Things just got a hole lot better

In a series of moves indicative of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing, City Hall has announced that just about every tax and fee imaginable in the city is set to skyrocket in the new year.

The Centre Party-dominated city government (or council, whichever one it is that makes these decisions), led by their supremo, mayor Edgar Savisaar, first revealed that land tax in the city would more than double from the 1st of January. This discouraging move would be in line with their vision of having everyone relocate to the city centre from the outskirts if it weren't for the fact that they're also putting up downtown parking fees. Shooting up by as much as 50% in the Old Town, the new prices - in the rest of the city at least - have been defended by Vice Mayor Jaanus Mutli as 'still being cheaper than in Helsinki'.

This in turn could be in line with City Hall's policy on roadworks: the 2008 budget has seen spending on the city's pot-holes-and-no-gutters infrastructure slashed. Perhaps the idea is that if people are stubborn enough to live on their own property in the suburbs and still drive into the city, they will have to put up with bad roads and high parking prices when they get there.

On the other hand, if they idea is to clear the roads of cars and get people onto public transport (which will still be travelling on the terrible roads they won't be spending nearly as much money on) it seems strange that the other major announcement was that ticket prices for buses, trams and trolleybuses would also be going up (yet again) in 2008, by as much as 20%.

Never missing an opportunity to pass the buck and/or take a swipe at the government, our Jaanus explained this away as being the result of rising fuel prices and the state's decision to increase excise duties. He also added that drivers are demanding pay rises and that the city has to fund the purchase of new vehicles without any of the help that other towns and counties receive from the central government.

However, in news that would have brought sweet relief to about three people in the country, Mutli revealed that the list of people who can travel on public transport for free will be expanded from New Year's Day - to include those Estonians who were involved in the clean-up operations following the Chernobyl disaster. Won't they be sitting pretty... providing they're in good health, living in the city centre, don't own their own property and don't have a car they need to park on the street.

In your dreams

Someone called Vilja Kiisler was full of praise for City Hall's crackdown on alcohol in an article entitled The Centre Party's Wet Dreams on Delfi today:

Curing the nation's drinking problems with restrictions on alcohol sales is no longer the business of the Centre Party alone: Tartu's Reformist mayor has also come to the conclusion that selling vodka in the wee hours will have to be done away with. But back in Tallinn, the Centrists plan to turn the taps off even tighter.

City Council mouthpiece Toomas Vitsut has announced that even tougher restrictions are in the pipeline — because the ones they've put into practice thus far have failed to reduce the amount of drinking. A bit of common sense here might make them question whether the restrictions make sense in the first place if they're not even getting close to doing what they say on the tin. But no. Loyal footsoldiers cannot afford the luxury of common sense. Particularly not Vitsut, whole sole reason for being of late seems to be to play up [party leader Edgar] Savisaar's great ideas.

And now Vitsut is going even more Savisaaresque on us and promising that if one ban isn't enough, we'll impose two — and keep on imposing them until they produce results, without bothering to ask whether it actually helps anyone break their debilitating habit.

We can talk about it till the cows come home, but common sense says that no restriction is ever going to break the habit of a lifetime — it will only make people hide it even more. If you know you won't be able to get your beer or your vodka from the shop after 8 o'clock, you buy it earlier, and voila, problem solved. In fact you buy more, just so you won't have to face the inconvenience of running out. Who does Vice Mayor [Jaanus] Mutli (hooray! - Ed.) think he's fooling when he says that vodka shopping sprees are a thing of the past and that people aren't drinking as much as they used to?

http://www.delfi.ee/news/paevauudised/arvamus/article.php?id=16848162

We don't need another hero

After hundreds of drunken children were found stumbling around the Song Festival Grounds during the Õllesummer festival despite City Hall's crusade to save them from unethical traders, Jaanus Mutli has decided that it's all the organisers fault. "We did everything we could," he said*, "but it just wasn't enough. And now measures are going to have to be taken." And there is, of course, only one man to take them. Mutli outlined the uncompromising steps Tallinn is set to take to safeguard the future of its innocent and impressionable young citizens in a press release issued today: "The organisers are really going to have to think about setting an age limit in future."

