Election time in Finland

whiteonion

It's election time in Finland.
http://www.rte.ie/news/2011/0417/finland.html

I hope the True Finns get as many votes as possible. They are a nationalistic, anti EU-party. They want to abolish teaching of Swedish in school. They are angry about Finland having to contribute to the bailout of countries who did not have their house in order. Realistically the True Finns should get a minimum of 15% of the votes but more likely around 20%.

Duffy the Vampire Slayer

The True Finns combine left-wing economics with social conservatism. Sounds like the arch-enemy to the typical politics forum user.

whiteonion

I agree that Swedish should be abolished in Finnish schools. Finnish is not compulsory in Sweden so why should Swedish be compulsory in Finland?

I agree with their anti-EU stance, why should a country like Finland where they get less money on welfare and where the PS salaries are lower contribute to a bailout for a country like Ireland?

They want to take in less refugees to their country. I agree with that to. How can illiterate people from places like Somalia and Afghanistan contribute to the economy in a country where university graduates have difficulties getting jobs?

The True Finns are a voice of reason.

Duffy the Vampire Slayer

whiteonion wrote: »

I agree that Swedish should be abolished in Finnish schools. Finnish is not compulsory in Sweden so why should Swedish be compulsory in Finland?

Because a minority group of Finns speak Swedish as their native language. The government didn't introduce it for the craic.

Denerick

Duffy the Vampire Slayer wrote: »

The True Finns combine left-wing economics with social conservatism. Sounds like the arch-enemy to the typical politics forum user.

In other words, populist. They are also highly euroskeptic and will probably be a major spanner in the works if they get into government. Like a terrier biting at the EU's heels.

whiteonion

Denerick wrote: »

In other words, populist. They are also highly euroskeptic and will probably be a major spanner in the works if they get into government. Like a terrier biting at the EU's heels.

Eurosceptic is good, why should the the good people of Finland have to bail out nations who binged on credit and now acts like beggars and asks for bailouts? :mad:

Can you tell me any reason why no one should vote for the True Finns?

I minority of Finns in Sweden have Finnish as their native language as well, yet learning Finnish isn't compulsory in Sweden.

Unpossible

whiteonion wrote: »

I minority of Finns in Sweden have Finnish as their native language as well, yet learning Finnish isn't compulsory in Sweden.

Finland was under Swedish rule until the Russians took over, there are a few cities and areas where they speak Swedish. Aland is the obvious example, the only other place I can remember off hand is Turku. As far as I'm aware Finnish was never spoken in Sweden. So that would explain the language issue, however they do take it a little extreeme with Swedish. I remember my Finnish classmates saying they needed to pass a Swedish exam in order to graduate from college.
From my 4 years there (and the trips I make back every year), I always thought we had more immigrants here in Ireland. Helsinki is the exception, but up around the middle of the country immigrants were less visible. I honestly hope the TrueFinns don't get many seats because I hope to move back there someday.

Duffy the Vampire Slayer

whiteonion wrote: »

I minority of Finns in Sweden have Finnish as their native language as well, yet learning Finnish isn't compulsory in Sweden.

The Finnish speakers in Sweden are mostly recent immigrants and their families with the native Finnish speakers having been almost totally assimilated decades if not centuries ago. The Swedish speakers in Finland are a historically distinct group situated in certain areas, some of which have attempted to join Sweden.

JustinDee

What's the big deal? Finland, as a Nordic country, has ties to Scandinavia as Ireland has with the UK, mostly economically. Having Swedish as a curricular language is just logical, as having French here is.

whiteonion

JustinDee wrote: »

What's the big deal? Finland, as a Nordic country, has ties to Scandinavia as Ireland has with the UK, mostly economically. Having Swedish as a curricular language is just logical, as having French here is.

According to this party most people don't want to learn Swedish and because of the lack of motivation to learn Swedish they learn it very poorly and this is a waste of resources.

itarumaa

The decision to support Ireland&Greece was not actually well supported by Finnish people, it was a goverment decision, not people decision.

Now the Portugal decision did go over the election, so next goverment will decide about that. Accordingly the pre-election votes Perussuomalaiset aka TrueFinns are 3th biggest party now in Finland, so I would assume they would be in the Goverment. This is definitely a major change in Finnish voting history.

