Government formation talks will officially begin on Friday, but discussions on the outlines of the next administration's economic policy are already underway -- and the nationalist Finns Party is involved,  tabloid daily Ilta-Sanomat reports  on Wednesday.
 "No party has been excluded from the negotiations," a source told the paper.
 IS said that according to information it has obtained, Social Democratic Party (SDP) general secretary  Antton Rönnholm  is leading the intense negotiations behind the scenes and the economy is seen as one of the most difficult areas to find consensus.
 On Friday the SDP, which  narrowly won a mandate  to lead formation of a new government, will summon parliamentary groups and will provide them with a series of fundamental questions about the administration's programme for the next four years.
 The government is likely to comprise at least the SDP, led by ex-union boss  Antti Rinne , and the conservative National Coalition Party, chaired by outgoing Finance Minister  Petteri Orpo , according to IS. However it wrote that the populist Finns Party has not been ruled out, despite Rinne's comments suggesting that it may have been.
 "With regard to the government's composition, everything is still open," the paper was told.
 Migri "overstepped its authority"
 The Finnish Immigration Service Migri recently received a slap on the wrist from the deputy chancellor of justice for directing officials to retain the passports of asylum applicants. Another tabloid, Iltalehti, reports Wednesday that  the deputy chancellor ruled that the immigration agency  overstepped its authority when it issued the guidance in 2016 and said further that the practice is not based in law.
 In summer 2016, Migri issued guidelines to the police and border guards, calling on them to retain passports or other travel documents submitted with asylum applications until the cases were either approved or rejected. The directive specifically targeted people seeking international protection and the National Police Board had in turn urged police departments to comply with the recommendation.
 The deputy chancellor began to investigate the practice following a complaint filed in 2017 by one applicant whose passport was taken by police officials. The deputy chancellor found that Migri's actions violated the principle of legality and that the practice of seizing a passport as part of the asylum process was a matter that required legislation. In other words, the decision to retain passports was a matter for lawmakers to decide, not Migri, IL wrote.
 Following the ruling by the deputy chancellor of justice, the Interior Ministry began preparing an amendment to legalise the practice. A new reform that will make it legal for police and border officials to seize the passports of asylum applicants will take effect from 1 June.
 Finns fittest among western nations
 Finns are in excellent physical shape, according to another IL report. The paper  picked up coverage of a new World Health Organisation study  carried by Business Insider Nordic, which found that although Uganda topped 168 countries in terms of citizens' fitness, Finland ranked first among rich western countries, where work requires less activity.
 IL writes that as recently as the 1960s, Finland led the rest of the world in terms of the prevalence of heart and vascular disease among men. However the situation has turned around, in part because people smoke significantly less than before and have healthier diets. But Finnish residents are also keener on looking after their bodies, IT noted. The WHO study suggests that 56 percent of residents aged 30 to 64 engage in at least one hour moderate physical activity every day.
 Business Insider Nordic also highlighted the popularity of Nordic walking in Finland and the fact that schools and workplaces encourage students and employees to exercise.
  Time up for changing the clocks?
 Finland is hoping to use its rotating EU presidency to push through a final decision by EU member states  on giving up daylight saving time , says the southwest Finland-based Turun Sanomat.
 Although the European Parliament  endorsed the decision to abandon the biannual ritual back in March , the European Council, the body that defines the bloc's policy agenda, has yet to corral member states to adopt a conclusive stance on the issue. Finland hoped that this would happen during Romania's EU presidency during the first half of this year.
 "Finland's goal is to also get an official decision at the level of the EU Council during its presidency through to the end of the year. It's not that simple, given that there are 27 member states and each of them will have to ask national parliaments and governments about the matter and then draft a national position, but we are aiming for a decision," said  Maria Rautavirta , a counselor with the transport and communications ministry.
 Rautavirta said that it would still be possible to call time on daylight saving time in 2021 if Finland is able to push through a final decision during its EU presidency. Once the EU Council upholds the EU Parliament's decision, each member state will determine whether to retain summer or winter (normal) time as standard.
 Finland  has already indicated support for adopting winter  time as permanent standard time. However Rautavirta said that the then-cabinet's support for winter time is only an initial position that can still be negotiated.
 "The final position will come from parliament and it will then be implemented nationally," she added.
 A majority in neighbouring Estonia is said to back switching permanently to summer time, while studies show people in Finland prefer sticking with winter or normal time. Rautavirta noted that normal time would keep Finland in the same time zone with Estonia, while it would be one hour ahead of Sweden if winter time applies in all three locations.
 Edit: Updated at 11.16am to clarify how Finland would stand with respect to Estonia and Sweden if winter time becomes the norm throughout.


MPs began their work in earnest as a new session of parliament began at midday on Wednesday. Social Democratic Party chair  Antti Rinne  was elected speaker of parliament, a position that will be temporary should he go on to become prime minister.
 Rinne is said to be  in initial government formation talks  with all of the major parliamentary groups.
 According to established practice, if Rinne becomes premier, a representative of the second-largest government partner will take up the post. If the nationalist Finns Party are not part of the new administration, the speaker's position will probably go to the conservative National Coalition Party.
 The Centre Party, led by outgoing PM  Juha Sipilä , is not a likely candidate for government talks, having indicated that  it will join the opposition after heavy election losses .
 Rinne secured 187 votes from MPs for the position, while challengers  Laura Huhtasaari  from the Finns Party and  Antti Lindtman ,  Ville Skinnari  and  Tytti Tuppurainen  from the SDP, all got one vote each.
 Finns Party MP  Juha Eerola  was elected first deputy speaker with 172 votes. Outgoing Speaker  Paula Risikko  of the NCP grabbed 178 votes for the position of second deputy speaker.
 Finnish state protocol places the speaker of parliament second after the president and retired presidents, and before the prime minister for ceremonial purposes.


In a  letter to the editor  of Hufvudstadsbladet, journalist and author  Staffan Bruun  says that ahead of the  general election , the Finnish media failed to confront Finns Party leader  Jussi Halla-aho  on his most outrageous statements, such as wanting to bring charges against Finnish volunteers aiding migrants in the Mediterranean. As an example, Bruun claims that before the polls, no journalist pressed Halla-aho when he said he considered it illegal to help drowning children.
 Bruun said the Finns Party’s  immigration-centred party platform  dominated election debates, allowing the nationalist party to project 2,7000 asylum applications filed in 2018 as the country’s biggest problem.
 Now that Halla-aho is attempting to present a sanitised version of himself as the leader of Finland’s second-biggest party, the country’s media outlets have taken an interest in Halla-aho’s  blogs writings , but it’s too little, too late, writes Bruun.
 Finland's lost youth
 Business magazine  Talouselämä  picks up on  youth marginalisation , reporting that  improved employment figures  don't extend to young people who have fallen through the cracks or those struggling with mental health issues.
 Between 2016 and 2018, the number of 16 to 29-year-olds receiving disability pensions rose by nearly one thousand to 15,622, according to the Finnish Centre for Pensions.
 Some 20,000 children and young people currently risk multi-generational marginalisation, according to TE.
 Within at-risk groups, employment prospects have improved the most among young people with vocational schooling.
 Ticket disruptions
 National daily  Helsingin Sanomat  reminds readers that HRT’s  ticket overhaul  comes into effect on Saturday, 27 April at 4.30am. The update means it won’t be possible to purchase tickets from machines or load travel cards on Saturday.
 Disruptions to ticket sales are in store on Saturday as 3,100 card readers, over 500 ticket machines, some 1,700 onboard devices will be updated.
 The system renewal is four years behind schedule and has cost 100 million euros, according to HS.
 More  information is available in English  at Helsinki Regional Transport.
 Edit: Updated at 2.28pm to clarify that 2,700 asylum applications were filed in 2018.


President  Sauli Niinistö  called on lawmakers to seek the common interest of the nation during an address to the  formal opening of parliament  on Thursday. He reminded MPs that during the past decade, the government has changed several times and that the "old normal" was for government policy to last four years.
 "During this decade, we have already changed governments five times; on average, this is more than once every second year. The old normal was solid government policy shaped over a full four-year term," he declared.
 Niinistö urged the incoming government to stand behind joint decisions, rather than continue the divisive rhetoric of pre-election campaigning.
 "It has been striking to hear, also outside the context of the health and social services reform, the Government Programme or a decision made by the Government being characterised as something that was 'our demand', whereas that was 'proposed by them'," Niinistö said as he addressed MPs on Thursday.
 "It is equally striking when you hear a Government decision being described as 'just the policy of this or that minister'," he added.
 The president stressed that he would continue to maintain contacts with parliamentary group chairs. As he had done in the past he also extended an invitation to party leaders to joint discussions on security, one of the focal points of Finland’s EU presidency which begins in July.
 He urged EU member states to come together to identify areas of commonality rather than focus on internal squabbles within the bloc.
 "The tectonic plates of geopolitics are shifting, and Europe is facing external pressures and temptations from different directions. We can only thwart them together, within the framework of a well-functioning European Union. Otherwise we run the risk of allowing Europe to fall apart into different spheres of interest," Niinistö said.
 He noted that Finland and the rest of the EU will go to the polls in about one month to elect Europarliamentarians. He called for an improved voter turnout, saying that it would be a fitting start to Finland’s EU presidency.


