Ratings: Party support stable, Reform's decline levels off
Support for political parties remained largely unchanged over the past week, according to a recent survey.
The latest data, from pollsters Norstat compiled on behalf of conservative think tank the NGO Institute for Societal Studies, shows that 29.5 percent of respondents back opposition party Isamaa, while 17.4 percent favor the coalition Reform Party – the prime minister's party.
The Center Party, in opposition, is not far behind at a 14.1 percent rating according to Norstat, and the coalition Social Democrats (SDE) are just behind Center, at 13.3 percent.
Next comes the Conservative People's Party of Estonia (EKRE), also in opposition, and polling at 12.6 percent.
The sixth and final Riigikogu party, Eesti 200, in coalition, polled at just 4 percent this week according to Norstat, below the 5-percent threshold of the vote required to win seats under Estonia's d'Hondt system of proportional representation.
The non-parliamentary Parempoolsed party polled a little ahead of Eesti 200, at 4.8 percent.
Despite a four-week decline of 2.2 percentage points in support for the Reform Party, Norstat reported that the latest figures indicate this downward trend has now flattened out.
The three coalition parties combined polled at 34.7 percent, while the three opposition parties (excluding non-parliamentary parties) polled at 56.2 percent – unpledged respondents and those picking parties not represented at the Riigikogu make up the balance.
The Estonian Greens polled at 1.5 percent, while the Estonian Nationalists and Conservatives (ERK), a breakaway faction of former EKRE members, rated at 1.2 percent.
The pro-Kremlin KOOS/Vmeste party had a rating bang on 1 percent.
Norstat surveyed 4,001 Estonian citizens aged 18 and older, between October 21 and November 17, using a mix of telephone and online methods, to ensure a representative sample.
Norstat says it weights its sample to various socio-economic indicators, and claims a margin of error in direct proportion to the size of a party by support: For example, the margin of error for Isamaa as the most-supported party is +/-1.74 percent, compared with +/-0.75 percent for Eesti 200.
While political polling has come under scrutiny in the wake of the recent U.S. presidential elections, inaccuracies there relate to the bipartisan nature of politics, a drift towards extremes rendering harder the search for the elusive median voter, and a complex societal and demographic makeup, among other factors.
In Estonia with its consensus politics and coalition governments, polling could be considered to be less affected by most of these issues.
The next election in Estonia is to local government, in October 2025.
--
Follow ERR News on Facebook and Twitter and never miss an update!
Editor: Andrew Whyte, Mait Ots