They are against money support in Eu, so it will be interesting to see what happens to Portugal decision.

The start of support growth of TrueFinns is mostly related to immigrant critisim, since the major parties were too scared to actually touch the issue, many immigrant critic persons are voting the TrueFinns for this reason.

JustinDee

I've yet to see any proof on this apparent conviction of theirs. Just a cherry-picked topic for populist agenda based on nationalism. Even though English is widely understood over the border, knowledge of an actual Scandinavian language is more important given Finland's relationship with Scandinavia. Learn one, and you're through the door to another two.

Sir Oxman

Results with 47.5% of vote counted:

National Coalition Party: 18.9%

Social Democratic Party: 18.8%

True Finns: 18.8%

Centre Party: 18.8%

Left Alliance: 8.1%

Green League: 5.9%

Christian Democrats: 4.3%

Swedish People’s Party: 4.3%

Pirate Party: 0.4%

Others: 1.6%

alan85

Out of interest is there any tension between the Swedish minority and the natives?

Dr. Baltar

alan85 wrote: »

Out of interest is there any tension between the Swedish minority and the natives?

None whatsoever. As others have said before, learning Swedish in Finland is a little bit like learning Irish here. It's compulsory, but a minority wants to learn it.

A worrying development with the True Finns I must say. Social Conservatism and Economic Leftism is the enemy of the Liberal man.

malkmoose

Well I am here in Helsinki at the moment and every single one of my Finnish friends are appalled by the result, Timo Soini leader of the True Finns played a great election by waking a lot of the sleeping voters, the more worrying part is that the other members of PS have zero experience in politic.

To boil it down the likes of me are no longer welcome in Finland even though I contribute to the tax system as a 'high earner' (according to PS classification). They want to return to the good old days of Finland that never actually existed.

On the positive side I am not going to worry too much about PS, like any other party that "grew up too fast", without any structure, without experienced bureaucrats, without enough professional politicians, will make a fool of themselves presto starting tomorrow.

whiteonion

With the True Finns as the third biggest party maybe the Finns will be able to veto these insane bailouts. I wish they got more votes.

malkmoose

whiteonion wrote: »

With the True Finns as the third biggest party maybe the Finns will be able to veto these insane bailouts. I wish they got more votes.

Unfortunately they are both xenophobic and homophobic, I won't play the racist card......yet

whiteonion

malkmoose wrote: »

Unfortunately they are both xenophobic and homophobic, I won't play the racist card......yet

I can live with that as long as they veto the bailouts.

Dj Stiggie

whiteonion wrote: »

I can live with that as long as they veto the bailouts.

But unlike Malkmoose, you don't have to live in Finland do you?

JustinDee

The EU is not even close to being their raison d'etre. It is a populist issue aimed at tugging at the nationalist heartstrings of some. Immigration will be next then those little social issues that seem to irk their kind so much.
Finland, like Ireland, did well over the years out of its EU membership re.structural funding and economically. Unlike Ireland however it hasn't been on a badly-managed and misleading economy.
But don't let the truth of the matter get in the way of the right-wing platform whatever happens.
Let the misleading scaremongering commence!

malkmoose

whiteonion wrote: »

I can live with that as long as they veto the bailouts.

Most civilized societies do not tolerate medieval values such as Xenophobia, Homophobia, Racism etc. It would be interesting to know what other Human Rights Violations you would tolerate?!?!?

whiteonion

JustinDee wrote: »

The EU is not even close to being their raison d'etre. It is a populist issue aimed at tugging at the nationalist heartstrings of some. Immigration will be next then those little social issues that seem to irk their kind so much.
Finland, like Ireland, did well over the years out of its EU membership re.structural funding and economically. Unlike Ireland however it hasn't been on a badly-managed and misleading economy.
But don't let the truth of the matter get in the way of the right-wing platform whatever happens.
Let the misleading scaremongering commence!

An anti-immigration party is a good idea anyway. We all know what happens when you let in to many people from third world countries, you get alot of social problems. Maybe the True Finns say no to these social problems that the multiculturalism fanboys want to have.

whiteonion

Dj Stiggie wrote: »

But unlike Malkmoose, you don't have to live in Finland do you?

Why would anyone want to live in Finland anyways?

malkmoose

whiteonion wrote: »

Why would anyone want to live in Finland anyways?