As Finland returns to normal following a divisive general election result, parliamentary groups in the new session named Social Democratic Party chair  Antti Rinne  as leader of government formation talks. Rinne was widely expected to assume the role, given  his party’s razor-thin victory  in the recently-concluded election.
 Speaking during a press conference on Friday, Rinne said that the timetable for the formation of a new government will run a few days later than originally anticipated.
 The party leader distributed a list of questions covering 11 key areas to all parliamentary groups in his bid to zoom in on the optimal candidates to invite to talks on establishing a coalition government. Party groups must turn in their responses by mid-day on Tuesday, 30 April.
 Follow-up discussions will then take place from 3-6 May. In such a case, formal government formation talks will not begin before Wednesday, 8 May.
 Rinne told journalists that he would need to at least have an idea of other parties’ economic policy positions before embarking on the first round of talks. He noted that the original goal was to be able to announce invitees to coalition negotiations after May Day on Friday, 3 May. However now, his target is to begin those discussions on Monday, 6 May.
 Basic income or means-tested benefits?
 Rinne’s laundry list of key issues reflects the SDP’s focus on areas such as equality, education and the economy. These themes were central to the party’s election campaign and formed the backbone of election promises to remedy massive cuts in education spending and to reduce inequality.
 Rinne’s questions seek to determine whether or not other political parties want to improve services and social benefits. They also aim to analyse whether or not other parties would fund spending on education and benefits by possible tax hikes or by curbing spending in other areas.
 Queries relating to benefits reform are meant to gauge other parties’ support for means-tested benefits, where applicants must prove their eligibility for support. This point will require the Greens and the Left Alliance to consider their support for a universal basic income as an alternative to the current system of benefits.
 Disclosing possible red lines
 With respect to employment and the labour market, Rinne will be looking to see if other groups want to support cooperation with employee and employer organisations. He will want to understand if they want to maintain the universally binding nature of collective bargaining agreements. Analysts are eagerly anticipating the views of the centre-right National Coalition Party and the Centre Party on this question.
 Other key areas the survey addresses include testing parties' commitment to mitigating climate change, strengthening Finland’s policy and its status in the global arena, maintaining internal security while safeguarding human rights in Finland.
 Rinne’s questions also ask for proposals to ensure economic growth in the face of climate change while considering mega trends such as urbanisation. The questionnaire also tackled boosting the employment rate above 75 percent, developing expertise, education and innovation while aiming to gauge positions on social and health care reform.
 Rinne has also asked parliamentary groups to disclose possible obstacles they may have to joining a government led by the SDP.


Numerous calls led to security personnel taking steps to remove signs displayed in the windows of MP offices in a building of the Finnish Parliament on Friday. One sign demanded a tough law addressing climate change, while the other called for Finnish borders to be closed.
 The windows with the signs looked in on the interior of the Parliament Annex building, where a restaurant is located.
 "In my 18 years here, I can't recall anything like it," said  Lasse Jartti , a long-time security officer at the Finnish Parliament. He said he gave the order to remove the signs from the highly visible places, as he judged them to be inappropriate.
 Freshman populist Finns Party MP  Sebastian Tynkkynen 's signs, one with the political slogan "Close the Borders" and another inviting those who want to learn more about his immigration policy to visit his office, were on display for just one day before they were removed.
 He later  pointed out on Twitter  that it was only after he put up his sign that a decision was made to remove the signs, saying that the sign demanding swift climate legislation had been in the window much longer.
 "Different standards apply to nationalist sentiments," he wrote in his tweet.
 Tynkkynen told Yle that he planned to immediately put his sign back up if someone else makes the mistake of posting "left-green propaganda" in a window.
 Climate sign on display longer
 The sign calling for strict climate laws was the property of Left Alliance party secretary  Laura Koskinen , who is in charge of drawing up her party's climate policies. Koskinen displayed this sign and another that commented on Finland's forestry laws with the slogan "Our national assets are not for sale" in her office window about a week ago.
 "I wasn't aware that it was prohibited. I'm not upset at all; I removed the signs immediately, of course," she said, adding that she hadn't heard of or seen MP Tynkkynen's retaliatory signs.
 Koskinen says she had received the climate speech bubble as a gift. She remembers that it had been on display earlier, in another office facing the restaurant, during the last parliamentary term.


Finland's Social Democratic Party  (SDP) won the most seats in the 14 April general election , and the SDP chair  Antti Rinne has since been appointed by the parliamentary groups with the job of gathering together a coalition government .
 He sent out a list of 11 questions to each of Finland's parliamentary political parties on Friday, asking them to return their answers by 30 April.
 The SDP election platform posits that the incoming government should commit itself to keeping global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius, in line with recommendations from the  UN climate group IPCC . The Finns Party is the only parliamentary party in Finland that has not committed to achieving this target.
 In an appearance on an Yle's Ykkösaamu programme Saturday, Rinne would not reveal if certain policies would exclude some parties from consideration.
 "I truly hope that each of the parties will now commit to responding in a serious manner that shows their commitment to being a coalition partner – the Finns Party, too. Each of the parties' answers will be considered on an equal basis," the SDP chair said.
 Although he wouldn't say that the climate-scepticism of the Finns Party would disqualify them from the negotiations, he did make his own stand clear in the interview.
 "In my opinion, it is absolutely clear that Finland must adhere to this 1.5 degree Celsius goal."
 Better care for the elderly also tops agenda
 When asked what one of his main objectives for the four years would be, however, Rinne zeroed in on senior care.
 "The number of old people is growing rapidly and as we have seen in the events of last winter, we have major problems with the implementation, quality and accessibility of care for the elderly. The SDP made a clear election promise that will be upheld: If we are a part of the next government, new patient-nurse ratios will be written into law," he said.
 He also supplied some specific numbers for improving care services throughout the country.
 "We will insist that the government programme includes a decision to hire 1,000 more doctors and nurses. We are also of the opinion that basic health care should have a care guarantee for non-urgent cases as well. People should be able to see a doctor within seven days after it has been determined that treatment is necessary," he continued.
 Rinne said he seeks to form a coalition government that collectively holds a majority in the Finnish Parliament, in other words, at least 101 seats out of the 200 total.


Following news about alleged antisemitic, homophobic and racist Facebook comments made by Social Democrat  MP Hussein al-Taee , al-Taee admitted in his blog on Monday that they were authentic and he was the author. Previously, he had questioned whether they were written by him.
 Social Democrat Party Secretary  Antton Rönnholm  told daily newspaper Helsingin Sanomat that this admission of authenticity was news to him and the party, and on Thursday al-Taee will have the opportunity to explain himself at a parliamentary session.
 ”Previously he (al-Taee) had said that he would go through his previous posts when we asked him to check what he had written," said Rönnholm in an interview with Helsingin Sanomat.
 Al-Taee's made derogatory comments about Jews, Somalis, Sunni Muslims, and homosexuals.
 Press conference apology
 Late Monday afternoon al-Taee held a press conference at the Parliament House in Helsinki and apologised for his his inflammatory comments. He said his apology was particularly directed towards the homosexual, Jewish and Sunni Muslim communities, along with "many others" who were hurt by his Facebook posts.
 He also apologised to his supporters, voters and party as well as his former employer the Crisis Management Initiative (CMI).
 “I also wanted to apologise to the SDP about the fact that I haven’t been completely open with them. I did not tell them or the CMI the whole truth. I wasn’t brave enough,” al-Taee said Monday afternoon.
 The newly-elected MP said he will try to be worthy of the trust of his supporters and friends, adding that he wants to use his position as an MP to work towards preventing polarisation.
 Crisis Management Initiative removes mention of former employee
 On Monday morning political news publication Verkkouutiset reported that conflict resolution organisation the CMI had removed mention of former employee Social Democrat MP  Hussein al-Taee  from its website. Al-Taee had also removed references to CMI from his Twitter profile.
 CMI was founded by Nobel laureate and former Finnish President  Martti Ahtisaari  in 2000 and al-Taee became a newly-elected MP in Finland's recent general election.
 CMI's and Al-Taee's deletions appear to have taken place shortly after a Jerusalem Post article headlined   ”Finnish MP under fire for comparing Israel to Isis”  was published on Sunday.
 In the article,  Dr Efraim Zuroff , the head of the Jerusalem office of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre, told the Jerusalem Post that al-Taee is ”obviously an antisemite” referring to several different social media posts by al-Taee.
 Facebook posts cause controversy
 Earlier this month Finnish news agency STT reported that in 2014, al-Taee made controversial statements in Facebook posts about the situation in the Middle East, suggesting that Israel and the US had trained Isis terrorists.
 Responding to STT, al-Taee said, ”I want to apologise for equating Israel and Isis because that comment was simply stupid and does not represent my values in any way."
 Yle reported on al-Taee's comments last week when the  newly-elected SDP MP came under scrutiny over contentious Facebook posts  and his then-employer CMI said it stood behind al-Taee.
 According to Verkkouutiset, a political publication owned by the National Coalition Party, CMI's director  Tuija Talvitie  said that she was contacted by the Jerusalem Post by email after the paper published its article about al-Taee on Sunday. She reportedly said that the CMI condemns any inappropriate or degrading comments about any ethnic, religious, national or other groups.
 Verkkouutiset reported that according to CMI's Twitter feed, the reason that al-Taee's name is no longer on the website is because he started working as an MP last Tuesday and no longer worked for the conflict resolution group.
 Edit: Updated at 5:10 pm to reflect SDP's comments and Hussein al-Taee's admission of the authenticity of his social media posts.
 Edit: Updated at 6:31 pm to add al-Taee's apologetic comments made at a press conference in Helsinki late Monday afternoon.


