Finland’s population is divided on whether to keep the annual tax that pays for the country’s public broadcaster, the Finnish Broadcasting Company YLE, according to a recent study that comes as negotiations for a possible four-party government focus on ways to reduce public debt.
To fund YLE, adult Finns currently pay an annual tax worth 2.5% of their net annual income if this exceeds €14,000, with the maximum tax being capped at €163. Companies also pay the tax up to €3,000 a year depending on earnings.
With the potential new coalition of the National Coalition Party, the Finns Party, the Swedish People’s Party and the Christian Democrats looking to make savings worth €6 billion over the next four years, YLE’s funding has become a topic of discussion, including in a recent survey which points to a divided nation.
While the YLE tax in its current form pleases 51% of those surveyed, 41% said the tax should be lowered, even if that meant cutting YLE’s content.
At the same time, only 8% of those surveyed said they wanted a tax increase to help a company that saw its turnover increase to €511.8 million, a 2.4% rise compared to the year before.
Still, a clear majority of those surveyed defended the public broadcaster’s impartiality and independence, with some 71% saying politicians had no business interfering with YLE content, while 18% expressed the opposite, and 10% expressed no opinion.
The survey also drew differences across party lines, with supporters of the nationalistic and populist Finns Party standing out.
Some 74% of the Finns Party voters were ready to decrease the YLE tax and the company’s funding, while 38% did not object to giving politicians a say in the content of the programmes.
(Pekka Vänttinen | EURACTIV.com)
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