This, needless to say, didn't sit well with the organisers, who, like I said, have been working hard to market the festival as more of a family event of late. However, their reaction was possibly not as helpful as it may have been, considering their alleged target audience. "It's nobody's fault but the parents'," declared festival director Marje Hansar. "They've obviously raised their children appallingly if they're letting them go about getting drunk. I can't be expected to take responsibility for them." She has a point, although blame in the first instance surely has to be laid at the feet of the kids themselves? Bugger not being responsible for their own actions in the eyes of the law.

Not that there's much point in playing the blame game, as our Jaanus has a point and all. Õllesummer is exactly what it says on the tin: a beer festival. You can dress that up as much as you like with sausages in buns and balloons and concerts for all ages, but it doesn't change the fact that the whole thing is founded on something which is meant to be illegal to supply to anyone under the age of 18. Now I'm not much bothered either way; kids are always going to want to try things they're told they're not allowed to, and they'll always find ways of doing it, so you're faced with a choice: make it an 18+ festival on principle, or abandon all pretence and just let people get on with it.

* Or words to that effect: all 'quotes' appearing in this article are rendered in a paraphrased and exaggerated style for dramatic effect.

The need for speed

Jaanus Mutli, who seems to be the only civil servant left at City Hall who hasn't gone on holiday yet, has revealed vague plans to cut the speed limit in Tallinn to 40 km/h. Not a blanket limit, he is quick to point out: just along specific roads and at specific intersections in the city centre where there are large numbers of pedestrian targets. In fact, the suggested go-slow zone covers the same area of the city in which you have to pay for your parking. I'm not sure whether this is simply for convenience or whether there's a logic to it somewhere. In any case, it is a largely sensible move, if as yet not thought through at great length.

It has nevertheless already created something of a stir. 'Traffic experts' have pointed out that reducing the speed limit in the neck of the bottle will only make it more congested, while also pointing out that whatever the signs you stick up, there will always be people who ignore them. The initiative is supported by the local Roads Authority, albeit with the caveat that City Hall should only implement the move if they can come up with the manpower required to exercise supervision of it. And there's the rub (i.e. in those last two points).

Estonians are some of the worst drivers in the world. People warned me about Italians and their cars before I went to live in Italy, but at least they're reckless in a reliable kind of way, and there are plenty of ridiculously dressed police on the roads maintaining some semblance of order. Here the drivers are just appalling. There might as well not be speed limits at all, as next to no one sticks to them, instead regularly exceeding them in bustling, built-up areas to degrees that would see them automatically lose their licences in Australia. The road seems to be where the average Estonian will happily express his frustration, jealousy and aggression, towards other drivers and hapless pedestrians alike. You only have to see the way the locals approach pedestrian crossings like lambs to the slaughter to appreciate that there is something to be feared here.

The flagrant disregard for road rules and the aggression of the drivers is exacerbated by the fact that the arm of the law that should keep them in check is so limp-wristed. (It's not helped either by the fact that there is never enough money to bring roads up to scratch, but that's another story; we're talking about an authority here who can't even find a paint for pedestrian crossings and lane markings that doesn't wear off in less than 24 hours.) I'm guessing this is a product of the enormous, sudden transitions that have been made since the Soviet Union collapsed. Estonia is a country, after all, which went from roughly no banking to Internet banking in the blink of an eye; ask anyone here what cheques are and they will probably never have heard of them. It works kind of the same with cars: all the Ladas have been replaced by black BMWs, but some basics of road safety have gone by the wayside in the meantime.

