Irish general election, 26th Feb 2016

[ObserverIE]

Yes, to make it clear, on those figures Burton would not even make it to the final count, which would be between Coppinger and McGuinness.

FF aren't as transfer-unfriendly as they were and Chambers would undoubtedly pick up enough scraps to get him over the line.

[ObserverIE]

RedC for the Sunday Business Post:

FG 28 (-2)
SF 20 (+3)
FF 18 (-)
Ind/Oth 16 (-)
Lab 8 (-)
SD 4 (+1)
SP/SWP 3 (-1)
GP 2 (-)
Renua 1 (-1)

Apparently political insiders and the media are surprised, even shocked, by this result, which has followed a week of co-ordinated attacks against Sinn Féin over the issue of the Special Criminal Court (a non-jury court set up under emergency legislation in 1972 and which largely deals with trials of republican - now dissident republican - paramilitaries).

Its current relevance is because a leading "republican" figure in south Armagh/north Louth was tried and convicted in the SCC a couple of weeks ago for tax evasion offences. The convicted man, Thomas "Slab" Murphy, was influential in securing acceptance for the peace process among the IRA in south Armagh, and Gerry Adams described him as a "good republican" after the conviction and said, along with other senior SF figures, that Murphy shouldn't have been tried before the SCC, which SF want to abolish in any case.

This produced a wave of concerted and largely synthetic outrage from the three other main parties, led by FG, and with enthusiastic support from RTÉ and [REDACTED]-owned Independent Newspapers. One RTÉ journalist (Claire Byrne) actually announced on the radio this lunchtime that the Special Criminal Court was the only important issue in the election.

The trial judge announced yesterday that the verdict sentencing in the Murphy case would be announced on February 26th - the day of the election.

Anyone who remembers the media sh*tstorm over the Máiria Cahill allegations last year, accompanied by the same tag-team attacks by the "traditional" parties and the media, might recall that the chief effect of the furore was to increase support for SF in the opinion polls.

Middle-class south Dublin, where the media and political commentariat reside, may well be terrified of the barbarians at the gate, but the world beyond has lost all trust in the political and media establishment. If they have any sense at all, they will move onto another topic, and move on quickly.

[ObserverIE]

As always, a great post, Jas. I have some questions. What is the depost threshold?

One quarter of the quota, i.e. 6.25% in a 3-seater, 5% in a 4-seater, 4.16% in a 5-seater. It's not a deposit as such, but a partial refund of election expenses.

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I'm not sure most people think that tactically. From tallying votes at the last local and European elections in 2014, transfers went all over the place. I'd expect it to be a bit more coherent at a Dáil election, but you will get:

• the party loyalists who will vote for their own candidates first, then any allies (FG/Lab), then largely stop (termed "plumpers"),
• local-minded voters who will transfer between local candidates of any party - this tends to be particularly the case in areas which feel peripheral or neglected within a constituency or the country at large,
• the conscientious/bloody-minded, who will go down through the entire ballot paper.

I'd say the median voter preferences half the names on the ballot paper.

SF voters had a reputation as plumpers, but I'd expect them to transfer well this time to "protest" independents and smaller parties - and vice versa. FF voters may go anywhere once they've done the duty by the local candidate or the party. FG voters will look after their own first and only then preference Labour.

[ObserverIE]

What is the background of this [REDACTED] stuff all the time?

[REDACTED] is Denis O'Brien, litigious Maltese-based would-be oligarch, who had his ascent to oligarchhood accelerated by the award of a mobile phone licence under the last FG/Lab coalition in the late 90s. A subsequent investigative tribunal found that O'Brien had made payments to the minister in charge of awarding the licence. O'Brien owns the largest daily/weekly newspaper group as well as two national and a number of local radio stations, ensuring that there are a large number of megaphones at his disposal, and has been able to take advantage of the detritus of the crash by buying up companies who owed large amounts of money to now state-owned banks. These companies have then in a number of cases been awarded lucrative government contracts (installing water meters, fuel supply, etc.).

