Blue Reform: Doomed to Fail or Potential Shock?

I've mentioned in my last two posts that 2019 is an election year in Finland. Parliamentary elections are scheduled on the 14th of April and elections for the European Parliament at the end of May and as a result, parties are getting ready to launch their campaigns. One of them is the Blue Reform, which despite being part of prime minister Sipilä's government and holding 17 seats in parliament, is in serious risk of completely dropping out of parliament after the election. How is this possible?

I covered this topic in one of my earliest posts, but in summary: the Blue Reform is a splinter group of the Finns Party, which split off after the Finns Party's 2017 convention in which they elected new party leaders. Earlier that year current foreign minister Timo Soini who had led the party since 1997 without any real opposition announced he would not seek another term as party leader. Pretty soon there.were two main candidates for the job: Sampo Terho, widely seen as Soini's hand picked successor and party hardliner Jussi Halla-aho. Halla-aho ended up winning and soon after the Finns Party was kicked out from the government, with prime minister Sipilä claiming different values as the reason. Sipilä soon announced plans to resign but before he could go through with it, 20 Finns Party MP's, including all of the party's ministers suddenly announced they had left the Finns Party and formed their own faction in parliament and pledged support for prime minister Sipilä, which allowed him to stay in office. Blue Reform was officially registered as a party in November that year and Sampo Terho elected as it's first leader.

So it's pretty clear why Blue Reforms support is so low. The people who formed the party were all supporters of Sampo Terho, meaning the party is effectively seen as a bunch of sore losers. Also, the possibility of the Finns Party splitting in case Halla-aho won was speculated by the media before the convention and both Terho and Soini went on record calling the idea ridiculous. So when the split happened, not only did they look like toddlers throwing a tantrum for not getting what they wanted, they also seemed like total hypocrites because they had promised they wouldn't leave. Not only that there's also the very plausible possibility that this was all pre-meditated just in case Halla-aho would win. In conclusion, it's not too hard to see why a recent poll from the national broadcaster YLE showed the party's support at 1.4%. As a side note, the margin of error in that poll is 2%, meaning the party's support is literally within the margin of error. So the question is, how the hell does a party climb up from that? The answer: make up vague promises you have now way of fulfilling.

And when I say vague, I really mean vague. The party recently announced it's agenda for the election which basically included something for everybody. Among other things the party wants more funds towards elder care (which itself has been a hot topic recently), border patrol, emergency services and the police and fix the roads. On the other hand while promising more funds for all these things they also want to cut taxes. When asked where they were going to get the money for all this, Sampo Terho responded that these are general goals they want to work towards and not actual promises. To me this tells they really have no idea what they're doing. Only plans they have for paying for all this seems to come down to  a form of trickle down economics, which hasn't really worked, has it?

Then there's the issue of fighter jets. Finland is currently planning to replace the F-18 Hornet's used by the air force with something more modern by 2030. The current plan is to buy 64 jets, which is projected to cost between 7 to 10 billion euros. That's the planes alone, if you factor in issues like maintenance and weapon systems, the total price would be around 20 billion. Large portion of this is meant to be funded by debt. However, not everybody is happy with this and think the 64 fighters are not enough. One of these people is minister of defense Jussi Niinistö, who think Finland should buy at least 100 fighters. He also happens to be a member of Blue Reform, which is probably a good reason why the party also wants to buy 100 fighters instead of just 64. And how will these additional 36 fighters get paid for, you might ask? Obviously, by taking more debt. Are you surprised?

That being said, I do think the Blue Reform will stay in parliament. The Finnish parliament has 200 seats, so with the support they currently have they could theoretically get three seats. While the party itself is fairly unpopular, they have name recognition. As an example, Jussi Niinistö, despite being one of the people to jump ship from the Finns Party is still relatively popular in certain circles. He has also announced his candidacy for the election and is running in the Uusimaa constituency which has 35 seats in parliament, making it the largest constituency. In other words, here Blue Reform has the best chance to get people elected. Apart from Niinistö, both party leader Terho and leader of the party's parliamentary group Simon Elo have announced their candidacy in Uusimaa. Then there is the question of Timo Soini, who has speculated running. In the previous election in 2015, Soini received the second highest number of votes for a candidate. If he were to run, he would most likely run in Uusimaa as well. They have a chance of pulling a major upset victory in the election, because nobody really believes in them. So while people in Finland love to laugh at them I wouldn't count them out just yet. But, we have to wait until 14th of April to find out.

I'm planning to focus on the upcoming elections more in the near future. I already have plans to cover some other aspects, like some of the minor parties involved or specific people. But again, things can always change. You can also follow me on Twitter for more updates.