Wrong number

I’ve been part of the group that drew up a propsal for a new executive for Åland’s Social Democrats. After the group’s discussions we had to ring around to those we intended to include in the proposal. One name I had was Anders Ericson, a social democrat from Lemland and not the leader of Åland’s Future, Anders Eriksson. Perhaps you can see where this is going…

Roughly, as I remember the conversation:

“Hello..”

“Hello, it’s Andy from the party office. I believe someone’s spoken to you about the new executive and I wondered if you’d had my email?”

“..”

“About the new executive. I’m in the group the that’s drawing up the proposal. It’s Andy from the party office,”

“Which party office?” Sounding puzzled

“Is this Anders Ericson I’m speaking to?” light beginning to dawn…

“No, this is Harry Jansson, but I can give you Anders Eriksson’s number” proceeds to give me the number

“Umm… I’m afraid I’ve completely messed this up. I meant to ring Anders Ericson with a C, the social democrat from Lemland. I’m really sorry.”

Trying to stop himself laughing too hard “No, it’s not a problem”

“Bye”

still laughing “Bye”

I not only got the wrong Anders E, but managed to confuse his number in my mobile with that of Åland’s Future’s other Member of the Lagting, Harry Jansson. The new party secretary for Åland’s Social Democrats in action! Improving communication with the grass roots is clearly a priority!

Manifesto

I was at a meeting of Mariehamn’s Social Democrats last night. Top of the agenda was our manifesto for the municipal elections. I managed to get a change made to it with a positive reference to “hemspråksundervisning”. That is, that children with other mother tongues than Swedish should be able to get extra tuition in them in school assuming there are sufficient pupils and teachers qualified to teach them. As far as I could tell, there was pretty unanimous support for it at our meeting, but I read in the paper the other week that Centre are giving a clear “no” to it in their manifesto.

I’ve argued for it before here, but it was pleasing to get a commitment to it in the manifesto. If I’m elected its one of the things I will be working towards achieving.

Double Standards and Anonymity

Nyan has a report today on the case of a “leading politician” who has been reported for assualting one of his sons. The article is meant to provide the man in question with anonymity, but for anyone at all invovled in politics here, and probably for many who aren’t, it’s pretty obvious who it is from the description provided. In the report he’s called “Fredrik”, so at least you know it’s not anyone called Fredrik.

I notice there’s nothing about it in Ålandstidningen. They were quick to pounce on Barbro Sundback with very flimsy evidence (she was falsely accused of bullying a cleaner), so it’ll be interesting to see if they follow this case up with the same vigour. It also made me wonder about the way the press here provide people with anonymity. It’s such a small place that giving details about a case like this effectively “outs” the person in question before a decision has been made as to whether or not they’re guilty. Personally, I’d rather the press waited until all the facts are in, but if they can’t manage that, shouldn’t they at least be consistent, rather than pretending to give the accused person anonymity, and treat this leading politician just as they treated Barbro?

Reform of Further Education

At the moment there is rather controversial reform programme in the works for further education on Åland. The idea is that various further education institutions on Åland will be combined into a single organsiation. I would say that the main aim of the reform from my party’s perspective is to increase flexibility and choice for students at the different schools, allowing them to take a wider range of courses/broaden their qualifications. There is general acceptance that the reform is a good thing within the “technical schools”, but Åland’s Lyceum, which provides a traditional academic education, is strongly resistant to the reform and wants to remain outside it.

I was having dinner with my parents-in-law this evening (all five of their kids studied at Lyceum), and the subject of this reform came up. They are against it. I offered my opinion that objection to the refom was really based mostly on feeling. I believe this is particularly evident in the way that most of the criticism has been directed at the proccess rather than the actual content of the reform. When I say that objections really are based mainly on feeling, what I mean is that those who object to the reform think that academic education is more valuable than technical education. Lyceum’s students are therefore not seen to benefit from it because it’s not thought they would want to go and take technical courses. The assumption is that the traffic of students will all be one way: to Åland’s Lyceum. Of course, the other unspoken assumption is that this will in some way make the education at Åland’s Lyceum worse.

Why the hostility?

It was my daughter’s fourth birthday on Friday, and we had a little party for her in our flat. One of the guests mentioned that her husband had been teased for going to a “sosse” (social democrat) party. This got me thinking about the general attitude to social democrats here on Åland, and I think there’s quite a bit of low-level hostility towards us and, to some degree, there is a stigma attached to being a social democrat. It’s all very strange if you ask me, because, as has been observed elsewhere, the other parties do sign up to what is essentially a social democratic model. Most Åland people seem on the whole to be content with the social democratic system we have here. They accept the ideas, so why the hostility when they hear the name?

Loss of Confidence?

The story currently waiting to break here on Åland concerns the result of a no-confidence vote in the province’s Education and Culture Minister, Camilla Gunell, which I read is going to be tabelled on Monday. As so often on Åland, it all boils down to different attitudes to Finnish. Camilla has come under pressure because she’s been critical of a committee charged with producing a rapport on which the provincial government could base its language policy programme. Unfortunately, the Provincial Prime Minister, Roger Nordlund, was the chairmen of the committee, and he and Camilla had an, apparently, heated exchange over it in the Lagting.

The Independent group (conservative åland-nationalists) have seen a chance to bring the whole provincial government crashing down. They hope, no doubt, that a beautiful, new provincial government will be reborn. They also hope, of course, that some of them will be in it, and, almost as importantly, that there won’t been any social democrats in it. I think it’s unlikely (but hey, I’ve been wrong before) because there is an agreed policy, which Camilla and Roger have both backed. Some of the opposition, the Liberals, agree with Camilla too, so you’d think it would be tough for them to vote against her. That means you’d need a whole scale desertion by one or both of the parties in the coalition government for the vote to be lost. I really can’t see how they could justify it.