Did you ever fall in love with a beautiful girl? And believe me they are beautiful here.

But back on topic, I think what most of Finns are trying to understand WHY people felt the need to make this Populist protest vote, because thats what it is a protest vote, this result is a lot to do with the growing inequality and exclusion, poor becoming poorer, more and more people living on the edges of society. When you've nothing to lose anymore, this happens

deman

whiteonion wrote: »

Why would anyone want to live in Finland anyways?

Education
Health
Countryside
Friendly people
A country that knows how to deal with snow and frost
Beautiful summers
Healthy living
Good standard of living
Politicians that you can trust (compared to most other countries anyway)
Equal rights between all
Music

the list goes on.......

alan85 wrote: »

Out of interest is there any tension between the Swedish minority and the natives?

The Finnish natives hate the Swedish speaking population and shot and bomb them at every opportunity and tell them to go back to their own country after 700 years of oppression. No wait a minute... I'm thinking of something else... The Finns have moved on from holding a stupid grudge.

Back to Perussuomalaiset... their supporters have more or less verbally abused me when they found out I was Irish and complained "their" taxes having to bail out the Irish people. I've been paying a lot more tax to Finland in the 13 years than the average True Finns supporter. This is the only reason that they got as many votes as they did... Ireland, Greece and Portugal.

Timo Soini is a very charismatic man with wit and charm and aimed this charisma at the working class Finn who felt left out and unimportant, until now.

-The working class Finn who complains about foreigners coming in and taking their jobs when they can't be arsed to do the same job.

-The working class Finn who complains about foreigners coming in and taking their women when they are too drunk to keep a woman.

The True Finns are a popularist party who are saying what (only) 20% of people want to hear. But they will NOT be able to hold their promises and if the government doesn't collapse in the next four years, they will lose as much support as they gained in the last election.

Agreed, that there are too many people coming from other countries and living off the state and this should be dealt with and has been dealt with quite well by previous governments. But this is not a Finnish matter, it's an EU matter.

whiteonion wrote: »

Finnish is not compulsory in Sweden so why should Swedish be compulsory in Finland?

How old are you Whiteonion? This comment seems very childish. As pointed out before, Finland was under Swedish rule for several hundred years. The language is part on the culture. Swedish used to be compulsory for kids starting in Year 3 (aged 9 years old) but now that's been replaced by a choice between Swedish or English. In many schools now though, they don't even have a choice any more as it's automatically English. Swedish becomes compulsory when kids go into Year 7 (aged 13, Secondary school).
Also, there are many companies in Finland that have Scandinavian owners. So Swedish is often a must for when doing business. Can you imagine your 10 Swedish business associates all having to speak English at an important meeting because you're the only one that doesn't speak Swedish. Swedish is being taught to a lot of adult business people because they didn't spend enough time learning it at school.

JustinDee

whiteonion wrote: »

An anti-immigration party is a good idea anyway

Well, have to say that I felt all along the reason the thread was started had very little to do with concern over Finland, its people or its relationship with Scandinavia and Europe.
Your previous post would indicate that this was the case, I'd say. A little political football to have a bash at in an anti-EU and anti-immigration rant.

whiteonion

In the early nineties Finland suffered a serious recession just like here and they had to suffer the austerity, now they are being asked to help bail out countries who inflicted their problems on theirselves. Surely you can understand the anger of the Finnish working class person?

JustinDee

whiteonion wrote: »

In the early nineties Finland suffered a serious recession just like here and they had to suffer the austerity, now they are being asked to help bail out countries who inflicted their problems on theirselves. Surely you can understand the anger of the Finnish working class person?

You are not speaking for the "Finnish working class person" or any Finn for that matter. I even wonder if you've ever been there or any of the Nordic countries, given what you post.

If I sign up to a Trade Bloc, I know what I'm signing up to. Finland has done well out of the EU and Eurozone. They're in it as much as any other member, not just for the good.

whiteonion

JustinDee wrote: »

You are not speaking for the "Finnish working class person" or any Finn for that matter. I even wonder if you've ever been there or any of the Nordic countries, given what you post.

If I sign up to a Trade Bloc, I know what I'm signing up to. Finland has done well out of the EU and Eurozone. They're in it as much as any other member, not just for the good.