A poll commissioned and published by the daily  Helsingin Sanomat  indicates that the most popular combination in a new coalition government for Finland would be the SDP and the centre-right NCP, rounded out with participation by the  Green League .
 The survey of just over 1,000 voters found around a third in favour of an SDP-NCP core for government cooperation.
 The next most popular combinations would be the SDP and the Centre Party, and the SDP plus the Finns Party. Both of these options were backed by about one-fifth of respondents to the poll.
 The process of government formation is being led by the SDP. The deadline for answers from the various parties to a list of policy  questions from SDP chair   Antti Rinne  is Tuesday.
 Actual talks on putting together a cabinet are scheduled to begin next week.
 Helsingin Sanomat points out that the most popular combination in its poll, the SDP-NCP option is also the most likely. The SDP came out of the recent parliamentary elections in first place while the NCP retained its position in third.
 These two parties, according the Helsingin Sanomat, are close on issues such as social services and health care, social security, the climate, and asylum policy.
 However, they have different goals in economic affairs. Helsingin Sanomat writes that according to the information it has acquired, the two parties views on taxation would be a difficult mix.
 The paper points out that the option of a SDP-Centre-led coalition is possible only if the Centre Party is interested in joining the government. Following its big election loss, a number of its most influential members think  it belongs in opposition .
 As for a SDP-Finns Party-led cabinet, Helsingin Sanomat points out that this would be hard, as a number of parties have announced they will not cooperate with the Finns Party.
 Regardless of which two parties form the core of a new government, they will need the inclusion of smaller parties in order to control a majority in parliament. And, for all the possible combinations, the inclusion of the Greens was the most popular choice in this poll.
 Centre response
 Oulu's  Kaleva  is among the papers today reporting the Centre Party's responses to a series of policy questions that may determine whether or not it could be a good fit in an SDP-led cabinet.
 Two of the key issues, according to Kaleva, are the party's call for an overhaul of Finland's parental leave system, and demands that taxes are not increased for entrepreneurs or corporations.
 The Centre Party stated that continuing positive development in the economy and employment requires that the next government makes commitments to a target of a 75 percent rate of employment and to balancing public finances by 2023.
 The paper quotes the chair of the Centre's parliamentary group,  Antti Kaikkonen , as saying that the threshold to the Centre Party's participation in a new government is, however, a high one.
 Prison violence
 Top officials at Finland's Criminal Sanctions Agency, the authority that operates the nation's prisons, say they are concerned about the deteriorating security situation behind bars, according to an article in Tuesday's  Turun Sanomat .
 This follows a report on Sunday by the news syndicate Lännen Media that an organised crime group, United Brotherhood,  is running an extensive drug trafficking operation  in Finland's prisons, leading to an escalation of violence.
 Criminal Sanctions Agency Development Manager  Pauli Nieminen  is quoted as saying that officials have been working to root out the problem with all the means at their disposal, but that "It's a different matter whether or not we have been successful enough."
 However, Nieminen denied that the situation is out of control, saying that it has been more a matter of isolated incidents.
 The director of Riihimäki prison,  Pasi Oksa , told the paper that it is often forgotten that the prisons have a crime prevention function.
 "Prisons are not, however, [sealed] bottles. Criminal acts, threats, extortion, and running gangs out of prisons are things we cannot ever completely eliminate. But, what we can do is to try to make it as difficult as possible," stated Oksa.
 Risky party trick
 Colourful helium-filled balloons are as much a part of the May Day celebrations in Finland as are student caps, picnics, and the Finnish take on mead known as  [sima]( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sima %28mead%29)_.
 And, once in a party mood, for some people it's hard to resist inhaling some of that helium in order to speak in a funny, squeaky "Donald Duck" voice.
 But, seriously, don't do it. It can be fatal, writes  Ilta-Sanomat .
 The paper reports on a press release from the Aga gas company pointing out that while helium is not poisonous, when inhaled it displaces oxygen in the lungs, lowering or at worst blocking oxygen intake.
 The gas can inhibit breathing reflexes, and just a few breaths of it can lead to suffocation and loss of consciousness.
 Ilta-Sanomat says that in such a case, check to see if the person is breathing, start first aid measures, phone the emergency centre and follow their instructions.


Times are changing, Social Democratic Party chair  Antti Rinne  said to crowds gathered at downtown Helsinki’s Central Railway Station for annual May Day speeches. Rinne, who is  identifying possible coalition partners  to form a new government after edging a narrow victory in last month’s general election, declared that there will be no more "legal enforcement" affecting workers.
 "A small country like Finland cannot afford to reject the culture of compromise and a contract society. We cannot afford a self-inflicted crisis of confidence," he commented, likely referring to the outgoing government’s  so-called social contract  that saw government transfer some social payments from employers to employees, lengthen working hours and cut holidays in the public sector in a bid to boost business competitiveness by cutting unit labour costs.
 Rinne also repeated a pledge that he’d made last May Day to introduce a 100-euro pension increase for low-income retirees.
 "Society cannot stand by while the elderly are in distress. This is why we have called for a 100-euro increase for pensions below 1,400 euros over several years. Experts say this proposal alone would lift 55,000 pensioners out of poverty," Rinne declared.
 The SDP leader said that the outcome of the election proved that voters were tired of a conservative government. He said that it’s now time for a government of the future and called for reforms to secure economic growth that was socially and ecologically sustainable.
 "I mean bold future reforms. Investments in science and research. Job creation. Caring. Social and health care services. Senior care. Child welfare. Support for the elderly," he continued.
 Rinne said that Europarliament elections due at the end of the month would determine the future of the EU. He noted that the failure of immigration policy had boosted the fortunes of the right in Europe.
 Finns Party’s Halla-aho slams fragmented party system
 Meanwhile over in Hesperia Park, Finns Party chair  Jussi Halla-aho  condemned what he described as Finland’s fragmented party system, which he said makes it difficult to form a majority government. Halla-aho’s party was  narrowly pipped at the election finish line  by Antti Rinne’s SDP, which won 40 seats to his party’s 39.
 The leader of the populist party pointed to Sweden’s system of bloc politics and the Danish model of a minority government as more functional approaches. He added that the results of the election should be reflected in the policies of the government that takes office and said that in the present system, small parties such as the Swedish Peoples Party wield too much influence.
 Story continues after photo.
 Jussi Halla-aho. Heikki Saukkomaa / Lehtikuva
 "The fact that almost all parties in Finland can join with almost all others is clearly problematic from the perspective of voters' consumer protection rights. In such cases, voting has no real impact on decision-making and it is not at all possible to deduce from the election result what kinds of policies would be forthcoming," Halla-aho remarked.
 Green leader stresses climate targets
 Pekka Haavisto , chair of the Green Party, which made significant strides in the election to push its seat count up to 20, said that his party is not prepared to compromise on climate targets.
 “Climate targets are an issue on which we will not compromise. The continuity of life on the planet, our wellbeing, our economies are entirely dependent on our environment. Eight parties have signed up to the climate goal or keeping global warming below 1.5 degrees. I believe that it is possible to find consensus on ways to do that,” he told the gathering.
 Haavisto also listed climate change as one of the central issues in upcoming European Parliament elections. He said that Finland, Europe and the world need a strong EU that can deal with the challenges raised by climate change, the decline of bio-diversity and technological development.
 Left Alliance chair calls out "inhumane" activation model
 Speaking in the southwestern cities of Turku and Salo, Left Alliance chair  Li Andersson  called for an end low wages paid to foreign workers and the complete dismantling of what she described as the inhumane and failed activation model, which penalises job seekers in the labour market if they do not meet certain conditions for maintaining their unemployment benefits. She said it is not enough to get rid of the system, but said it is necessary to develop the local labour market as well as worker competence.
 Story continues after photo.
 Left Alliance chair Li Andersson. Roni Lehti / Lehtikuva
 "The transformation of the labour market, the fragmentation of employee contracts and the growth in the demand for expertise means that people must have the option of self-directed study much more than today and the educational offering must be opened up at all levels of schooling," Andersson said.
 The party leader talked of the implementation at the European level of a Green New Deal model that would create new jobs by reducing emissions. The Left Alliance was one of the recent election's big winners adding four new parliamentary seats to take its complement of MPs to 16.
 Centre Party calls for support for families and pensioners
 Head of the Centre Party’s parliamentary group and a frontrunner  to replace Juha Sipilä as party chair  later this year,  Antti Kaikkonen , spoke to party faithful in Hyvinkää and Helsinki. He made a case for improving the incomes of families and pensioners.
 "This country must be able to increase the incomes of all cash-strapped families, provide additional home assistance and preventive services and ensure that people have the option to choose their children’s care [services]. It must also ensure that no young people are lost after completing their primary education," he declared.
 Kaikkonen reminded SDP leader Rinne of the promise he made last year to increase the pensions of poor retirees by 100 euros.
 Essayah "perplexed" by coalition talks
 Christian Democratic Party chair  Sari Essayah  said that she was perplexed by the array of questions that SDP chair Antti Rinne posed a survey he sent to all parliamentary groups in a bid to identify possible government coalition partners.
 "The complete absence of a few questions caught my eye. Economic and finance policy have been initially addressed in separate talks involving the four largest parties. This is a rather curious set-up given that it [economic and finance policy] is the basis of the government programme," she observed.
 Speaking at a gathering in Kuopio, Essayah said that her party indicated in its response to the survey that it would hardly join a government that would fundamentally undermine the profitability of work and entrepreneurship, likely referring to the SDP’s preference for hiking taxes to pay for social programmes. She added that from the perspective of families, three factors affect the profitability of work: income taxes, daycare fees and benefits.


