Aggregate party ratings: Reform top, EKRE and Center even stevens
Reform is the most popular party among voters in Estonia according to all three major pollsters, while the opposition Conservative People's Party of Estonia (EKRE) and the coalition Center Party, are neck-and-neck.
ERR's online news in Estonian started publishing market research results as an aggregate of findings from Norstat, Turu-uuringute and Kantar Emor last August, in order to get a clear picture of the political landscape, though it reports that taking into account statistical margins of error, results from the three different firms may vary by up to 3 percent.
Taking into account possible statistical margins of error, the individual results of research companies (Norstat, Turu-uuringute AS and Kantar Emor) may differ by up to three percent, ERR says.
With that in mind, Reform emerged most popular for the month of March, averaging 30 percent in support and unchanged from the previous month, followed by EKRE and Center on 19 percent each. For Center, this represents a slight rise in support, of one percentage point, while EKRE's has fallen by one percentage point.
Non-parliamentary party Eesti 200 saw a fall, from 15 percent to 14 percent on average; the party's support has declined since year end 2020 when it briefly overtook EKRE.
The opposition Social Democratic Party (SDE) has hovered around the 8 percent-mark since the beginning of 2021, while Isamaa, also in opposition, has been at the 5 percent-mark, significant in that it is the threshold required to gain Rigiikogu seats at an election.
The Green Party is below the threshold at three percent, while TULE, formed last year after a merger between the Free Party and Richness of Life, lies on one percent on average for March.
While the three companies paint a similar picture for most parties, Reform has consistently done better with Norstat (at nearly 35 percent for March), who compile their results for a socially-conservative think-tank, than with Turu-uuringute and Kantar Emor (26-28 percent), whereas the opposite is the case for Eesti 200 and SDE, with a gap of three to four percentage points.
Also noteworthy are the differing methods the companies use. Norstat conducts its surveys over the phone and also online. Turu-uuringute polls the public via a 50/50 split between face-to-face and online interviews, while Kantar Emor is online-only.
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Editor: Andrew Whyte
