MP Kaikkonen got more than EUR 42,000 from foundation in 2008

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Centre Party Member of Parliament Antti Kaikkonen received more than EUR 42,000 in payments of various kinds from the Youth Foundation (Nuorisosäätiö) in 2008 alone.
      This is more than EUR 20,000 more than he has admitted so far. Kaikkonen has served as the chair of the foundation itself, as well as that of the foundation’s building maintenance company and of the boards of various buildings it holds. The Youth Foundation provides low-cost housing for young people.
      The numbers came out after Helsingin Sanomat asked the Housing Finance and Development Centre of Finland (ARA) for an inspection report concerning the foundation.
     
ARA announced on Tuesday that its report on the Youth Foundation was ready. The centre criticises the foundation for what it sees as careless use of money. The remunerations paid by the foundation were seen to be unusually large compared with other similar foundations and companies.
      The chairman of the board has been paid exceptionally large compensations in recent years. In its statement, ARA mentions that it found shortcomings on the general level, but saw no reason to take special action.
     
Kaikkonen was not particularly upset by the fresh report, saying that 2008 was a “peak year”.
      “In that year the merger of more than ten housing companies kept me busy”, he explains.
      According to ARA, the Youth Foundation spent EUR 165,000 on foreign and domestic travel, as well as seminars in 2006-2009.
      Travel destinations by trustees, staff, and cooperative partners of the foundation included Malaga, Prague, Modena (Italy), Barcelona and Paris. Numerous trips were also made to the Estonian capital Tallinn.
      Domestic travel was usually to Lapland - mainly the resorts of Levi and Saariselkä, the ARA inspection report reveals.
     
In the view of ARA, the spending was so exceptionally high for a non-profit foundation and for companies involved in rental real estate that it cannot be considered reasonable in any way.
      Furthermore, a tax inspection has revealed that in many cases, the destinations of the travel and the activities at the destination were such that the trips cannot be seen to be related to the work. At least some of the trips were seen by tax authorities to be primarily recreational.
      Kaikkonen said that the foreign trips were for “personnel training”.
      The foundation’s annual Christmas parties cost EUR 10,000.
      “The expenses of the foundation are paid by low-income young tenants chosen on the basis of social criteria”, ARA notes in its report.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Vanhanen got campaign contributions for nonprofit housing foundation (21.9.2009)
  MP Antti Kaikkonen got considerable supplementary income from housing foundation chairmanship (9.10.2009)
  Vanhanen and Kaikkonen silent about alleged misdemeanours at Nuorisosäätiö (1.10.2009)

Helsingin Sanomat