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First option would be to look for Healy-Rae style independents (one complicating factor is that one of the likely independents is the former FG minister referred to above). Next option would be to look for support from the more amenable small parties - Social Democrats, Greens (if they win any seats), and Renua in order of preference. Next option might be a supply and confidence arrangement for a minority FG government by FF.

FF/SF is unlikely at least until after another election. SF would be open to FF/SF/Lab/SD/compatible independents provided that FF didn't have a majority within the coalition. FF are ruling it out for the moment. (The Alphabet Left are impossibilists and will not participate in or support any government other than a hypothetical Trotskyite majority.)

[ObserverIE]

We're probably now under or around 40 days out from the election.

So with 40 constituencies, maybe we can try and take a look at one a day until polling? Let's find out...

First up - Carlow-Kilkenny.

Candidates

Fine Gael	Pat Deering TD, Cllr. David Fitzgerald, John Paul Phelan TD
Labour	Ann Phelan TD
Fianna Fáil	Bobby Aylward TD, John McGuinness TD, Cllr. Jennifer Murnane-O’Connor
Sinn Féin	Cllr. Kathleen Funchion
AAA-PBP	Conor MacLiam, Adrienne Wallace
Renua	Cllr. Patrick McKee
SocDems	-
Green	Cllr. Malcolm Noonan
Indepenents	Noel Walsh, Paddy Manning

Carlow-Kilkenny is one of the few constituencies to see no boundary change, nor a loss of representation since the last election in 2011.

In 2011, it split 3 FG, 1 Lab, 1 FF - good vote management by FG maximised their returns, and too many candidates from FF helped squeeze them to but one. Their affected candidate, Bobby Aylward, won the by-election in the constituency last year caused by the movement of Phil Hogan from the cabinet to the European Commission.

This time, I doubt anyone believes FG could take 3 seats. Phelan should be the safest of the three - it seems to me a pretty close call between Deering and Fitzgerald for the other seat.

FF only need to do marginally better than 2011 to hold two seats - and the general polling indicates that they should manage just that. It will be interesting to see if their vote management improves this time.

Labour have historically done well in Carlow-Kilkenny - and despite losing seats, IIRC the party overperformed in the local elections compared with Labour in the rest of the country. To have any chance, Phelan will need to transfer very well from the minor left-ish candidates and from geographically nearby candidates. A tall order.

Kathleen Funchion (SF) is running for the Dáil for the fourth time - building her vote each time, getting to 16% in the by-election last year, pretty much exactly what will be needed this time. I doubt she'll match it in the general, but 10-12% looks perfectly plausible and probably good enough to suck in enough transfers to get through.

Of the others, Malcolm Noonan is one of the longest standing Green county councillors in the country - holding his since since 2004. Though the Greens took a seat here in 2007, Noonan would need some freakish luck to make it this time.

Patrick McKee defected to Renua from FF last year and won 9.5% of the vote in the by-election. I suspect he benefited from heightened attention for Renua at the time and would do well to hold that level of support. I doubt he can gather the necessary transfers to be truly competitive - but then there's not much data to go on here.

I would wonder whether a good single AAA-PBP candidate would have been able to outpoll the Greens and maybe push ahead of Phelan to give them a perfectly credible result. As it is they seem to have cemented their status as also-rans.

The constituency has never returned an independent TD - and it doesn't look like breaking that streak is at all likely this time either. Noel Walsh, running on an anti-cronyism platform, has a personal best of 0.36% from his previous two efforts to get elected. Paddy Manning, known for campaigning on pro-life and anti-marriage equality issues, is the other indie.