Most Swedish, Finnish, Danish and German people I know don't feel like bailing out the PIIGS. They all feel that the PIIGS problems were self inflicted and they should deal with it on their own. No one signed up to bail out failed states with a populace unfit to govern themselves.

View

whiteonion wrote: »

In the early nineties Finland suffered a serious recession just like here and they had to suffer the austerity, now they are being asked to help bail out countries who inflicted their problems on theirselves. Surely you can understand the anger of the Finnish working class person?

Finland wasn't a member of the EU in the early nineties. As such, expecting a "bailout" loan from the EU would have been a bit much...

whiteonion

View wrote: »

Finland wasn't a member of the EU in the early nineties. As such, expecting a "bailout" loan from the EU would have been a bit much...

Why should countries who acted irresponsibly be able to expect bailout money from normal countries who acted in a prudent manner and did not blow all their money on idiotic spending and tax breaks towards real estate?

These countries should suffer the consequences. Why should people who get less social welfare and have lower public sector salaries help to bailout countries like Ireland? WHY?

If I was in charge I would throw the PIIGS to the wolves for slaughter.

beeftotheheels

whiteonion wrote: »

Why should countries who acted irresponsibly be able to expect bailout money from normal countries who acted in a prudent manner and did not blow all their money on idiotic spending and tax breaks towards real estate?

These countries should suffer the consequences. Why should people who get less social welfare and have lower public sector salaries help to bailout countries like Ireland? WHY?

If I was in charge I would throw the PIIGS to the wolves for slaughter.

Because, and this goes back to the concept of actions having consequences which you don't seem to grasp, by joining the euro Ireland and Finland and all the other Eurozone countries tied their fortunes together. A European response to the crisis is not required purely to help Ireland, Greece, Portugal etc, it is also required to stop the problem spreading to other Eurozone members through contagion.

The Financial markets are a house of cards based on trust, when they lose that trust they collapse. If the markets saw Europe allowing the peripheral countries to fail, they could then turn their attention to the next weaker Member States, including some of those who are currently contributors to the bail out fund, and economies which look to be surviving now could find themselves in a mess next week.

JustinDee

whiteonion wrote: »

Most Swedish, Finnish, Danish and German people I know don't feel like bailing out the PIIGS. They all feel that the PIIGS problems were self inflicted and they should deal with it on their own. No one signed up to bail out failed states with a populace unfit to govern themselves.

No-one wants to but its part of the basis of membership of a trade zone such as the EU.
In for the sh*t as well as the shinola.
I'm sure these swathes of Scandinavians, Finns and Germans that you allegedly know should even realise this.

whiteonion

beeftotheheels wrote: »

Because, and this goes back to the concept of actions having consequences which you don't seem to grasp, by joining the euro Ireland and Finland and all the other Eurozone countries tied their fortunes together. A European response to the crisis is not required purely to help Ireland, Greece, Portugal etc, it is also required to stop the problem spreading to other Eurozone members through contagion.

The Financial markets are a house of cards based on trust, when they lose that trust they collapse. If the markets saw Europe allowing the peripheral countries to fail, they could then turn their attention to the next weaker Member States, including some of those who are currently contributors to the bail out fund, and economies which look to be surviving now could find themselves in a mess next week.

I don't think the Finnish people want to bail out gamblers who spend a fortune on the PIIGS countries, why would the electorate otherwise vote for the True Finns?

I hope the True Finns make sure that Finland vetoes this madness.

I say let the markets fall, if you allow the markets to go up I see no reason to not allow the markets to go down.

whiteonion

JustinDee wrote: »

No-one wants to but its part of the basis of membership of a trade zone such as the EU.
In for the sh*t as well as the shinola.
I'm sure these swathes of Scandinavians, Finns and Germans that you allegedly know should even realise this.

The public wasn't informed about this when they voted for EU membership. Perhaps it's for the best if we dissolve the EU all together. If I could vote in my home country to exit the EU I would. All the time it has been a member it has been a net contributor of funds and now they cry for even more money.

Fook em'

Unpossible

On one side we have the bailed out countries complaining that the ones providing the money are making a profit out of the loan repayments. On the other side the ones providing the loans are complaining about bailing out others.

