|
Parliamentary elections were held in Finland on 18 March 2007.〔(Election Guide )〕 Early voting was possible from the 7–13 March. The 200 members of the Eduskunta were elected from 15 constituencies. Election themes included a reduction of income tax and VAT on food. A proposal for a guaranteed minimum income was introduced by some parties.〔(The Green Party published its manifesto in English )〕 The election debates were characterised by the high economic growth in Finland in recent years, which was thought to mean the government would have extra money to use on welfare services and transfer payments. Largest advertising budgets were spent by the Coalition Party (2,46 M€) and the Center Party (2,48 M€) with SDP far behind (1,37 M€).〔Porvarihallitus: (Yritysraha nosti porvarit valtaan ), accessed 28.3.2011.〕 Altogether, 2,004 candidates were nominated, 799 of whom were women. About three-quarters of the candidates were nominated by parties currently represented in Parliament. The number of female MPs rose as 84 women were elected (formerly 75), now comprising a record 42% of the 200 MPs. According to the newspaper ''Helsingin Sanomat'', the number of advance voters rose in comparison with the previous election in 2003. After the Tuesday before the Sunday election, when advance voting ended, the voter turnout had already reached 29.2%, which was more than at the same point in the 2003 elections. However, total voter turnout, at 67.8%, fell short of the 2003 figure, 69.7%, reaching a new low since the 1939 elections. Many prominent MPs decided not to stand in the election. Former Prime Minister (1995–2003) and Speaker of the outgoing Parliament, Paavo Lipponen left his seat, as did the fifth-longest serving minister of all time, Jan-Erik Enestam, and former Left Alliance party leader Suvi-Anne Siimes, who had harshly criticized her party after her resignation as chairman in 2006. Some former MPs made a comeback, former Finance Minister and presidential candidate Sauli Niinistö and the first European Green minister, Pekka Haavisto, former minister and National Coalition chairman , former foreign minister Paavo Väyrynen and rock musician Pertti "Veltto" Virtanen being the most famous examples. Niinistö also set a record for the highest number of personal votes, 60,498, which is almost twice as high as the previous record, and with the application of the d'Hondt method used in Finland, as many as four other National Coalition candidates were elected to Parliament on the strength of these votes. The date of the election was near to the 100th anniversary of the first Finnish parliamentary elections, which were held on 15–16 March 1907, and were the first elections held under universal suffrage in Europe. ==Electoral system== Some constituencies elect only six or seven MPs, resulting in a high election threshold for a given party,〔(Conservatives thrashed SDP in Finnish vote )〕 favouring large parties and reducing the proportionality of the result. Because of this, the party leader of the Greens, Tarja Cronberg, lost her seat in the district of Northern Karelia, the party's only one, despite their getting 11.7% of the vote there. Her case, made seemingly even more unfair by her impressive personal total of 7,802 votes, greater than that of most of those elected, has been held up in the media as a symbol of the flaws in the present system. The constituencies of 2007 were mostly based on the old provinces; the largest difference was counting Helsinki as a separate district. The case has sparked a multi-party initiative that could result in a reform, to become effective in the 2015 parliamentary elections at the earliest. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Finnish parliamentary election, 2007」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|