RTÉ prediction: 2 FG, 2 FF, 1 SF
Irish Times prediction: 2 FG, 2 FF, 1 Lab
Jas prediction: 2 FG (Phelan, Deering), 2 FF (McGuinness, Aylward), 1 SF (Funchion)

A constituency profile with a bit more detail on local party strengths from psephologist D.J. Moore
here: http://www.tallyrifficmaps.com/reports/Carlow%20Kilkenny%20Profile.pdf

[ObserverIE]

Given the Green Party's decision to contest all constituencies (despite, in even the most optimistic scenarios, being only competitive in a very small number of seats) - this threshold will an important marker across the country as it will determine just how expensive the election will prove to be for them.

Did any non-incumbent Green Dáil candidates reach the deposit threshold in 2011?  I know three of their six incumbents lost their deposits that year.  Do they have a decent shot of meeting the deposit threshold in more than three constituencies this year?

Mark Dearey in Louth, who had been one of only three candidates to get elected in the city/county council elections in 2009, and had been appointed a Senator in the interim.

At a guess, the three "South Dublin" constituencies, along with Louth, Carlow-Kilkenny, Dublin Fingal and Dublin Bay North (outside chance in Waterford). The last four are all five-seaters (lowering the deposit level) and have enough of a metropolitan or alternative middle class to give them some sort of a base.

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I think it's 2% of the vote nationally (they were on 1.8% last time, so they should clear it this time with a - very modest - recovery).

I suspect, however, that they'll struggle to make a serious recovery beyond their niche because they acquired a reputation for obsessing with ideological trivia as the house went up in flames around them. I think Labour will struggle to revive after February 26th for much the same sort of reason and because SF and the Alphabet Left will have eaten their working-class base just as the Social Democrats pose a threat to the middle-class "conscience" vote.

[ObserverIE]

More political broadcasts:

Freemen On The LandDirect Democracy Ireland
Fianna Fáil as Gaeilge

[ObserverIE]

MRBI poll in Kerry giving Michael Healy-Rae two quotas by himself.

Healy-Rae The Cap 33
Deenihan (FG) 13
Griffin (FG) 13
Brassil (FF) 11
Spring (Lab) 8
Ferris (SF) 7
Moriarty (FF) 6
Healy-Rae The Beard 4
Green 2
O'Donnell (FG) 1
Renua 1
Others 1



(Tacaíocht do pháirtithe - support for parties,
Vótaí céadrogha - first preference votes,
LO - Lucht Oibre/Labour,
NS - Neamhspleách/Independent.
EL - Eile/Others)

Next generation of Caps out early lowering expectations.

[ObserverIE]

RedC again, this time for the Irish Sun:

FG 26 (-2)
FF 19 (+1)
Ind/Oth 18 (+2)
SF 17 (-3)
Lab 9 (+1)
GP 4 (+2)
SD 3 (-1)
SP/SWP 2 (-1)
Renua 2 (+1)

I'm sceptical that the Greens are at that level, and I'm also doubtful that FG are that low, no matter how awful their campaign has been. (On the other hand, FG being asked if they'd be willing to enter a FF/FG coalition as the junior partner would provide endless amusement.)

One of the two SF figures - from this poll or last - is also likely to be wrong.

[ObserverIE]

By the way, why are Irish elections on Fridays?

They haven't always been; the 2007 election was on a Thursday, and other elections have taken place on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. The polling day has always followed the UK midweek convention rather than the continental tradition of Sunday elections.

[ObserverIE]

Friday is considered to make it easier for students or people working in Dublin or other cities but whose permanent residence is elsewhere to travel down to vote if they don't then have to return to work the following morning.

[ObserverIE]

A local poll in Clare (conducted by the Marketing Department of the local university, FWIW) shows SF and Ind gaining seats at the expense of FG and Lab.

Party votes:

FF 27.9 (+0.5)
FG 24.7 (-17.7)
Ind/Oth 22.1 (+3.3)
SF 12.9 (+12.9)
Lab 8.7 (-6.1)
GP 3.7 (+1.7)

[ObserverIE]

And another...

