In 1969, women were still in the minority and the majority of MPs were still mainly old men, and Dahl attracted some controversy with her miniskirt and the fact that she was an unwed mother.

[1][2][5][6] Dahl was a leading figure behind the reform of child corporal punishment laws, in which parents were outlawed from beating their children in 1979.

During the period of 1975 to 1979, when Cambodia was ruled by the government of Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge party, approximately 1.7 million Cambodians were killed.

In 1976, Dahl participated in a debate on Sveriges Radio about the situation in Cambodia, where she said, among other things, that: "It was completely necessary to evacuate Phnom Penh.

The problem is that we really don't have knowledge, direct testimonies, in order to reject all lies that are spread by the enemies of Cambodia".

After intense campaigns during her time in office, Dahl secured support in Parliament to shut down two nuclear power reactors.

This undermined Dahl's position, and in January 1990, she was replaced as Minister for Energy by Rune Molin [sv], who supported nuclear power.

When Dahl was appointed Speaker of the Parliament in 1994, Per Ahlmark questioned her appropriateness to the office due to her past statements about the Khmer Rouge regime, in his book The Open Sore (Swedish: Det öppna såret).

[13] In the debate that ensued, Dahl made a public apology in Dagens Nyheter, in which she wrote: "The problem was that I – and others – at the same time yet believed that much of what had been written about Cambodia were lies and speculation.

We believed – incorrectly – that it was part of the propaganda to accuse the new regime in Cambodia of even worse crimes that had previously been committed.

Ever since the terrible truth became clear to me, I've been in pain that I didn't grasp and repudiate the cruelties of the Pol Pot regime quickly enough.