Do we serve Finnish bureaucrats or do they serve us?

[rinso]

All lawyers are required to uphold the law. But they are not required to look for ways that hamper their case. So both parties need their own lawyer to find weaknesses in the others side.

As for municipalities, only the larger ones have their own legal department. The smaller ones hire as needed.
The main task of these legal departments is to scan for inconsistencies and advice if problems are expected.
Most decisions however do not pass through the legal department.

So if you feel being treated unjustly, you have to take action. The legal advisor than will advice the board if the objection is valid or not.
If the case is clearly in your favor, the board will probably accept the advice and change the decision. If not, the next step is court.
Your lawyer should tell you what your chances are. But they can be a little to optimistic, after all they earn their living (and more ) by handling those cases not by dropping them as quickly as possible.

[Rosamunda]

1. Rosamunda, in what way do you think a "government lawyer" differs from an "after-tax lawyer"?
2. Rosamunda, what are the objectives of a "government lawyer"? Are they different from making sure that the procedures and decisions of a government and actions of the clerks are in line with the law?

I'm not sure what you mean by a "government lawyer". It is not a term I am familiar with. Are you referring to organisations like the consumer Ombudsman? One could equally argue that all lawyers are "state" lawyers insofar as they are there to ensure the laws of the land are upheld.

PS: I have nothing to add to this discussion (and your sometimes deliberately obtuse comments are not helpful). It is local news: I live in Espoo not Tampere and we have our own "battles" to fight down here. Good luck with your endeavours.

[Karmalite]

1.

You need to work WITH the local authorities in Tampere to sort this out.

The request in Finnish for the decision grounds clarification was sent to the local authorities in Tampere. So far there is no response.

2.

I think you are wasting your time asking questions about a very local issue on here.

Rosamunda, it looks you perceive the value of this forum from an absolutely different perspective.

Imagine an expat family, which is settled in Tampere. Suddenly the life of the family is disturbed by a non-transparent decision of the local authorities. The decision dramatically influences the key parameters of the life quality - predictability of the situation and the quality of the education of children. The decision is unexpected, non-transparent and illogical for the local families also. Both expat and local families try to obtain clarifications from the decision makers, but there is no response.

What are the reasonable next steps for this "victim" expat family?

1. To assess the opportunity to influence the decision-making process (with the assumption that Finnish bureaucrats serve taxpayers at the end of the day). To estimate the cost of this (in monetary terms, in terms of time and efforts).
2. To find out if this unfavorable situation is local or country-wide. If taxpayers serve bureaucrats just in Tampere, then, may be to find the better locations in Finland. And so on, following this clear logic.

This forum is a unique opportunity to get the realistic understanding of what is going on in the country. At the same time, the realities of the Tampere's case will add certain details to the mind pictures of other forum members. Rosamunda, if you genuinely share that you feel 100% on a safe side in Espoo, then, probably, expats should consider the relocation from Tampere to Espoo. Why not?

I live in Espoo not Tampere and we have our own "battles" to fight down here.

Could you, please, briefly cast some light on the realities of the "battles" in Espoo? It would be, indeed, very practical.

[Upphew]

2. To find out if this unfavorable situation is local or country-wide. If taxpayers serve bureaucrats just in Tampere, then, may be to find the better locations in Finland. And so on, following this clear logic.

Larger the city, larger the bureaucracy. Find a small town that doesn't have too many people to bounce issues. Problem might be that small towns won't have the services you want or need... as in services in other languages than Finnish. Then again, private school, bringing private money and tax payers to small town, might be interesting for the decision makers of said small town...

[Karmalite]

Find a small town that doesn't have too many people to bounce issues.

The small towns do not look like a remedy also.

According to the "Corruption and the Prevention of Corruption in Finland" overview issued by the Finnish Ministry of Justice (can be found at http://www.oikeusministerio.fi/material ... te_eng.pdf):

beginning of the quotation
The allegations of “old boys’ networks” are closely tied to suspicions that decisions may be unjustly made on political grounds. According to these suspicions, appointments to office and allocation of contracts are not necessarily made on the basis of the substantive merits of the applicant, but on the basis of his or her membership in a political party.
The background to these allegations includes the fact that many municipalities are small (with perhaps only 20,000 or 30,000 residents), and the decisions in the municipal- ity are made by a small, active group who have lived and worked in the municipality for many years. It is thus not unusual that both the municipal decision-makers and the persons in the private sector who want certain decisions know one another, and meet one another also socially. It is also not unusual for them to belong to the same political party.
....
Such allegations cannot of course be ignored, and should be taken seriously in order to show that corruption in any form is unacceptable. The best response is to ensure that decisions by State and municipal bodies are made in as transparent manner as possible, and that the decisions can be subjected to review.
end of the quotation

So, Upphew, the size of a town will not automatically improve the situation or make it worse. The situation can be mostly improved by the transparency of the decision-making processes and grounds/criteria for the decisions made.

The lack of transparency is an opportunity for unfair competition and other forms of the corruption or a cover for unprofessional handling of issues.

The grounds for the decision on the IEEC in Tampere are still non-transparent. What is the particular reason in this case? Let's see. The analysis goes on.