The Irish Independent commissioned Millward Browne to poll Dublin Bay South.

%
20 Murphy (FG)
17 Andrews (SF)
13 Creighton (Renua)
13 Humphries (Lab)
11 O'Callaghan (FF)
10 O'Connell (FG)
  7 Ryan (Green)

No sign of the other 8 percentage points in the article. The three candidates not mentioned are the AAA-PBP, SocDems, and independent Mannix Flynn.

From the dead-tree edition:

 4 Mooney (SWP)
 2 Flynn (Ind)
 2 Lynch (SD)
 1 O'Gorman (Ind)

Compared with the last election:

FG 30 (-6)
SF 17 (+13)
Lab 13 (-12)
Renua 13 (+13)
FF 11 (-)
Green 7 (-)
SWP 4 (+2)
Flynn 2 (-2)
SD 2 (+2)
Oth Ind 1 (-11)

According to the second preference figures given, O'Connell is on 19 and Creighton on 6, with the Indo bigging up their favourite Blueblouse totty to knock out Lucinda as a result.



However, a lot of that 19 is likely to come from her running mate Murphy and from Labour's Humphreys, both of whom are ahead of her and likely to stay ahead of her during the count, and therefore won't be available to her.

On those figures, I would expect Andrews to pick up enough from the SWP and independents to be home and hosed. Flynn's votes will go everywhere, except perhaps SF.

Ryan and Lynch's votes will go to "progressive" but "nice" candidates. This might favour O'Connell, who has run a very well-financed campaign trying to out-Ivana Ivana in one of the few constituencies where that would be a net positive, except that Humphries will still be in the race and will be competitive for those votes, and I don't see her overtaking him.

The next one to go out will be O'Callaghan. If any block of votes in Dublin South East is likely to favour Creighton over O'Connell, it will be the rather socially-conservative rump of FF.

I'd call it Murphy, Andrews, Humphries, Creighton.

How the embassy belt and the chatterati react to having a Shinner TD (even one who's a recycled FFer) remains to be seen.

[ObserverIE]

So according to constituency polls Sinn Fein are going to gain a seat in Dublin Bay South but lose Martin Ferris in Kerry. Don't mind me if I take a whole bucket of salt with these polls.

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Not all of DBS is like Ballsbridge or Ranelagh, there's also Ringsend and the South East Inner City where I suspect a lot of these Shinner votes are coming from

I'm well aware of that.... I spent a looooonnnng time living in Dublin 4 and 6 flatland (I even lived in Ranelagh before it got gentrified in earnest - I remember TriBeCa when it was a very greasy greasy spoon). But the matrons of Shrewsbury Road and the radical chic of Mountpleasant Square also form part of the mix.

[ObserverIE]

Allegations of a B&A poll (apparently there was a PDF up on the website which has now disappeared)Existence confirmed and published:

FG 30 (+2)
FF 22 (+2)
SF 15 (-2)
Ind/Oth 15 (+1)
SP/SWP 5 (+2)
Lab 4 (-4)
SD 3 (-1)
Renua 3 (+1)
GP 3 (+1)
WP 1 (-)

Even I doubt that Labour are as low as 4%.

[ObserverIE]

And the Irish Independent is... pro-coalition?

This kind of scaremongering against anti-establishment parties seldom works (well, it might work counterproductively).

It is principally pro-Denis O'Brien.

It was traditionally the Fine Gael house journal until 1997 when it turned towards Ahern's FF as revenge for the outgoing government's failure to sufficiently support its then-owner's commercial interests. It then stayed with FF all through the Tiger years until turning towards FG as the default right-wing option in the aftermath of the crash.

It has always been anti-SF but it has gone into overdrive now that it perceives the party as a threat to the way things are done.

