We can put on the water how it is ... Look here what the water is here. It usually gets quite brown.
Yes it turns yellow.
Mats Fors: Yes now it looks!
Marika: I'm not allowed to drink this for my mom, a trained nurse ... It's dangerous here! Do you want to kill me, you might wonder!
Mats Fors: Well it's clear that this isn't something I think is great, which I'm proud of. No human being would have to live like this at the same time, the conditions that exist and what we have to work with ...
Reporter: But can you blame it on that?
Mats Fors: No, that is an explanation. There is no one, I do not blame myself, but I say based on what we have to work with on the social services and how the people we work with how the legislation looks to cooperate with others with psychiatry etc., so ...
Reporter: But are you responsible for finding worthy accommodations?
Mats Fors: Yes.
Marika: I'm so upset!
Mats Fors: Yes, there is not much to say about this. It's like ... What should I do about it?
There are lots of things that have gone wrong and we may look at different things in different ways. But we can still, the important thing is that we talk about it. We need to do what we can and invite and you need to do what you can and invite. Then we can reach forward somehow.
Marika: Yeah, but get going.
Mats Fors: Yes, we're getting started now.
The days go by after the social manager's visit. Someone has made a report to Haninge municipality's environment and health protection, which comes out and inspects the premises. According to Marika, they do not knock at her. But their report states that moisture is found in the other houses. It is also noted that there are repeated problems with pests in the houses, but there is no agreement with the cleaning company. Rysseviken AB states that you sanitize yourself.
Then a call from Marika comes on the phone. It's been Mother's Day. And in the morning, Mother Birgit has been standing there on the doorstep.
Marika: She knocked on unannounced, but yeah, I was so moved like, little mum. She is 81, I have told her, Mom it is I who will come to you with chocolate and flowers as well, but I can not do it ..
Birgit: That's what it's like to be a parent. I thought, I go there, the others they can come whenever they want. You have to. Yes.
Reporter: Mmm. Did you meet any staff there?
Birgit: No one, no one. No.
Reporter: Now was the head of the social services, he came out, to Marika ... He had been there before you came out on Mother's Day ..
Birgit: Yes, yes.
Reporter: So he's seen it now.
Reporter: He said, I can't do anything about this? What should I do about this?
Birgit: What should I do about this? Isn't it true that the municipalities, I think, buy places there, for those who are homeless? But when you buy you have to know what to buy? That doesn't seem to be the case. God ... Yes.
Lars Erdner: The moral responsibility, that there must be people who are driven by an ambition, a fire spirit, to want to do something good from psychiatry or good from social service. And I don't think you see it today. You do your formal and then it gets good with it.
Reporter: Lars, you are a pensioner, why do you continue to work on this? Help Marika?
Lars Erdner: Yes, why do I continue ... Because I simply like her. I want to try to make sure that it is possible for me to do something to help her not end up where she did now at the dump, and where others have ended up not fitting in, but can make a living.