Finland’s Office of the Prosecutor General has asked police to look into whether a preliminary investigation should be opened into inflammatory comments made by Social Democrat MP  Hussein al-Taee  several years ago on social media, according to tabloid newspaper Iltalehti.
 On Thursday afternoon it was reported that al-Taee had been admitted to hospital on Tuesday and that he was on sick leave. The anticipated duration of al-Taee’s sick leave was not disclosed but officially began on Thursday. He will not participate in parliamentary matters during his sick leave, according to the party.
 The election's biggest winner last month - by a very  slim margin  - the SDP is currently engaged  in initial government formation talks  with the major parliamentary groups.
 The SDP's parliamentary group chair  Antti Lindtman  said on Thursday the party would address possible repercussions al-Taee may face for his past inflammatory comments once he returns from sick leave.
 Denial then apology
 Al-Taee, who became a first-time MP in last month’s general election, admitted earlier this week that he was the author of several anti-Semitic, homophobic and racist comments on Facebook several years ago. He  apologised for the comments  in his blog and at a press conference on Monday.
 Last month news agency STT reported that in 2014, al-Taee had made controversial statements in Facebook posts about the situation in the Middle East, one of which suggesting that Israel and the US had trained Isis terrorists.
 Al-Taee apologised for that statement shortly after the STT article was published, but said other derogatory comments about Jews, Somalis, Sunni Muslims, and homosexuals attributed to him were part of a ploy to blackmail him.
 However he has since admitted that all of the comments in question were his own.
 Former employer, SDP’s reaction
 The SDP’s Party Secretary  Antton Rönnholm  told newspaper Helsingin Sanomat on Monday the party had not been aware of the comments he now acknowledged making.
 Some members within the SDP’s parliamentary group have said they felt deceived by al-Taee, but the party has yet not made any decisions about possible disciplinary action in the matter.
 Before he running for parliament, al-Taee worked for the Crisis Management Initiative (CMI), a conflict resolution NGO founded by Nobel laureate and former Finnish President  Martti Ahtisaari .
 On Monday, political publication Verkkouutiset reported that the peace negotiation group had removed links related to al-Taee from its website, following the publication of an article in the Jerusalem Post headlined  ”Finnish MP under fire for comparing Israel to Isis”  on Sunday.
 CMI's director  Tuija Talvitie  said that she was contacted by the Jerusalem Post by email after the paper published its article about al-Taee. She told the paper that the CMI condemns any inappropriate or degrading comments about any ethnic, religious, national or other groups.


When politicians use extreme rhetoric, it becomes normalised and can be experienced on the streets where it affects people's lives, says journalist and social commentator  Aurora Lemma , who appeared on APN to discuss political discourse in Finland.
 Tampere University senior media researcher  Heikki Heikkilä  agreed, saying that the groups affected by extreme language include people working with grassroots organisations as well as people with multicultural backgrounds.
 The APN panel concurred that the media have an increasingly important role to play in helping audiences to parse political rhetoric. Heikkilä said that over the past decade many Finnish politicians have become rather proficient in the art of "spin" or propaganda, while Lemma noted that politicos are increasingly resorting to catch-phrases to mask xenophobia in language that seems neutral.
 Heikkilä also pointed out that although there is a great deal of diversity among Finnish journalists, the media need to do more work to introduce more than two voices in a bid to providing balanced reporting.
 Racism more an opinion than a fact
 Both analysts noted that social media channels have made it difficult for traditional media to work in what he called a "hybrid media culture". He called on journalists to exercise caution using social media content as part of their reporting and to be self-critical and open up their editorial decision-making more to the public.
 Heikkilä and Lemma noted that Finnish media tend not to call out racism in political discourse. Lemma said that it likely because in Finland, racism is seen as an opinion rather than an objective fact.
 New Social Democratic MP  Hussein al-Taee  recently came  under fire  for controversial Facebook posts he had made several years ago about the situation in the Middle East, while  several Finns Party members have been convicted for hate speech offences  by Finnish courts - party chair  Jussi Halla-aho   included .
 If you have any questions, or would like to share something on your mind, just contact us via WhatsApp on +358 44 421 0909, on our Facebook or Twitter account, or at yle.news@yle.fi.
 The All Points North podcast is a weekly look at what's going on in Finland. Subscribe via  iTunes  (and leave a review!), listen  on Spotify  and  Yle Areena  or find it on your favourite podcatching app or via our  RSS feed .
 This week's show was presented by  Denise Wall  and  Mark B. Odom . The producer was  Pamela Kaskinen  and the sound engineer was  Joonatan Kotila .


SDP chair  Antti Rinne  is leading one-on-one follow-up talks with party leaders on Sunday to help determine the optimal candidates for inviting to talks on establishing a coalition government.
 On Sunday, Rinne began discussing parties' answers to a  list of questions  he distributed after the election. He met with the Christian Democrats, Finns Party and Centre Party. On Monday, he will talk with the Greens, Left Alliance, Swedish People's Party as well as the National Coalition Party.
 Rinne, who was named by parliamentary groups to lead government formation talks given  his party’s razor-thin victory  in the general election, said he expects to know by Tuesday evening which parties will be a part of government formation talks.
 “We’ll know what the makeup will look like by Tuesday evening,” Rinne said.
 Despite some internal division, there’s interest within the Centre Party, which  lost over one-third of its seats  in the general election, to join the government, according to information obtained by Yle.


Helsingin Sanomat, the country's most widely-read newspaper, carries a  story  on how the parties chosen by Finland's next likely prime minister, Social Democratic Party chair  Antti Rinne  on Tuesday will have long-ranging consequences for the country's future in terms of its system of social benefits, response to climate change and taxation. Rinne earlier committed himself to reaching a final decision on the parties he will invite to Helsinki's House of the Estates for government formation talks by Tuesday evening.
 The paper writes that "today is an exciting day in politics" because the decision the SDP leader makes about what parties to choose will have "almost as much influence as the election results", as even some parties that did not do as well in the elections might be chosen to participate in the negotiations. It says that the elections were so close and the field of political parties in Finland preceding the parliamentary elections was so fragmented that "power is only now being meted out in earnest".
 Rinne said in a Saturday interview in the paper that he was looking for an "suitable friend" from among the parties that had earned the next-best election results: the populist Finns Party, the centre-right National Coalition Party and the Centre Party.
 Shining a light on internet recesses
 The Joensuu-based paper Karjalainen features an  STT story  on cyberbullying, reporting on a recent study that discovered that only one in five parents in Finland knew if their children had been subject to online harassment and only one in four has done anything to prevent their children from being the target of cyberbullying.
 Teachers were found to be much better aware of cyberbullying than parents, with one in three having observed the phenomenon in their work. Both the 1,000-some parents and the over 400 teachers responding to the study's survey said they wished there were more digital tools available to safeguard and promote empathy online.
 Insurance company If's country director  Timo Harju  tells the paper that adult figures in children's lives cannot rely on apps to solve the problem, saying that families should do everything in their power to "keep the lines of communication open" and talk about the subject.
 Tracking down lead-foots
 The paper Etelä-Suomen Sanomat also  reports  this Tuesday that police in Finland are planning to start sending notices to Estonian drivers that have been caught speeding by traffic cameras in the country. Law enforcement says the crackdown will begin with Estonian residents because the clear majority of traffic violations by foreigners have been traced to vehicles registered in Estonia.
 The news agency Uutissuomalainen says offenders can expect their first notices in early June. The notice advises the receivers to pick up a ticket stating their fine at the police station in Helsinki's Malmi district. Finnish police cannot send the actual ticket to Estonia, as criminal penalties cannot be sent abroad.
 "The notice will have a deadline and if the recipient doesn't respond by that time, we can put out a search notice for the individual,"  Dennis Pasterstein , chief inspector and head of Helsinki Police Department's traffic safety unit, tells the paper.
 Another scorcher in store?
 And finally, the tabloid Iltalehti has the  first of the inevitable summer weather forecasts  that start popping up at this time of the year in Finland. The tabloid reports a prediction from the Weather Company that says that Europe is in for a hotter summer this year than normal.
 Foreca meteorologist  Joanna Rinne  says it is too early to say with any certainty how things will play out, but unseasonably warm temperatures in the south could indicate hotter summer temps are on the way, as southern and central parts of Europe are already heating up. She says Spain could even see the 40 degrees Celsius mark be broken this summer.
 Rinne predicts more high-pressure fronts over northern parts of Europe in the coming months, meaning clear skies. Last summer Finland had 63 days with temperatures over 20 degrees Celsius, the second-warmest summer in Finnish history. The warmest temperature of the season was recorded in the west coast city of Vaasa on 18 July, when the mercury rose to 33.7 degrees.
 The tabloid writes that a Nature Communications study from last August found that extremely high temperatures will be twice as likely in Finland and the rest of the Europe for the next five years due to climate change and a rise in surface temperatures of the planet.


