Showdown approaches over Tallinn budget

TALLINN - The Tallinn City Council passed its controversial budget on Sept. 9, raising the stakes in the municipality’s clash with the national government over the issue of local taxes. The Center Party’s smaller coalition partner, the Social Democrats’ Party, stated that it was pleased that more details were added to the budget. “The positions that are especially under the priorities of Social Democrats are written in detail and are quite clear for me,” said Andres Anvelt, board chairman of the Tallinn regional branch of the Social Democrats and a member of the city council.

The 463 million euro budget passed its second and third readings on Sept. 9, with 48 out of the 79 elected councilors voting in favor. For the first time in the history of Tallinn, however, opposition representatives were not present at any of the readings. They had walked out of the first reading on Sept. 6 over the inclusion of revenue from the city’s 1 percent sales tax, introduced on June 1. The national government is currently in the process of abolishing this tax, as well as some other municipal taxes in Estonia, by parliamentary vote.

The opposition factions, on the other hand, asserted that they received the amended version of the budget only half an hour before the beginning of the city council meeting and it would not be possible to examine such an important document during such a short period of time. Reform Party member, city council member Ants Leemets said that although the city chancellery budget was explained in a more detailed way, the budget bill was beyond criticism since it only listed sums to be allocated for some projects, while the general picture remained unclear.

After the walkout, deputy chairman of the Reform Party faction, Valdo Randpere, said that the budget was “devoid of content,” calling the discussion “futile.”
“The opposition is unanimous in its opinion that a constructive discussion about a budget devoid of content is not possible, and thus we considered it appropriate to walk out of the session,” he said.

The other opposition members who spoke at the session were of the same opinion and hence the opposition factions left the city council hall during the time of deliberating on the municipal budget. Efforts to pass the budget had turned into a race by city councilors from the Center Party to save the sales tax. Tallinn City Council Chairman Toomas Vitsut said that the sales tax would remain in force if the budget was adopted before parliament’s decision to abolish it. Jaak Juske, deputy chairman of the Social Democratic faction of the City Council, said that the budget was adopted “on the run. It’s no secret that the main reason for the rapid and early adoption of the capital’s budget was a desire by right-wing parties to significantly cut the already small revenue base of local governments in the parliament in  the coming days.”

The division over municipal taxes has taken on the dimension of a party conflict, with members of the Center Party, who control the Tallinn city government, pitted against Reform and IRL, who form the nation’s governing coalition.