[ObserverIE]

RedC for the Sunday Business Post:

FG 30 (+4)
FF 18 (-1)
SF 16 (-1)
Ind/Oth 15 (-3)
Lab 8 (-1)
SD 4 (+1)
GP 4 (-)
SP/SWP 3 (+1)
Renua 2 (-)

[ObserverIE]

Full breakdown of Inds/Others will be released tomorrow

 ^
 |__________ points to previous post...

[ObserverIE]

IMS/Millward Brown for the Sunday Independent:

FG 27 (-)
FF 23 (+1)
SF 19 (-2)
Ind/Oth 13 (-6)
Lab 6 (-)
SP/SWP 6 (+4)
SD 4 (+3)
Renua 2 (+1)
GP 2 (+1)

(Yes, I know the numbers add to 102)

[ObserverIE]

IMS/Millward Brown for the Sunday Independent:

FG 27 (-)
FF 23 (+1)
SF 19 (-2)
Ind/Oth 13 (-6)
Lab 6 (-)
SP/SWP 6 (+4)
SD 4 (+3)
Renua 2 (+1)
GP 2 (+1)

(Yes, I know the numbers add to 102)

Presumably the SP/SWP number is an outlier.

They're on 5% in B&A and 3% in RedC so 6% is not a huge outlier. Their representative (Richard Boyd-Barrett) was considered to have performed well in the leader's debate on Tuesday.

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Their weakness is that they have few candidates and some of the ones they do have are weak. A lot of people may turn up at the polling station to find that the party they intended to vote for is not actually on the ballot in their constituency.

For example, they have no candidate in either of the social liberal bastions of Dún Laoghaire and Rathdown, or in Fingal, Dublin West, Kildare South, and the two urban Cork constituencies, all of which would be likely areas for them to do well in. They will hold the three seats they're defending but I don't see any obvious gains - their best chance of a gain looks like Dublin Bay North, where they're running a sitting councillor who got re-elected as an independent in 2014, but where there's a lot of competition on the "progressive" left with two sitting independent TDs, two SF and two Alphabet Left candidates, a Labour junior minister and, last and hopefully least, Adorable Averil.

[ObserverIE]

Ipsos/MRBI for the Irish Times:

FG 28 (-)
FF 23 (+2)
Ind/Oth 18 (+2)
SF 15 (-4)
Lab 6 (-1)
SP/SWP 3 (-1)
SD 3 (+1)
Renua 2 (+1)
GP 2 (-)

More details here.

[ObserverIE]

Two things that would now not shock me come Saturday:

1. FF outpolling or being within 2% of FG on first preferences.
2. Labour being on 3 seats or fewer.

[ObserverIE]

Day 2... Cavan-Monaghan

Candidates

Fine Gael	Heather Humphreys TD, Joe O'Reilly TD
Labour	-
Fianna Fáil	Mike Durkan, Brendan Smith TD, Cllr. Niamh Smyth
Sinn Féin	Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin TD, Sen. Kathryn Reilly
AAA-PBP	-
Renua	-
SocDems	-
Green	Micheál Callaghan
Direct Democracy	Michael McDermott
Indepenents	Sean Conlan TD, Jimmy Mee, John Wilson

Cavan-Monaghan loses a substantial part of west Cavan to the Sligo-Leitrim constituency, and with it one of its seats to become a 4-seater constituency.

In 2011, it split 3 FG, 1 SF, 1 FF - FG gaining 3 seats on 39% of the vote, SF got 1 seat from 26% of the vote, and FF 1 seat from 20% of the vote.

FG are down to 2 candidates, from 4 last time, losing their third candidate when the increasingly scandal-prone Sean Conlan left the party recently. Minister for the Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, Heather Humphries shouldn't face any difficulties in re-election. Now having the Monaghan FG vote to herself, she will also take votes from Cootehill in Cavan, and as the most prominant (maybe only?) Protestant on the ballot, will pick up votes elsewhere in Cavan ahead of her running-mate. Indeed, I suspect her relative strength and the loss of west Cavan might make things more uncomfortable than they should be for Joe O'Reilly.