Finland moved a step forward in the search for a new coalition government on Tuesday, as SDP leader  Antti Rinne  concluded talks with the centre-right National Coalition Party--but said that he would like to know whether the Centre Party would be interested in joining his government.
 Rinne is set to invite his preferred government partners to official talks on Wednesday, but as of Tuesday afternoon the situation remained unclear.
 Earlier the leader of the Centre Party’s parliamentary group,  Antti Kaikkonen , said after a meeting of his MPs that they had not yet decided on whether they were ready to hold talks on joining a Rinne-led government. A caucus of senior Centre Party figures were due to meet on Tuesday evening to hammer out their position on joining the government.
 "It would be important for the whole picture that the Centre was also ready to join [the government]," said Rinne.
 Rinne said the talks had gone well, but he would take his time before announcing on Wednesday which parties would be invited to attend official coalition-formation negotiations.
 Differences of opinion
 NCP leader  Petteri Orpo , meanwhile, said that his party and the SDP had a lot in common but also many differences of opinion.
 In elections on 14 April the SDP emerged as the biggest party with 40 seats in the 200-member unicameral parliament. The radical right-wing Finns Party won 39 seats while the centre-right National Coalition took 38.
 The Finns Party, which was thrown out of government in 2017 after hardliner  Jussi Halla-aho  took over as leader, has said it would be open to joining a government if it was ideologically compatible. However several parties including the SDP have said before the election that they could not envisage forming an administration with Halla-aho’s group.
 Orpo has since faced pushback from rank and file members and some MPs on the right of his party, who would like to keep the option kept open. He said on Tuesday that his party would not be willing to join a government that included the Left Alliance, however, and Rinne said that restriction remained in place.
 Traditionally the leader of the biggest party gets the first crack at forming a coalition among parties holding at least 101 seats in parliament, or trying to govern as a minority administration.
 Official government-formation talks will be held at the House of the Estates, the central Helsinki pile where representatives of the Tsarist-era Diet assembled between 1891 and 1907.
 This story is being updated


Finnish MPs voted 128 to 37 on Tuesday to rearrange their seating arrangements. The radical right Finns Party will henceforth be positioned on the right hand flank of the legislature, in a move that was staunchly opposed by their MPs.
 The Swedish People’s Party had requested a switch to a more central position so that they could more easily access translation services, necessitating the Finns Party’s move.
 The office of the speaker had approved the new arrangements, but with opposition from the Finns Party fierce the measure was put to a vote on Tuesday after a motion from group leader Ville Tavio to retain the current seating arrangement.
 “You won’t shut us up by moving us to the far right,” said  Juha Mäenpää , a Finns Party MP.
 Far-right or not far-right?
 His intervention distilled the substance of the complaint: that the Finns Party should not be regarded as a far right party. Finnish media have tended to eschew that term for the party, but international outlets including the BBC and AFP have used it.
 Several Finns Party MPs including the leader have been convicted of incitement to ethnic hatred, while others have been criticised for attending events with neo-Nazi activists. In 2015 Oulu MP Olli Immonen shared a picture from a memorial event where he posed with members of the now-banned Nordic Resistance Movement, an extremist group many of whose members have been convicted of racist violence.
 With one eye on upcoming European elections, Finns Party MPs ranged far and wide in their topics for discussion, talking about immigration and old age care home staffing in addition to the matter at hand.
 SDP group leader Antti Lindtman was bemused at the row.
 “If a place to the right of the National Coalition is okay in the European Parliament and in the Nordic Council is okay for the party, then why is it unacceptable here?” he asked rhetorically.


Social Democratic Party chair  Antti Rinne  was due to announce which Finnish political parties he wants to begin government negotiations with before midday on Wednesday, and Centre Party MPs took to social media to figure out whether joining with the democrats would be a good idea.
 Tabloid Ilta-Sanomat wrote  that top Centre Party politicians  Katri Kulumni ,  Mikko Kärnä  and ex-PM  Matti Vanhanen  posted social media updates and polls on Tuesday asking their Facebook friends and followers whether to enter the coming government coalition.
 Rinne was due an answer as to the Centre Party's plans on Tuesday, but instead the party announced it would "gauge its base" before answering. IS wrote that MPs had until 9 am on Wednesday to reply yes or no to a web questionnaire.
 "It looks like the election victors are not going to have a workable majority, so people are looking to the Centre Party. It's a simple question: should the Centre Party be prepared to enter coalition negotiations?" wrote Vanhanen late on Tuesday.
 Responses to Vanhanen's and Kulumni's queries were mostly supportive of joining a coalition, while Kärnä's more formal poll had received almost 70 percent negative votes by Wednesday morning.
 The official web questionnaire will determine what the Centre Party does, IS wrote, with the party's parliamentary group chair  Antti Kaikkonen  saying the results "would be respected".
 Falling interest in metalwork training
 Machinists and welders are in short supply in Finland as an industry-wide slump has caused interest in the work to wane,  wrote daily Turun Sanomat . Various companies are turning to foreign workers and international programmes to make sure their factories remain adequately staffed.
 Engineering company Skoda Transtech out of Kainuu, for instance, constructs trams for the tramlines in Helsinki and soon Tampere, too. TS wrote that half of the firm's 150 welders come from abroad, mainly from Russia and Poland, and mainly gaining employment through temping agencies or labour banks.
 Transtech CEO  Lasse Orre  said one solution would be to bring welding training programmes right to Russia, specifically to the industrial town of Kostomuksha near Finland's eastern border.
 "We have to figure out where to find welders, and Finnish people don't seem to care for the work," Orre said.
 The situation is not rosy at shipbuilding company Meyer Turku, either. Most of the workers are in-house employees, but now not even the basic training courses can be filled.
 "We started an intro course for plater-welders in March, and we were supposed to have one in the summer, but we had to cancel that," Meyer Turku publicist  Tapani Mylly  said in TS. "Let's hope there'll be more interest in the autumn."
 Dodgy school guidelines
 Meanwhile  newspaper Helsingin Sanomat reported  on a reader survey that found one in four parents have come across official school rules or guidelines about student behaviour that are prohibitively or even illegally strict.
 The paper wrote on Monday that a school in Tampere had sent around a form for parents to fill out ahead of a children's field trip. The form indicated that misbehaving students would be sent home with a guardian by bus, train or taxi – no matter how far away the destination is from the school district.
 For instance, a cab ride from Helsinki's popular Linnanmäki amusement park back to Tampere would have the cost the parents of a child from that school some 300 euros. The school's principal  Sirpa Raevaara  admitted in HS that the form was a mistake.
 "I admit that such a form was in fact sent to parents. We follow the Finnish National Agency for Education rules, and guidelines like these are prohibited," Raevaara said.
 The punitive money-related measures are against the Finnish constitution and the right to free basic education, according to education agency administrator  Matti Lahtinen .


Social Democratic Party (SDP) chair  Antti Rinne , placed in charge of forming a new government, has announced which parties are to enter formal negotiations. At a press conference late Wednesday morning, he confirmed that the parties entering government coalition talks with the SDP will be the Centre Party, the Greens, the Left Alliance and the Swedish People's Party (SPP).
 The parties that came in close second and third places in last month's elections - the nationalist Finns Party and the the conservative National Coalition Party - appear to be heading into the opposition.
 The leaders of the five parties launched negotiations at 2pm Wednesday at the House of Estates in Helsinki's Kruununhaka district.
 Centre Party chair and outgoing PM  Juha Sipilä  said earlier in the morning that his party was ready to enter talks on forming the next government coalition.
 Sipilä tweeted that eight out of 10 Centre Party leaders polled said the party should try for another cabinet term – despite their heavy losses in last month's parliamentary election.
 "Eighty percent of the party's council, board and parliamentary group members support entering government formation negotiations on the condition that the Centre's threshold questions are met. Twenty percent opposed joining government talks. I have informed Antti Rinne," Sipilä said on Twitter shortly after 10 am.
 The Centre Party has published a list of 10 threshold demands for the new government agenda. They include targets of 75 percent employment rate and balanced public finances by 2023, no increases in corporate taxes, no increase on farmers' financial burden, reform of regional administration into 18 provinces to support health and social services reform ( known as sote ), increases for small pensions and "moderate" increases in logging and "sustainable forest use".
 After Rinne's press conference, Sipilä said that the Centre Party chair would certainly be a member of the new cabinet, but that it will not be him for long. After the election loss, Sipilä announced that he would step down and called a party congress for 7 September to elect a new leader.
 Five-party coalition would hold 117 seats
 Yle reported earlier that besides the SDP and the Centre, the parties in the government coalition talks will be the Greens, the Left Alliance and the SPP.
 They would have a solid majority of 117 seats in the 200-seat Parliament.
 The SDP narrowly won April's election, securing 40 seats in Parliament, just ahead of the nationalist Finns Party with 39 seats and the conservative National Coalition Party (NCP) with 38.
 The Centre Party suffered a historic defeat, losing 18 seats for a new total of just 31. That spurred many party faithful to say that the party should sit out the next legislative term among the opposition ranks.
 The Greens and Left Alliance gained seats for totals of 20 and 16 respectively, while the centrist SPP held on to its 10 seats, including a representative from the autonomous Åland Islands who votes with the bloc.
 Rinne's decision indicates he was unable to agree on basic principles in this week's talks with the NCP. Political analysts such as Yle's  Paula Pokkinen  say that the right-leaning, pro-business NCP would be unlikely to fit into the same cabinet as the Left Alliance, one of the parties that gained seats in the election and which has traditionally been ideologically close to the SDP.
 Another Yle political commentator,  Ari Hakahuhta , notes that former union boss Rinne was still weighing last night whether to pick the NCP or Centre as his main partner in talks, but apparently decided that the SDP would be more likely to achieve its electoral promises in tandem with the Centre than the NCP.
 And an alliance with populist immigration hardliners the Finns Party was always seen as unlikely. The party's chair, likely future opposition leader  Jussi Halla-Aho , did not attend Rinne's press conference, although NCP chair  Petteri Orpo  did.
 Interviewed by Yle afterwards, Halla-aho predicted that the government would carry out "red-green policies" including "irresponsible, generous immigration policies".
 Orpo told the news agency STT that he believes the NCP can carry out opposition politics along with the Finns Party.
 "For instance, we have very similar views on economic policy. That is one example of an area where we can cooperate," the conservative leader said.
 12:13pm updated throughout, corrected number of potential coalition seats
 12:42pm updated with party leaders' comments and launch of talks