JustinDee

whiteonion wrote: »

The public wasn't informed about this when they voted for EU membership. Perhaps it's for the best if we dissolve the EU all together. If I could vote in my home country to exit the EU I would. All the time it has been a member it has been a net contributor of funds and now they cry for even more money.

Fook em'

The EU is your country's (UK, judging by your posts) largest market. Opting out would be equally as dumb as getting to a stage in one's economy where a huge loan is required.
Or are you going to try and laughably argue that the UK can be self-subsistant?

View

Unpossible wrote: »

On one side we have the bailed out countries complaining that the ones providing the money are making a profit out of the loan repayments. On the other side the ones providing the loans are complaining about bailing out others.

There is some justification for the tax-payers in the bailing out states for complaining. Taking out a loan (to loan to Ireland for instance) costs them additional interest payments which they have to pay for out of either increased taxes or reduced services. It is one thing to expect a Finn to pay increased taxes for a loan to cover hospitals services in Lahti, quite another when those services will be provided in Limerick...

beeftotheheels

View wrote: »

There is some justification for the tax-payers in the bailing out states for complaining. Taking out a loan (to loan to Ireland for instance) costs them additional interest payments which they have to pay for out of either increased taxes or reduced services. It is one thing to expect a Finn to pay increased taxes for a loan to cover hospitals services in Lahti, quite another when those services will be provided in Limerick...

I think the point is that the interest from their loan to us will more than pay for the interest on their loan since we are not being lent the funds at the lenders borrowing rates. If this is true, it does not require increased taxes/ reduced services for the lenders.

Whether we are credit worthy is probably the bigger issue!

Unpossible

View wrote: »

There is some justification for the tax-payers in the bailing out states for complaining. Taking out a loan (to loan to Ireland for instance) costs them additional interest payments which they have to pay for out of either increased taxes or reduced services. It is one thing to expect a Finn to pay increased taxes for a loan to cover hospitals services in Lahti, quite another when those services will be provided in Limerick...

Well if the Finns are borrowing at say 4% and are getting less than 4% on their loans to Ireland then they are either fantastic european brothers or fiscally stupid. Finland is obviously better at fiscal management so they won't be lending to us for less than they are borrowing at. The big question is how much of a profit are they expecting; are they borrowing at 4% and lending to us at 5% ?
Even more importantly as Beef pointed out, will it stop us defaulting and costing you the money anyway.

The numbers I just made up to illustrate my point, I don't know how much Finland is borrowing or lending at. Finland's recession was painfull too, I'm told the Savo region where I used to live is over 20% unemployed.

View

beeftotheheels wrote: »

I think the point is that the interest from their loan to us will more than pay for the interest on their loan since we are not being lent the funds at the lenders borrowing rates. If this is true, it does not require increased taxes/ reduced services for the lenders.

Whether we are credit worthy is probably the bigger issue!

Increasing your borrowings effects your credit ratings which means you pay higher interest on all your other future borrowings. In addition, as the risk of us defaulting is not zero, this also feeds through - as, worst case scenario, we default (pay them no interest and/or principal) and the other state ends up having to pay back the loan from their tax-payers' revenues.

The other states are taking a risk trusting us and, given that a large proportion of our population feel extremely aggrieved when we are getting loans at a third less than market rates, it is questionable if that risk is justifiable.

View

Unpossible wrote: »

Well if the Finns are borrowing at say 4% and are getting less than 4% on their loans to Ireland then they are either fantastic european brothers or fiscally stupid. Finland is obviously better at fiscal management so they won't be lending to us for less than they are borrowing at. The big question is how much of a profit are they expecting; are they borrowing at 4% and lending to us at 5% ?
Even more importantly as Beef pointed out, will it stop us defaulting and costing you the money anyway.

The numbers I just made up to illustrate my point, I don't know how much Finland is borrowing or lending at. Finland's recession was painfull too, I'm told the Savo region where I used to live is over 20% unemployed.

The interest rate charged on a loan is a function of the perceived risk of the loan. Unless you are of the opinion that the risk of Ireland defaulting is less than or equal to that of Finland, then the interest rate we will be charged will be higher on any loan we receive.

I should point out "the markets" will loan to us at circa 10% at the moment if we'd prefer instead. Finland are charging us less though, so why should we opt to borrow from the markets?