Conlan himself I presume has seen the writing on the wall for some time. Whatever chance he has (and I suspect it's not much at all), he is probably correct that he'll get a better return as an indie than under the FG flag.

SF's Ó Caoláin has been solidly returned each time since 1997. The question is whether the party can seriously push for the second seat with 27 year old Senator Kathryn Reilly. Cavan is a more difficult hunting ground for SF than Monaghan - they'll need excellent vote management, and string transfers from the also-rans to stand a chance.

FF's Brendan Smith should be straight-forwardly re-elected. Formerly a stronghold constituency for the party - their resilience in Cavan was reasonably impressive in the 2014 local elections, but it won't be enough to seriously contest for a second seat. Such is the party's difficulties that finding a second candidate was a difficult enough chore. Just about all their sitting councillors in Monaghan ruled themselves out - and their search for a female Monaghan based candidate proved in vain. In the end they've gone with party activist Mike Durkan from Clones (Monaghan), and local election poll-topper Niamh Smyth in Cavan - one presumes at least in part with the gender quota in mind. 

Being one of the most conservative constituencies in the country, Labour, the Social Democrats and the Alphabet Left have decided to save their deposits. The Greens are planning to run in every constituency - and Cavan-Monaghan should be a contender for one of their weakest returns.

Renua's "pro-family, pro-life" candidate was essentially deselected in December after allegedly making homophobic comments online.

Of the indies, Cavan-based John Wilson might be the most likely contender. The nephew of a former FF Government Minister - and indeed brother to a sitting FF Senator, his came to public attention  from the garda whistleblower controversy.

Jimmy Mee is Monaghan-based and is known for charity fundraising. His priorities are hospitals, student grants, and rural crime. He's unlikely to trouble the election count staff too much.

Finally, there is Michael McDermott of Direct Democracy Ireland. Their wiki page gives the background on them. Mr McDermott was active in opposing the introduction of water charges in Cavan. DDI's record polling return so far is 6.5% in the 2013 Meath East by-election. I don't expect any of their candidates to reach those dizzying heights this time out.


RTÉ prediction: 1 FG, 1 SF, 1 FF, and 1 FG-SF toss-up
Irish Times prediction: 2 FG, 1 SF, 1 FF
Jas prediction: 2 FG (Humphries, O'Reilly), 1 SF (Ó Caoláin), 1 FF (Smith)

Cavan-Monaghan report from D.J. Moore here.

[ObserverIE]

Wild guess at final figures, assuming that the vote totals are something like 27.5 23.5 16.5 6 3.5 2.5 2.5 2.5 15.5:

FG 56
FF 39
SF 24
Lab 9
SD 3
SP 3
SWP 2
Renua 1
Ind/Oth 21

I'm deliberately giving Lab and FG the benefit of the doubt to counter my own biases.

[ObserverIE]

At this point I think the Labour TDs who'll survive will basically be random and based on personal votes.

They will also be mainly elderly, which doesn't bode well for the party's future as anything other than a secularist analogue of the Christian Centrist Party. The nine who I have holding on are Ryan, Humphries, Tuffy, Stagg, Wall, Nash, Howlin, O'Sullivan and Kelly. None of those strike me as inspiring and only four are the right side of 50.

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The only poll that I definitely know about is a RedC (presumably for Paddy Power) and I don't rate RedC especially highly. The Irish Times article from Damian Loscher of MRBI may possibly hint at another poll from them ("Luckily, the final Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI poll [in 2007] was late enough in field to register the lift") but that may be wishful thinking on my part.

I think FF will come back reasonably strongly outside of Dublin in areas where SF candidates are not ready for prime-time and there are no strong independents. FG have done nothing to endear themselves to anyone beyond their base (Enda having a Sheffield rally moment on Saturday will not have helped). FF might have done even better if they hadn't f***ed up candidate selection in a number of places (Roscommon, Longford, Monaghan).