Talks aimed at forming a new Finnish government got underway in earnest on Thursday.
 Social Democratic Party leader  Antti Rinne , who is steering efforts to form a new cabinet, is chairing negotiations at Helsinki's nineteenth-century House of Estates.
 Story continues after photo.
 Antti Rinne Jouni Immonen / Yle
 On Wednesday he chose outgoing PM  Juha Sipilä 's Centre Party as the SDP's main partner in efforts to form a coalition – despite the Centre's disastrous result in last month's election.
 The SDP and Centre are the largest and fourth largest groups in the new Parliament, with 40 and 31 seats respectively.
 If the current talks succeed, they will be in a coalition with the fifth-place Greens (20 MPs), the Left Alliance (16 seats) and the Swedish People's Party (10 seats including the Åland representative). That would give the government a comfortable majority of 117 seats in the 200-seat chamber.
 Two right-of-centre parties, Finns Party (39 seats and second-largest party) National Coalition Party (38 seats and third-largest) would be in opposition, along with the Christian Democrats and Movement Now.
 Only four party chairs were taking part in Thursday's talks though. Acting PM Sipilä stopped by in the morning but then headed to Sibiu, Romania, where he represented Finland at an informal meeting of 27 EU national leaders – without Britain – on Europe Day.
 The ghost of sote reform
 Sipilä has led a caretaker government since announcing the  three-party cabinet's resignation  in March over the failure of the reform of social and healthcare and regional administration known as _ sote _. He is to step down from his post as Centre chair when a new leader is elected in September.
 One likely contender for that post, parliamentary group leader  Antti Kaikkonen , was among those replacing him at Thursday's Helsinki talks. So far all Centre MPs are taking part.
 Story continues after photo.
 Antti Kaikkonen Jouni Immonen / Yle
 The party decided to join the talks on Wednesday morning after a straw poll of party leaders around the country.
 "We haven't had much time to prepare for this, because just 24 hours ago we didn't know that we'd be here," Kaikkonen told Yle.
 Conflicts loom over Centre demands
 Kaikkonen stressed that the party still has 10 'threshold issues' that it aims to have included in the next government's programme as a condition for moving forward.
 They include demands that may be difficult for other potential partners to swallow, such as pushing ahead with a provincial administration overhaul that was  central to the failed sote reform , and an increase in logging. That would likely reduce the country's  carbon sinks , undermining the ambitious climate goals of the Greens and Left Alliance.
 Story continues after photo.
 Party chairs Haavisto, Henriksson, Rinne, Andersson and Sipilä spoke to reporters before the latter left for an EU meeting. Vesa Moilanen / Lehtikuva
 The Centre and the Greens also have sharply differing proposals for reform of parental benefits, while the Left disagrees with the Centre's views on corporate taxes and subsidies. Meanwhile the SDP wants to change or rescind the so-called  activation model employment scheme , key legislation pushed through by the past Centre-led government.
 "Dark clouds on the horizon"
 As talks began on Wednesday afternoon, some 200 party officials heard from an array of experts on eight central themes such as the economy, climate and social and health care.
 On the economy, Rinne cited the latest Finance Ministry forecast.
 "The starting point is that there are dark clouds on the horizon, both globally and in the European economy, with Brexit, the Italian economy and even Germany's situation. These must of course be taken into consideration in economic policy," the SDP chair said.


More people in Finland back EU membership than ever, according to a survey published by the Finnish Business and Policy Forum (Eva) on Thursday, which is observed as Europe Day.
 The poll, carried out by Taloustutkimus, indicates that 56 percent of Finnish residents have a positive view of EU membership while only 13 percent see it negatively. The rest, nearly one in three respondents, are neutral on the issue.
 The business think-tank has gauged Finns' attitudes on the EU since 1988 – seven years before the country joined the Union. The positive rating in the latest survey was the highest ever, while the negative rating was the lowest ever. The current 56-13 ratio has only been approached once before, in 2012 when the ratio was 55-20.
 Finns Party, Christian Dems most eurosceptic
 Anti-EU feelings were at their highest – 35 percent – in 2000 and 2007, according to similar polls.
 As the UK's chaotic Brexit process plays out, Finnish respondents' desire for a "Fixit" or departure from the EU has hit a rock-bottom level of 14 percent.
 The biggest increase in EU popularity since the turn of the millennium has been among supporters of the Centre, SDP and Left Alliance parties, which are among those now seeking to form a new government coalition.
 There are only two parties where a majority of supporters take a negative view of the EU: the Finns Party and the Christian Democrats, both of which appear to be heading into the opposition for the next legislative term.
 Young adults pro-EU
 The highest levels of EU support is among backers of the conservative National Coalition Party, the Greens and the Swedish People's Party.
 Men tend to be more pro-EU than women, and support rises along with respondents' level of education and socio-economic status. Respondents aged 18-25 reported the highest level of EU positivity.
 The survey results are based on replies from just over 2,000 people aged 18-70 in January and February. Taloustutkimus estimates the margin of error at 2-3 percentage points.


Finland will not be signing a declaration by nine other EU countries calling for the rapid reduction of greenhouse gases across the union.
 The letter's signatories propose that the European Union commit to becoming carbon neutral by the year 2050 and direct a quarter of its next seven-year budget to combat global warming.
 The joint letter was released at a summit in Sibiu, Romania, on Wednesday. The climate stance was signed by the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, Latvia, France, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. Germany, the EU's largest member state, and all of Eastern Europe are also not among the signers.
 Outgoing caretaker prime minister  Juha Sipilä  said he refused to sign the letter because of Finland's upcoming EU presidency, which begins in July.
 "We're so close to Finland taking up the chair that we have to avoid joining in letters like these," he said. "We must make compromises. This is the only reason we are not involved."
 No discussion
 Despite not signing the climate demands, Sipilä still claimed that Finland is committed in principle to more ambitious climate policies.
 Parliament's Grand Committee did not discuss the letter while preparing for the Sibiu summit, nor have there been any inter-party talks on the matter since the parliamentary elections. Yle sources said that both the Social Democratic Party and the Green League consider the prime minister's avoidance of the climate letter problematic. The two parties are now engaged in government formation talks with Sipilä's Centre Party.
 Sipilä said he believes that as EU president, Finland could promote some sort of compromise, but he went on to call the attitudes of many member countries "very uncooperative".
 "Finland has some aces up its sleeve," Sipilä said.
 The outgoing premier said his personal goal is to see a carbon-neutral EU by 2050, as the letter insists.
 Last December every Finnish political party except for the Finns Party promised to pursue stricter European emissions targets. However, Finland was also one of the few EU countries where emissions actually rose last year (+1.9%),  according to Eurostat .
 Environment Minister: Refusal won't affect Finland's policies
 Kimmo Tiilikainen , Environment Minister for the interim government, said on Friday that not signing the climate letter was the correct move for Sipilä and will not affect Finland's climate politics in the EU at all.
 "Finland is for carbon neutrality by 2050. That official position is clear to everyone," Tiilikainen said.
 The minister said that staying out of the climate missive is in line with good EU presidency practices; the incoming chair ought not join in smaller coalitions of countries, Tiilikainen said, for the sake of streamlining the presidency.
 "We have to learn the unwritten rules of EU decision-making and how to serve the union successfully. There's still a ways to go," he added.


Social Democratic Party chair and government coalition manager  Antti Rinne  on Friday rebuffed claims that lobby group representatives will have an instrumental role in  the creation of the next government .
 "The parties have chosen their representatives for the negotiating bodies themselves," Rinne said. "Lobbyists will come along only if invited by a negotiating group."
 All parties have recently filled out their negotiation teams, with Greens chair  Pekka Haavisto  saying his party is including various experts including Helsinki deputy mayor  Anni Sinnemäki , a former environment minister and party chair.
 "These negotiations are for the parties, not for lobbyists," Haavisto said.
 Rinne said the wide-ranging talks are going according to schedule. The groups will continue to plan their goals and methods next week.
 The financial aspects of the coalition will be announced at the end of next week, said Rinne, who promised leeway in the first stages of the new government. Talks will go on hiatus over the weekend, starting up again on Monday between the SDP, the Centre Party, the Left Alliance, the Greens and the Swedish People's Party.


The Social Democratic Party (SDP), which won  last month's parliamentary election  by a whisker and is  now trying to form a new government , appears to have lost its status as the nation's most popular party. That is according to an Yle/Taloustutkimus poll released Friday.
 The first public opinion poll since the election indicates that the top spot now belongs to the nationalist Finns Party. They are now poised to be the main opposition party during the next four-year legislative term. According to the survey, support for the populist party has risen to 18.8 percent, 1.3 percentage points higher than their election result.
 SDP support stands at 17.8 percent, about the same as their ballot result in April. Support for the third-place conservative National Coalition Party (NCP), 16.9 percent, is also about the same as their election result.
 A Helsingin Sanomat/Gallup poll published on Monday also showed the Finns in first place, followed by the NCP and then the SDP, with the Greens in fourth ahead of the Centre.
 The Yle poll also shows growth for the Greens, rising by 1.8 percentage points since the election to 13.3 percent – neck-and-neck with the Centre. The two parties will be partners in the next coalition government if cabinet formation talks proceed as planned.
 Also taking part in the SDP-led government negotiations are the Left Alliance and the Swedish People's Party. They both slightly lost support since the election, now at eight and four percent respectively. There were no significant changes in support for the smaller parliamentary groups.
 Bandwagon effect
 According to Taloustutkimus research chief  Tuomo Turja , the survey results are unsurprising, as parties that succeed in elections usually show a bump in support in the first public opinion polls afterwards.
 Turja refers to this as a bandwagon phenomenon. He says this has benefited the Finns Party and the Greens, but not the SDP, whose election result was weaker than expected. After leading polls by a comfortable margin for nearly a year, they eventually only won the election by one seat ahead of the Finns Party
 The biggest loser of the election, however, was the Centre Party of outgoing caretaker prime minister  Juha Sipilä . According to the poll, its support has continued to slide, down a further half a percentage point more to 13.3 percent. The data in this poll was collected between 15 April and 7 May, before the Centre Party agreed to join coalition talks.
 Taloustutkimus interviewed nearly 2,000 people. It estimates the margin of error at +/- 2.3 percentage points for the larger parties.