There are plenty of watchdogs guarding the banks, I imagine because there's money to be made out of it. But in Estonia there simply aren't enough police to go around, let alone form a fully functioning, effective traffic division, and there aren't the rules and systems of fines and whatnot to back them up. Nor the infrastructure: like cheques, speed cameras are something the country never caught on to. As a result, there is a 'lack of traffic culture' - a term bandied about here a lot of late, to little effect if you ask me: recognising your failings is only useful if you've got the wherewithal to address them, though I credit the admission - and a prevailing mindset that is totally inconducive to positive change.

The issues are so wide-ranging though that it's hard to know where to start. Most people here still appear to regard seatbelts as an optional extra. Drink driving remains a huge problem. At least three cars will run every red light. Combine this cavalier attitude with the fact that there's no incentive - apart from common sense, which most drivers seem to abandon as soon as they stick their key in the ignition - to follow the rules, since there's basically no one to enforce them, and you to begin to realise how big the problem is.

In that context you'd think that reducing the speed limit in the city centre would be a good idea, and by and large it has to be. But how many more frustrated drivers will it produce who exceed the speed limit even more heedlessly once they make it out the other side of the traffic jam?

What do you have to say to that, Mr Mutli?

29 kids were booked for underage drinking on the first day of the Õllesummer festival alone. Where was City Hall's precious rescue squad when the paraletic children of Tallinn needed them most?

Protecting the children of Estonia

Hot on the heels of the folk festival for wee ones, Õllesummer, Estonia's answer to Oktoberfest, comes to Tallinn's Song Festival Grounds this Wednesday for five days of beer, food and concerts. It is arguably the most popular festival on the Estonian calendar, drawing people from all over the country, elsewhere in the Baltic States, and beyond. This year's programme is an impressive list of local artists - including, appropriately enough, Tanel Padar, who was caught drink driving by police last weekend. ("I sincerely regret it," he revealed in a heartfelt press statement. Hard to tell whether he means driving under the influence or being caught doing so.)

A glance at the line-up for the final night of the festival is a good indicator of how it's being marketed these days: while most of the other concerts are predominantly rock and alternative, the big guns for the finale are an early evening performance by the country's newly crowned, first ever Pop Idol, and a tribute to ABBA. You see, attempts have been made in recent years to turn Õllesummer into more of a 'fun for all the family' event rather than just a great big piss-up, but this in turn presents its own problems.

Recent studies revealed that the average age at which Estonian children get their first taste of hard liquor is something like 11 or 12, with most claiming to have experienced a hangover or worse from excess consumption of alcohol by 15. Beer in this country is sold in plastic bottles that make it look remarkably like soft drink, and is available in just about every kiosk. Ditto breezers and such. Basically, alcohol is everywhere and kids clearly get their hands on it at absurdly young ages.

But parents who are worried about packing their kiddies off to Õllesummer - the same kids who were only there the other day in their knee socks and knickerbockers - lest they act like every other 12-year-old in Estonia and head straight for the beer tents need fear no more. Tallinn's Vice-Mayor, the tasty Jaanus Mutli (pictured), has reassured the mothers and fathers of the land that while he is in City Hall, no child shall get wiped out on Saku Originaal.

Mutli will be unleashing a herd of inspectors from the Consumer Protection Division of the City Enterprise Department on the festival to carry out raids on unscrupulous vendors. It will be interesting to see whether the Vice-Mayor and his team employ the same tactics as Mutli himself did recently in exposing the underbelly of Tallinn's taxi trade. He and the then Mayor, Jüri Ratas, donned wigs, fake moustaches, fake tan and lots of designer labels in black and pretended to be Italian business men for a couple of days, seeing how many taxi drivers would rip them off. (Answer: most of them.) Amusingly, the pair allowed themselves to be photographed in their disguises, presumably for posterity. They looked like knobs. Proved a point, though.

It just makes me wonder whether the Mutli crew will be employing their underage offspring and neighbours' children to see if they can get away with buying beer without being asked for ID. What a coup it would be.