An upset is on the cards

There has been general acceptance in the press of the fact that the Social Democrats have stronger candidates on their list than the bourgoise list has on offer. Nonetheless, a commonly held view seems to be that we still won’t win. Sure, your candidates are better, but it’s one party against all the rest. You’ve only got 6 out of 30 seats in the provincial parliament, the parties supporting the other list have the rest. Social Democrats can’t win on Åland. But wait a minute, in which district did the Tarja Halonen – President of Finland and Social Democrat – get her highest proportion of the vote, 69%. That’s right, Åland.

The first (unscientific) poll gave us 30% support before little more had been said than who the candidates were going to be. I’m quite confident that the more the voters see of our candidates and the more they see of those on the other list, the stronger our support will be. The radio debates between the candidates should be particularly good for us. If experience, charisma, contacts on the mainland and general competence count for anything, our chances are better than they’ve been made out to be.

Here is a link to the group blog on Nyan.

To means-test, or not to means-test: that is the question.

The social democrats have come in for some criticism -short response here – over the new law regulating the fees charged by ÅHS (Åland’s health authority). There was a ceiling of 450 euros a year, above which you didn’t have to pay for a number of ÅHS’ services. This has been significantly reduced to 300 euros. The ceiling for children has likewise been reduced from 225 euros to 125 euros, and a new ceiling has been introduced for those over 65.

All well and good, but in the same reform, the safety net for those on low incomes was removed. That means there will be some people who are a little worse off than they were before the reform- those on low incomes who had the 225 euro ceiling, but who are not entitled to the lower 125 euro ceiling.

The general point at issue here is how far the benefits of the welfare state should be means-tested. One of the biggest problems with means-tested benefits is that they may not reach the people they are intended to reach. This was the case with the lower ceiling entitlement for ÅHS services; many of those entitled to the lower ceiling were discouraged from applying for it and those that did apply had the burden of proof on their shoulders. Means-testing also generates more bureaucracy, which usually increases the costs of administering the system significantly. Once again, this was the case with ÅHS. That’s not to say that means-testing is never appropriate, but when it concerns a public service that everyone uses regardless of income, it is far better to have a universal system of low/no charges. In addition to ensuring that nobody slips through the net, you generate greater support for the services from all groups in society.

Who should stand?

It’s now clear that the coming election to the Finnish parliament will be contested between a social democrat list and a “bourgoise” list. I’ve already outlined my views on the list system for this election here, but the question at hand is who the social democrats should have on their list.

In today’s Nyan leader, Nina Fellman advises we should put up the biggest names- Barbro Sundback, Lasse Wiklöf, Camilla Gunell and Christian Beijar (the Lagting’s speaker, two ministers in the provincial government and the social democrat’s party group leader in the Lagting). There is certainly something to be said for this; it would certainly present a favourable contrast with the alternative list where the other parties have neglected to stand their most outstanding players. The conservatives (FS) have as yet no candidate, the independent party group back someone who describes herself as a “genuine independent” (that is, she’s not even a member of the party) and neither the centre party candidate or the liberal party candidate could be described as the most prominent members of their respective parties.

Why not make the contrast even greater though? I think we should have at least three of the four names Nina Fellman suggests on our list to show that we are really going for it. However, the election also provides the opportunity to give some prominence to a member of the party who has yet to reach the highest echelons of Åland politics. Camilla Gunell is young, able and already a minister. She should definitely be on the list. Our most prominent party member, Barbro Sundback, should also be on the list, but I think one of the other two big names should give way for a younger member of the party.

Anyone out there got any opinions on the matter?

Party Labels

I’ve been told that the key to blogging is posting interesting contributions on a regular basis, so my apologies for the long break after Christmas. I shall try to get back into the rhythm.

Since I was about 15, I’ve rooted for the Labour party. It wasn’t and isn’t always comfortable, but I have never doubted since then that I was Labour. I still remember the slaughter in the mock elections held at my secondary school. Labour came in a resounding last place and didn’t even get 10% of all the votes cast. Tellingly, you had to pay to vote and could, if I recall correctly, buy up to five votes. My support for the party was not something I was particularly outspoken about.

When I turned 22 I became a member for the first time, but I still sat on the sidelines cheering rather than throwing myself into the fray. Committing yourself actively to a political party can feel like a big step. In Britain at least, membership of a polical party marks you out as some kind of deviant. Interesting reading for anyone who has ever considered getting involved is John Farrell’s “Things can only get better”, which gives an account of his time in the party during the 18 years (1979-1997) of Tory rule.

Upon revealing his party membership to others in the eighties he was met with responses along the lines of –

“I suppose you agree with social workers?”

and

“What you in that for, you a lesbian or something?”

In my experience of those on the left, what motivates people to join political parties is wanting to make a positive difference to society and, in particular, wanting to help the more disadvantaged members of society. That’s certainly what motivates me. I understand how lucky I’ve been in my life with the advantages that I’ve had, and that can all too easily be taken for granted.

When you move to a new country, getting a grip on where you belong in the political spectrum isn’t always easy. The questions which arise in British politics are a little different from those here on Åland, so the choice wasn’t a “no-brainer” for me at first. Of course, a growing understanding of where the parties stand on different issues leads you to where you belong eventually. In particular, the more contact I have with the social democrat members of Åland’s parliament and the provincial government, the more strongly I feel that the Social Democrats want the kind of Åland I want. I think I’ll always be Labour first, but, here on Åland, I’m a Social Democrat.

That’s why I’m glad to be entering the fray wearing my party’s label.