Professor  Markku Jokisipilä , director of the University of Turku's Centre for Parliamentary Studies, says that Finnish government formation talks may end soon.
 "I have a feeling that this may be wrapped up quite rapidly. It seems that there is political will among the groups taking part in the government discussions," he told Yle on Friday.
 Negotiations aimed at putting together a cabinet to govern Finland for the next four years began on Wednesday at Helsinki's historic House of the Estates.
 Social Democratic Party (SDP) chair  Antti Rinne , whose party won last month's parliamentary election by a razor-thin margin, choose the Centre Party of outgoing premier  Juha Sipilä  as his main partner in a planned five-party centre-left coalition. He also held extensive talks with the leader of the conservative, pro-business National Coalition Party (NCP), which is the Centre's main partner in the outgoing government.
 The three smaller parties taking part are the Greens, the Left Alliance and the Swedish People's Party. On Thursday evening, after the first full day of talks, Rinne said all was going according to plan.
 Jokisipilä argues those participating in the talks are motivated to succeed because there are really no other alternative government parties.
 "If one of the [parties] marches out or is kicked out, then in practical terms the only alternative would be the NCP. And if the NCP joins the negotiations, it would mean that the Left Alliance would have to leave," says the pundit, suggesting that the gaps between the two parties' stands on economic and other issues are too wide to be bridged within one cabinet.
 "Finns Party declared unfit for government"
 If that happens, the situation would become very difficult, Jokisipilä says.
 "I'd say there is probably no other alternative basis for a government. All the parties at the House of Estates certainly realise that. After all, the Finns Party has in practice been declared unfit for government by the other parties," Jokisipilä says.
 The nationalist party was in effect booted from the last government in 2017 when it elected a new chair,  Jussi Halla-aho , an anti-immigration hardliner who had been convicted of hate speech. They were replaced in the cabinet by a more moderate faction that split off from the Finns Party - and which failed to win a single seat in the new parliament.
 Meanwhile Halla-aho's Finns Party is now one seat short of being the largest bloc in the legislature, and topped two public opinion polls issued this week. Also this week they were moved – symbolically and against their will – to sit on the far right side of the parliamentary hall.
 Finland takes over the rotating EU presidency on July 1, and much of the country begins summer holidays on or around Midsummer's Eve (June 21), so Rinne is likely aiming to have a new cabinet sworn in by then.
 Four years ago, Sipilä's three-party government took office on 29 May after April elections. On 8 March this year Sipilä tendered the government's resignation after the collapse of its flagship legislation, a sweeping reform of the social and healthcare system and the nation's regional administration structure. Since then, his cabinet has carried on in a caretaker capacity.


Appearing on Yle's Ykkösaamu TV programme on Saturday morning, Finland's President, Sauli Niinistö, said he was closely monitoring  ongoing government formation talks  via the country's various media channels, and specifically looked forward to hearing some outlines of the economic policies proposed from the  prospective coalition partners .
 "Sometimes you hear talk of 'that's enough saving for now', but I understand savings to mean actually saving something, and this hasn't happened [in Finland] for ten years. Quite the contrary," the president said.
 He admitted that Finland's policies are exceedingly dependent on what is happening in the rest of the world, but said the economic forecasts are not the best.
 Leadership required on the environment
 Environmental goals are another discussion item in the coalition talks, and Niinistö says it is not his place to interfere. He said he did however wish to comment on claims he has heard about Finland being "too small a player" to make a difference with its environmental policies.
 "Now that Finland has taken over the EU Presidency, we must be able to say to the other EU countries that 'we have to' and not 'you have to'," Niinistö said.
 And before Finland can says these things with any credibility before the EU, and the EU for that matter to the rest of the world, there must be clear accomplishments to back it up, the president continued. Finland has to send a clear signal, he said.
 True commitment to the agenda
 Finland's President also continued his campaign to promote government stability after years of cabinet breakdowns. He said that once a potential coalition agrees on a shared agenda for the next four years, they need to stick with it – no matter how bitter it might taste from time to time.
 "Committing to the Government Programme is even more important than arriving at an agreement on its points," Niinistö said.
 He says that he remembers from his  own time in government  that everyone in the coalition was on the same mission.
 "We were all heading in the same direction. We understood the basic problems and we were fixing them. It would be a good sign if the new government sets out with this kind of mindset," he said.
 The glue that will hold things together will be found – if it can be found – during the tough moments in the negotiation sessions, when people lock horns, perhaps heatedly, and after long debates decide to reach a solution together, the president said.
 An emphasis on multilateralism
 Niinistö says he is looking forward to continuing the Finnish tradition of meeting with the parliamentary party leaders to discuss foreign and security policy issues that are the constitutional mandate of the president. He says it is important to hear the opinions of the opposition at these meetings as well.
 The Finnish President says he doesn't expect any significant changes in Finland's foreign policy, but he would perhaps consider a change in focus towards an alliance of multiple equally-weighted countries pursuing a common goal.
 "Emphasizing multilateralism is now of the utmost importance. The world has to return to a multilateral system. The only way to solve climate change and development questions is to discuss these things together."
 Countries should not only respect one another, but also multinational organisations like the United Nations. Otherwise, it will be difficult to make any progress, Niinistö said.


Outgoing Foreign Minister and ex-Finns Party chair Timo Soini announced in his popular blog on Saturday that he intends to write a book on populism.
 Earlier this year, the  veteran politician  chose not to run for re-election as a candidate in the general elections and also refused to run for a MEP position in the European elections.
 Soini was a co-founder of the Finns Party back in 1995 and is largely credited with bringing the anti-immigrant party into the mainstream.
 He says his book will spell out both populism and populists for the public.
 "What is it that drives or possesses them? This is no flash-in-the-pan phenomenon. When it comes to the world of politics, populism has come to stay," Soini wrote in his blog.
 Soini also confirmed that he had agreed to a few future speaking engagement invitations, to talk about "earthly and heavenly matters".
 Soini is already the author of two other books:  Maisterisjätkä  (roughly translated as "Academic Everyman") in 2008 and  Peruspomo  ("Ordinary Boss") in 2014. Soini wrote his Master's thesis on the topic of populism in 1988.
 Soini announced in April that he would be  ending his political career . He said he would serve out his term as minister and then be a "free Finnish man". Soini will serve as Finland's caretaker foreign minister until a new government coalition is formed and takes office.
 He said his new book will be complete before the year is out.


Thirty-four-year-old Ohisalo, a poverty researcher and Helsinki city councillor, gained 11,000 votes in last month’s general election. The Greens are the fifth-largest party in  Finland’s legislature  after the Centre Party.
 Last autumn two-time presidential candidate  Pekka Haavisto  was elected as the Green’s party chair after  Touko Aalto  announced he was stepping down from his party leadership position  due to health reasons .
 Haavisto said he would lead the party through April's parliamentary election but had no intention of continuing on as chair.
 The party will officially select a new leader at its congress in Pori on 15 June.


National Coalition MPs  Sanni Grahn-Laasonen  and  Juhana Vartiainen  fired back against criticism from Helsinki University communications professor  Anu Kantola  that the current government formation talks are the first time lobbyists have been excluded from government banquet hall Smolna, where negotiations are underway, reports online paper  Uusi Suomi .
 Grahn-Laasonen, said former PM  Juha Sipilä  barred lobbyists in 2015, but Kantola said that while some efforts were made to limit lobbyists four years ago, the interests of private healthcare companies with a stake in new social and healthcare reforms (‘sote’) featured prominently in subsequent government policy, an accusation Grahn-Laasonen and Vartiainen vehemently denied.
 Last week, Social Democratic Party chair and government coalition manager  Antti Rinne  rebuffed claims that lobby group representatives will have an instrumental role in  the creation of the next government .
 Voter apathy
 With less than two weeks to go to the European election on 26 May, business daily  Kauppalehti ’s leader says voter enthusiasm for the poll is low.
 KL says Finns have voter fatigue after last month’s general elections. Residents are now more interested in seeing how the new government shapes up than considering intangible EU issues. Just 39.1 percent of Finns cast their vote in the previous European parliament contest five years ago.
 Climate is a central theme in the European elections, a fact that KL says may encourage a higher youth voter turnout.
 Households getting deeper into debt
 Helsingin Sanomat ’s leader picks up on the Bank of Finland’s concern that Finnish households have become too indebted, partly because of the illusion housing company loans provide. The central banks say housing company loans have grown at an annual rate of 10 percent in the past decade.
 Today many new apartments in Finland's bigger cities can be purchased with a modest upfront payment that represents just a small portion of the home's nominal value. The bulk of the sale price then becomes a loan paid back to the housing company over time.
 The central bank wants to see limits on the total amount of debt available to households. In the past 20 years, Finnish households’ debt-to-income ratio has roughly doubled to 127 percent--a figure that is, however, still relatively low compared to the other Nordics.


