Poll: National Coalition Party and SDP on top, Centre declines

True Finns go down slightly

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The National Coalition Party and the opposition Social Democratic Party share the position of Finland’s two largest political parties, according to a fresh poll commissioned by Helsingin Sanomat and conducted by Suomen Gallup.
     Changes since a previous study, conducted in March, are quite small, and fit into the margin of error of the study. Support for the three largest parties has nevertheless moved in the same direction all this year.
     
Support for the Centre Party fell below 20 per cent for the first time in 13 years this spring, and continues to go down: now just 18.8 per cent say that they would support the party of Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen if Parliamentary elections were held now.
     The Centre’s main government partner, the National Coalition Party, is the most popular party, according to the poll, but it has declined from earlier this year to an even 23 per cent. The opposition Social Democrats have gone steadily upward, and now stand at 22.1 per cent.
     The Left Alliance (8.8 per cent), the Christian Democrats (4.3 per cent) and the Swedish People’s Party (4.5 per cent) have all made slight gains since March. The Left Alliance has been making gains all year.
      The True Finns have gone down from 8.1 per cent in the previous poll to 7.7 per cent in the current one. The gap between the Left Alliance and the True Finns has increased from 0.54 percentage points in March to 1.1 percentage points now.
     
The fresh poll can be seen as an indicator of trends for the upcoming elections for the European Parliament.
      Helsingin Sanomat published a Suomen Gallup poll on May 11th ascertaining the likelihood of voters to take part in the European Parliament elections on June 7th.
      The poll indicated that the readiness of supporters of the National Coalition Party to vote in the European elections has declined by ten percentage points from what it was in the 2004 elections.
      In May 2004, shortly before the European Parliament elections that year, public support for the National Coalition Party in hypothetical national Parliament elections was less than 19 per cent, and only 52 per cent of those supporters said that they were certain to vote. Now, with support for the party at 23 per cent, the voter turnout certainty among those supporters for the June 7th elections is just 42 per cent.
      Suomen Gallup Director Juhani Pehkonen says that the higher overall support for the party offsets the prospective lower voter turnout for the National Coalition Party.
     
Five years ago the Social Democrats enjoyed poll numbers of 25 per cent, and expectations of voter turnout were at about the same level as now.
      “However, support is currently at about 22 per cent. Simple logic dictates that the SDP’s starting point for the European election campaign is significantly lower than in 2004", Pehkonen points out.
     
The prospects of the Centre Party for the upcoming elections appear to be the grimmest of all of the three largest parties, compared with the European elections five years ago.
      The likelihood of turnout of supporters has remained more or less the same as before, while poll numbers have weakened by about five percentage points since last time.
     
Support for the Green League before the European Parliament elections in 2004 was 9 per cent. Now it has risen to 9.5 per cent, but the likelihood that Green supporters will cast ballots has declined from 41 per cent in 2004 to 34 per cent this year.
      The poll involved telephone interviews with 2 409 Finns of voting age in all parts of the country except the Åland Islands.
      Respondents were asked which party or group they would vote for if elections for the Finnish Parliament were held now, and which party or political group they voted for in the municipal elections last autumn. The assessment of party support was arrived at by combining the answers and the results of the municipal election vote. The margin of error with the larger parties is about two percentage points in either direction.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  HS poll suggests just 32 % of Finns will vote in European Parliament elections (11.5.2009)
  Poll: Centre Party falls below 20 per cent (4.2.2009)

Helsingin Sanomat