Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen (NCP) has declared that the more than 40,000 euros she raised for the parliamentary elections was too little. The information is based on a report by newspaper Helsingin Sanomat.
Valtonen told Helsingin Sanomat that in her view only the amount spent on the elections should be reported to the authorities, not all the money raised. She commented briefly to Yle by email.
"We reported campaign spending as required by law. The National Audit Office of Finland (VTV) interprets it as meaning that all funding is reported and this is what we did as soon as we received the information," Valtonen said.
Valtonen had declared to the National Audit Office of Finland the cost of her election campaign at almost 137,000 euros, but according to the newspaper, the Audit Office had noticed in the summer that the amount of money declared by Valtonen did not correspond to the amount collected. After the authority intervened, the amount collected was corrected to around 179,000 euros.
The amount is thus higher than the 145,000 election contribution by the National Coalition Party's Defence Minister Antti Häkkänen, which was reported in early summer to be the largest in the parliamentary elections. Häkkänen announced campaign spending of 118,000 euros.
Some corrected on own initiative
According to Helsingin Sanomat, Valtonen's announcement also omitted a 2,000 euro donation from the securities brokerage company Confido Emo. According to Valtonen, the reason for this was human error.
When notifying about election donations, donors of over 1,500 euros must be named.
In addition to Valtonen, many others have also corrected their campaign financing declarations.
HS reported in its story that one out of every five declarations has been amended after the deadline of 5 June. Some of the changes were made on the person's own initiative, but a large number were made after a remark by the VTV.
Candidates who have been successful in the parliamentary elections or who are reserve MPs are obliged to submit a declaration of election financing.
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