Freshly-elected MP  Hussein al-Taee  will continue to be on sick leave through the rest of May, according to his party, the Social Democrats.
 The SDP announced that al-Taee had been admitted to hospital in late April for stress-related reasons, a day after he confirmed and issued public apologies for having made inflammatory comments on social media several years ago.
 al-Taee found himself at the centre of controversy  after confirming  he had made derogatory comments about Jews, Somalis, Sunni Muslims, and homosexuals on Facebook in 2014.
 The MP has since been released from hospital, but when he was first admitted the SDP parliamentary group's chair  Antti Lindtman  said his sick leave was related to stress the new MP had recently been experiencing.
 Last week Finland’s Office of the Prosecutor General  asked police  to look into whether a preliminary investigation should be opened regarding al-Taee's comments. However police have since announced that they had no reason to suspect the MP of criminal breaches related to the comments.


Veteran politician Paavo Väyrynen has announced that he is leaving the party he  founded less than a year ago , the Seven Star Movement. The party confirmed his departure on Monday.
 Väyrynen, who is running for an MEP seat said he will continue to lead the party until EU parliamentary elections are held later this month, but plans to step down from his position as chair.
 According to the party, if Väyrynen is elected as an MEP he plans to join an Italian-based political group called the Five Star Movement.
 Väyrynen has also previously said he's planning a run for Finnish president in 2024 on the Seven Star ticket, and the party supported those plans during its annual meeting.
 However, if he does run for president, it's expected that Väyrynen will establish a new political movement in Finland.
 "Every Finn should be able to support Väyrynen," the party said in a press release issued Monday.
 Väyrynen established party last year
 Väyrynen, who has nearly 50 years of experience in Finnish politics, started the Seven Star Movement last summer.
 At the time he said he was creating the new party  due to lawsuits  involving the Citizens’ Party,  which he also founded in 2016 .
 The party made headlines when the founder of an anti-immigrant website,  Ilja Janitskin ,  announced he was running  for both the Finnish and EU parliaments on the Seven Star Movement ticket.
 Late last year, Janitskin was found guilty of 16 criminal charges related to his websites and handed a  22-month prison sentence  by Helsinki District Court.
 In the Finnish general election Janitskin received 390 votes and was not elected, and eventually dropped his bid for an MEP seat.
 The future of the Seven Star Movement may become clearer following the party's board next meeting, which is scheduled on 27 May.


The Helsinki tabloid  Iltalehti  writes that last week the parties in government formation talks spent their time examining the lay of the land and creating visions of the future. This week, it says, they will have to deal with economic and political realities.
 In a listing of some of the key points a new government programme will have to tackle, Iltalehti argues that a reform of health and social services will be the biggest and most important task at hand.
 The SDP, the Centre, the Greens, the Left Alliance and the Swedish People's Party involved in the talks have very different concepts of how the social safety net should be revamped. The SDP's  Antti Rinne , who is leading government formation talks, has pledged that reforms will be prepared by parliament, but this newspaper expresses doubts that it will be any easier that way.
 Among the other issues that Iltalehti believes will be causing headaches for negotiators are forestry policy, taxation and changes to the system of parental leave.
 One of the redline demands by the Centre is that higher taxes are not imposed by a new government on businesses and entrepreneurs. The SDP wants to target tax relief on small and mid-sized businesses and to more heavily tax the dividends paid out by unlisted companies, as well as more generally, ownership and capital.
 This leads the paper to the question: which party will give in? The Centre has announced that it will not back away a single inch from its key demands. Iltalehti though wonders whether or not it already has done so behind closed doors.
 Reining in lobbyists
 Tensions rose in the government formation talks last week over claims that lobby group representatives had been named by some of the parties to take part in formulating the programme for a new coalition.
 Although Social Democratic Party chair and government coalition manager Antti Rinne  rebuffed those claims , concerns about the role of lobbyists in Finnish politics are still very much alive.
 The agrarian paper  Maaseudun Tulevaisuus  writes that Rinne says that all of the parties in the talks have agreed on presenting parliament with legislation to set up a register of lobbyists.
 According to Centre chair and outgoing PM  Juha Sipilä , the cabinet office and parliament have both carried out work on establishing a registry of organizations and individuals involved in political lobbying. Rinne stated Monday that the work will move ahead and that he expects that a new law could be brought into force quite quickly.
 EU paradox
 Pointing to news that only  about 10 percent of young residents in Finland between the ages of 18-24 voted in the last EU parliamentary election , the daily  Helsingin Sanomat  reports one expert as calling this a "special paradox".
 This paper says that this past winter and now into the spring, young people have been calling for more powerful action to combat climate change. The young want long-term solutions from politicians.
 If there is one place where Finns have been able to influence climate change on a global level and the direction of Europe, that place is in the decision-making bodies of the European Union, writes HS.
 It is thus a "strange equation" when only 10 percent of young Finns voted in the 2014 parliamentary election.
 "Taking into consideration how intelligent and well educated our young people are, and in fact how well aware they are of European affairs, this is a special paradox," the head of Finland's EU parliament mission office Jarmo Oikarinen told the paper.
 Looking for an explanation, Oikarinen said that some of the reasons may be that decision making in Brussels seems so far away, that EU affairs have low visibility in the Finnish media, and that the most concrete decisions, such as how tax revenues are spent, are made on the national level.
 Tax day part II
 Kuopio's  Savon Sanomat reminds readers  that today, Tuesday 14 May, is the deadline for many people to file corrections or additions to the pre-completed tax return forms received by mail earlier this year.
 Dates for filing with the tax authority are staggered, with one already passed on 7 May, one today, and one on 21 May. The deadline date is marked on the forms and is also available online at the tax office's "MyTax" (Omavero) service.
 If there is no need for corrections or additions to your return, you do not have to do anything.
 Digital driving licence
 Iltalehti  reports that the Finnish Transport and Communications Agency Traficom on Monday launched the beta version an android app that allows drivers to carry a legal copy of their driving licence on their mobile phones.
 The app displays an up-to-date copy of the driver's licence that, at least for the time being, is valid only in mainland Finland.
 According to Traficom, the virtual licence is intended to be used just like a printed one. Traficom points out, though, that it may not be accepted as ID, for example at sales points, until it becomes more widely used.
 The mobile phone licence has a number of security features including an animated background, colour-shifting holograms and a QR code.


Turku's  Turun Sanomat  is among the papers reporting that SDP chair  Antti Rinne  is optimistic that the government formation talks he is leading will produce a programme for a new ruling coalition by week's end.
 However, Rinne also stated that even if a programme is ready by Friday, that will not necessarily mean he will be able to announce a new government.
 Before that final step, Rinne plans on holding a two-day seminar for MPs of the parties in the talks to make sure that they understand what has been agreed upon and to get their commitment to supporting government policies.
 On Sunday, the SDP leader denied that the closed-door negotiations have been difficult. Turun Sanomat reports that talks have focused on plans for  at least 700 million euros in tax increases . These revenues are said to be earmarked for measures fulfilling campaign promises to improve spending on education, pensions and care for the elderly.
 Greens in the lead
 The daily Helsingin Sanomat carries  a voter survey  showing that two Green League candidates,  Ville Niinistö  and  Heidi Hautala  are the most popular candidates in next Sunday's EU Parliament elections.
 Niinistö is a former MP, Green League chairman, and government minister. Hautala is currently the Greens' only MEP.
 Third in this poll of more than 1,000 voters is former SDP Member of Parliament  Eero Heinäluoma .
 Finnish voters will be electing 13+1 members to the European Parliament. This means that 13 of the candidates elected will take up their posts when the European Parliament reconvenes, and a 14th Finnish MEP will join their ranks if and when the UK leaves the EU and the seats it currently holds are redistributed.
 At present, the conservative National Coalition Party and the Centre Party each have three MEPs, the SDP and Finns Party two each, while the Left Alliance, Greens and Swedish People's Party have one apiece.
 Meanwhile, the agricultural sector newspaper Maaseuduntulevaisuus carries  the results of a poll  asking Finnish voters if they would want EU defense cooperation to move towards creating a common EU army.
 Of those surveyed, 26 percent were in favour of such a plan, 40 percent opposed, and 34 percent undecided.
 When the question was put to 159 of the candidates in the EU Parliament elections, 84 percent were against the idea of working towards creating an EU army.
 DUI sentences vary
 The tabloid  Iltalehti  reports that the penalty for drinking and driving in eastern and northern regions is less severe than in other parts of Finland.
 The paper quotes a University of Helsinki study showing that nationally, on average, the penalty for first-time DUI is a six-month driving licence suspension and a fine equal to 50 days income for the offender. In cases of aggravated DUI when a driver is found to have a blood alcohol content of at least 0.12 percent, or 0.53 milligrammes in a breathalyser test, the median driving ban is 286 days.
 The lightest sentences, the study found, are handed down by courts in the north and east of the country. Younger offenders also tend to get off with lighter sentences.
 Under new legislation coming into force at the beginning of June, DUI cases will not go to court unless appealed. Police will determine the period for a licence suspension, and prosecutors will set fines in each case.
 Pollen season
 Tampere’s Aamulehti shows readers  a photo of a city beach  on Lake Kaukajärvi with the sand and shore-side waters hidden by a thick carpet of yellow pollen.
 Luckily for pollen sufferers, this is spruce pollen which rarely causes allergic symptoms.
 However, the paper reports that birch pollen, which does bother many people, is still  at fairly high levels  in central and northern parts of the country. In southern regions, the amount of pollen from grasses in the air is expected to start rising this week.