The Social Democratic Party has benefited from a re-distribution of support within the green-left bloc – namely, at the expense of the Left Alliance and Green League, according to Tuomo Turja, the research director at Taloustutkimus.
“The Left Alliance seems to now have lost some of the support it got following its excellent performance in the European elections. Also the Greens’ support has dropped moderately. The Social Democrats, meanwhile, has managed to hold on to its supporters very well but has probably also won over some of the people who in the summer supported the Left Alliance,” he commented to YLE on Thursday.
Also the National Coalition and Finns Party both saw their popularity increase, the former by 0.3 points to 21.9 per cent and the latter by 0.8 points to 16.7 per cent. The Finns Party made gains for already the third consecutive month despite the public debate over spending cuts in the build-up to last week’s budget session.
Turja pointed out that supporters of the populist right-wing party tend to show their disapproval not by shifting their support to other parties but by withdrawing to the sidelines. The polling data do show, though, that the party has re-established itself as the most popular party among blue-collar workers ahead of the Social Democrats.
The polling period also coincided with the launch of a government campaign to weed out racism in Finland, which prompted a number of sceptical and scoffing comments from leaders of the Finns Party.
“The Finns Party seems to have been on a modest upward trend for the past few weeks, indicating that the racism controversy hasn’t hurt it,” said Turja.
The Centre Party saw its popularity fall from 11.9 to 10.8 per cent, the Left Alliance from 10.9 to 9.3 per cent and the Greens from 8.9 to 8.2 per cent. The latter two stumbled due to the resurgence of the Social Democrats.
“The government’s cuts and tax hikes have the biggest impact on low-income earners, and the Social Democrats – as the largest opposition party – has profiled itself the best as a vocal opponent of the government,” he analysed.
The Christian Democrats and Movement Now gained around half a points to climb to 4.1 and 1.6 per cent, respectively. The Swedish People’s Party, in turn, stood pat at 3.6 per cent.
Made up by the National Coalition, Finns Party, Christian Democrats and Swedish People’s Party, the ruling coalition has the support of 46.3 per cent of the public, according to the poll.
Taloustutkimus interviewed 2,308 people for the poll between 12 August and 3 September. The people were asked which party would receive their vote if the parliamentary elections were held now.
The results have a margin of error of two points.
Aleksi Teivainen – HT