Unpossible

View wrote: »

The interest rate charged on a loan is a function of the perceived risk of the loan. Unless you are of the opinion that the risk of Ireland defaulting is less than or equal to that of Finland, then the interest rate we will be charged will be higher on any loan we receive.

I should point out "the markets" will loan to us at circa 10% at the moment if we'd prefer instead. Finland are charging us less though, so why should we opt to borrow from the markets?

I think you might have gotten the wrong idea from my post. I'm not complaining about the interest rates we are going to get from the other EU members, as you have pointed out it is far lower than what the market will give us. My point was more aimed at those complaining about having to lend us the funds.

View wrote:

Increasing your borrowings effects your credit ratings which means you pay higher interest on all your other future borrowings.

Has it effected the credit rating of the EU members contributing to the bailout fund? That is a problem if it has.

View wrote:

worst case scenario, we default (pay them no interest and/or principal) and the other state ends up having to pay back the loan from their tax-payers' revenues.

I think we had already said that, although maybe we didn't articulate it as well as you did.

View wrote:

The other states are taking a risk trusting us and, given that a large proportion of our population feel extremely aggrieved when we are getting loans at a third less than market rates, it is questionable if that risk is justifiable.

Nobody is happy, if this thing goes wrong it will bea disaster.

View

Unpossible wrote: »

I think you might have gotten the wrong idea from my post. I'm not complaining about the interest rates we are going to get from the other EU members, as you have pointed out it is far lower than what the market will give us. My point was more aimed at those complaining about having to lend us the funds.

Fair enough, maybe I did - that said, I can understand them engaging in grumbling about it on principle and if, we chose to spend the next few years complaining about them loaning us money that we wanted to borrow, I'd have to confess their grumbling would be entirely justified.

Cork boy 55

When finland had its big crash back in 1990-1992 did it get an IMF loan?

Unpossible

Cork boy 55 wrote: »

When finland had its big crash back in 1990-1992 did it get an IMF loan?

Wasn't Ollie Rehn the minister for finance that got them out of it? I think we could have handled things better here, if it weren't for some incompetant ministers that wouldn't listen to anyone.

deman

Perussuomalainen's gains on Sunday have already started to cause problems. The small amount of racists n Finland seem to think that PS's newfound popularity has given them the green light to shout racist remarks at foreigners and tell them to go back home.

But as popular as PS are right now, they are also the hated party in Finland. I have not met one person who hasn't told me that this is a disaster for the country and they are seriously embarrassed that this was allowed to happen.

Fo Real

deman wrote: »

But as popular as PS are right now, they are also the hated party in Finland. I have not met one person who hasn't told me that this is a disaster for the country and they are seriously embarrassed that this was allowed to happen.

What do you mean by "allowed to happen"? The Finns voted them in as the third largest party! It's the equivalent of the Irish bemoaning how Fianna Fáil got elected for three consecutive terms even as the economy was going dwon the tubes. Newsflash - you elected them in! Some people love to deflect personal culpability and hide behind collective decision making.

From reading anecdotes from Finns on various internet fora, it appears that they saw what was happening to their neighnbours in Sweden due to uncontrolled immigration from the third world. Sweden is now the rape capital of the world. Islamic terrorism as thanks for hosting refugees. Isolationist and anti-immigration parties are currently seeing and will continue to see a rise in their popularity as Europeans realise that immigrants from the Africa and the Arab world bring a myriad of social problems and are incompatible with liberal European values. Best of luck to the True Finns Party.

Denerick

Absolute rubbish 'Fo Real'. Sweden is by no means the 'rape capital of the world' and they have had like one Islamic terrorist event (From a fellow trained in the UK) The Sweden Democrats by no means represent majority Swedish opinion, it was a one off election were they played the populist fiddle quite successfully. Besides the True Finns aren't as despicable as the Sweden Democrats.

JustinDee

Fo Real wrote: »

Sweden is now the rape capital of the world. Islamic terrorism as thanks for hosting refugees. Isolationist and anti-immigration parties are currently seeing and will continue to see a rise in their popularity as Europeans realise that immigrants from the Africa and the Arab world bring a myriad of social problems and are incompatible with liberal European values

Very distorted cherry-picking.
The most REPORTED rapes in Europe between 2004 and 2008. This means most rapes in that time, does it?

Pakistan, where most of the second and third generation migrants to southern Sweden are from, is not in the Arab world, by the way.