Yet another strange tale emerges from the supposed educational paradise that is Sweden. A primary school has been rapped by the parliamentary mediator for confiscating an eight-year-old’s birthday party invitations after he failed to invite everyone in his class.

Munspelets Primary, in the southern town of Lund, was reported to the ombudsman after teachers demanded that children return their party invitations because the birthday boy had left two boys off his guest list in May.

“The teachers had no right to collect the invitations against the pupils’ will,” the office of the parliamentary ombudsman said in its ruling last week, but added that the school would not be sanctioned.

Parliamentary ombudsmen are elected by the Swedish Riksdag to ensure public authorities and their staff comply with laws and other statutes governing their actions.

The father of the birthday boy, who filed the complaint, told the Swedish media there were good reasons the two boys were left out.

“One of them did not invite my son to his birthday party and the other has bullied my son for six months. You don’t invite your antagonists to a birthday party,” he told the Sydsvenskan newspaper.

The school argued that it had acted on an unwritten policy that either all children, or all the boys, or all the girls, in a class had to be invited to parties when invitations were handed out at school.