When authorities fail,
citizens pay the bill.
This is the calculation of what defending the rule of law costs a private individual.
The Cost Doesn’t Disappear
When an authority fails its duty, the work doesn’t go undone. It transfers to the citizen’s responsibility.
Investigation, documentation, complaints, appeals, litigation – all of this could have been avoided if building control had acted according to law.
Authority error has a cost. The question is only who pays.
3,400 Hours
We have spent over 3,400 hours investigating the matter.
Where the Time Went
- Obtaining documents – information requests, archive reviews, compiling documentation
- Reconstructing the chain of events – what happened, when, and by whose action
- Assessing legality – how authorities should have acted vs. how they did act
- Expert opinions – obtaining and analyzing technical evidence
- Complaints and clarifications – to 12 authorities, multiple supplements to each
- Litigation documents – summons applications, written pleadings, evidence
This has not been voluntary. It has been necessary to realize legal protection in a situation where authorities did not perform their own duties.
Litigation Costs
The costs of just the first trial’s District Court proceedings have risen to approximately €190,000.
A lawyer was involved in the trial to ensure formal matters and bring credibility. The content was produced ourselves.
Why This Amount
- Lawyers would not have done this work – no one takes on a case requiring years of study and thousands of hours of documentation
- The costs would have been impossible – if all work had been done at lawyer hourly rates, the bill would have exceeded €500,000
- Authorities’ investigative work transferred to us – we did what authorities should have done ex officio
Defending the rule of law is not possible without exceptional resources – or exceptional commitment.
Not Error – Deliberate Law Violation
During District Court proceedings, building inspectors were questioned as witnesses. Each of their answers is evidence that the law was knowingly violated.
What the Testimonies Revealed
- Building inspector Markku Aro: Admitted that for an expired permit the law leaves no alternative — a new permit must be applied for. Stated that inspectors nonetheless acted otherwise under a “shared interpretation”. Knowingly setting the law aside is not interpretation.
- Building inspector Tuomas Ellilä: Performed the final inspection. The permit’s expiry was, in his words, “probably known immediately”, but the inspection could still be carried out “through discretion” — it was “quite a general practice”. Section 143 of the Land Use and Building Act is mandatory law — there is no “discretionary” exception to it.
- Technical director Reima Ojala: Confirmed that final inspections have been held on expired permits “from a customer-service standpoint”. Customer service does not justify departing from mandatory law.
- Building inspector Juha Kuokkanen: Described the electrical commissioning inspection as something building control did not consider itself able even to require: “we had no authority to require it”. The law makes verifying that inspection a duty of the authority, not a discretionary right.
Each of these statements shows that mandatory law was not followed. This is not a matter of interpretation. It is the deliberate setting-aside of binding law — or, in one case, a failure to recognise a binding duty as a duty at all.
Land Use and Building Act Section 143: Land Use and Building Act Section 143: “If construction work has not been started within three years or completed within five years, the permit has lapsed.”
Land Use and Building Act Section 153: “A building… may not be taken into use before… the final inspection has been held.”
These are not subject to interpretation. These are mandatory laws.
When an authority states they knew the legal requirements but acted contrary to them, it’s no longer just a mistake. This provides grounds to assess official liability and may fulfill criminal liability criteria.
Constitution Section 118
Constitution Section 118 is clear:
“Everyone who has suffered a violation of rights or harm due to an unlawful measure or omission by an official or other person performing a public function has the right to demand that they be sentenced to punishment and to demand compensation from the public entity or from the official or other person performing a public function.”
This is not a new law. This is not subject to interpretation. This is the Constitution in force.
This is not about expanding the rule of law. This is about applying it.
What Is the Price of Rule of Law?
If unlawful authority action goes without consequences, the message is clear: the law doesn’t need to be followed.
Two Options
- Option A: Authorities are accountable for their errors. Consequences are sufficient to prevent recurrence. Rule of law functions.
- Option B: Consequences are nominal or non-existent. Errors recur. Rule of law is just a word.
Constitution Section 118 guarantees the right to compensation for unlawful authority action. The law exists.
The question is whether it will be applied.
Rule of law is not free.
But its costs should not be borne by a private citizen.
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