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Prime Minister Kaja Kallas (Reform) says that the use of wood as a fuel at power stations in the eastern Estonian town of Narva needs to stop. The practice may otherwise see growth, as a result of a draft amendment to legislation put in place by the previous administration.
Responding to a question from MP Jevgeni Ossinovski (SDE), Kallas said that I do not consider burning wood at these power stations the right thing; it is not good from the point of view of the Estonian forest . [or] Estonian nature. It is basically not right, it does not serve the purpose that the use of renewable energy sources should serve.
To curb political funding, the Political Party Funding Supervision Committee (ERJK) may gain the right to check the expenses of political parties, Prime Minister Kaja Kallas (Reform) said on Wednesday.
Speaking during her first Riigikogu question time on Wednesday about tackling corruption, Kallas said one idea which has been raised is that income, as well as expenses, should be scrutinized by the commission. She also raised the question of who pays for advertising.
She said, currently, the problem is that ERJK cannot undertake the task as it not capable of checking the expenditures of political parties and said the analytical capability of the commission should be increased.
On Friday, the Riigikogu board initated proceedings for a bill presented by 19 MPs that would equate a registered partnership contract to a marriage union.
The bill was presented by 10 Center MPs and nine of the 10 opposition Social Democratic Party (SDE) MPs. The bill would subsume registered partnership contracts, implemented from October 9, 2014, and regulated by the Registered Partnership Act into the Family Law Act, rendering the Registered Partnership Act, also known as the cohabitation act, off the statute book.
The bill follows the scrapping of a planned referendum on the definition of marriage, which in turn fell by the wayside largely with the resignation of Jüri Ratas as prime minister earlier in the week, and consequently the exit of the Center-EKRE-Isamaa coalition.
The recent trend for rising support for non-parliamentary party Estonia 200 is unsustainable, according to one analyst, though if it can adequately use the marriage referendum issue as a rallying point, the party may be able to keep up its current popularity.
Martin Mölder, researcher at the University of Tartu s Johan Skytte Institute for Political Studies, says the two most significant trends of late have been the rise and rise of Estonia 200, now in third place in support levels after Reform and Center for several weeks, and also the fall in proportion of non-committed voters.
The two phenomena are likely related, with many previously unpledged voters – the figure has fallen from 28 percent of respondents to 20 percent in recent weeks, at least according to results from pollsters Norstat – expressing support for Estonia 200.