Irish general election, 26th Feb 2016

[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.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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

A few weeks ago, I was pretty confident that the government would be re-elected, or at least close to being so with perhaps the IA added to the coalition, but now I think there's no chance of that unless the polls are massively wrong (they are likely to be a bit off given independents/candidate issues but not to that extent). Alas this might make me have to revise my 'Fianna Fail are going to make a very few gains' view. But before listing prediction I'll wait for the very last polls.

[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).

[Tetro Kornbluth]

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I wouldn't be anywhere near confident for half of those listed, Wall and O'Sullivan especially. I think though what I expect is for them to be hit the worst in working class areas (as we saw in the locals) so it's completely possible imo that Humphries will be only Dublin survivor with a few popular local TDs (Kelly? Howlin? Penrose?)

Worst of all for Labour is if Alan Kelly does survive he'll probably become leader and I don't think the party and possibly not the country can survive that level of testosterone.

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I increasingly suspect that the election outside Dublin will resemble the locals more than I had anticipated (I used the European elections as my previous model) but I wouldn't rule out at all 'surprise' Sinn Fein gains in many non-Dublin constituencies, in many places they will be the default non-'big party' choice and will gain from them significantly.

However, I still don't think FF can win 39 seats with just 23% of the vote. FG, after all, won just 31 with 22% in 2002 and that was with more a favourable transfer patterns than what FF will receive this time around. I still think FF will be doing well to get more than 2 seats in Dublin and any at all on the Southside.

[ObserverIE]

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I wouldn't be anywhere near confident for half of those listed, Wall and O'Sullivan especially. I think though what I expect is for them to be hit the worst in working class areas (as we saw in the locals) so it's completely possible imo that Humphries will be only Dublin survivor with a few popular local TDs (Kelly? Howlin? Penrose?)

Howlin has stuffed enough pork into Wexford to be one of the very few bankers for Labour. I have my doubts about Penrose based on health issues (the FF and FG candidates he's competing with in Mullingar are younger and more active-looking).

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LOL.

I think there could be worse fates for Labour in terms of random survivors becoming leader:

 

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I increasingly suspect that the election outside Dublin will resemble the locals more than I had anticipated (I used the European elections as my previous model) but I wouldn't rule out at all 'surprise' Sinn Fein gains in many non-Dublin constituencies, in many places they will be the default non-'big party' choice and will gain from them significantly.

However, I still don't think FF can win 39 seats with just 23% of the vote. FG, after all, won just 31 with 22% in 2002 and that was with more a favourable transfer patterns than what FF will receive this time around. I still think FF will be doing well to get more than 2 seats in Dublin and any at all on the Southside.
[/quote]

I have them taking six seats in Dublin (O'Brien, Haughey and Chambers on the northside, and less certainly Curran, Lahart and SchoolmarmHanafin on the southside), but winning one seat everywhere else except Roscommon-Galway, and two in Carlow-Kilkenny, Cork - South Central, Donegal, Offaly and Wexford. I think their vote outside Dublin will be high 20s/30s.

FG had too many candidates in 2002 and their campaign was an absolute shambles. I don't think we can say either of those things about FF this time.

[ObserverIE]

Another constituency poll by the Indo in Cork South Central:



Party votes:

FF 36 (+8)
FG 26 (-9)
SF 18 (+10)
Lab 6 (-13)
Finn 6 (+2)
Renua 2 (+2)
GP 2 (-1)
SP/SWP 2 (+2)
Other Ind 4 (-)

[Gustaf]

Went with Dublin Rathdown, since that seems to be the most common one used and it makes things convenient for comparison's sake.

SF: 32 (!)
Peter Mathews 31
FG (Shatter) 30
FF 29
Green 27
FG (Madigan) 26
Labour 19
Shane Ross 0

Funnily enough, they have recorded Shane Ross's stance as 'equivocal' on every issue.

EDIT: Upon further review of his Wikipedia page I don't think I would be a big supporter of Shane Ross. "Promotes himself as standing up for small shareholders and consumers" sounds nice but doesn't excuse opposition to fluoridation and other such wacko positions.

Also took this one:


FG: 28
SF: 27
Peter Mathews: 24
Green: 23
FF: 19
FG: 18

So I guess I'd be a Fine Gael voter in the godforsaken Irish party system?

[ObserverIE]

Went with Dublin Rathdown, since that seems to be the most common one used and it makes things convenient for comparison's sake.

SF: 32 (!)
Peter Mathews 31
FG (Shatter) 30
FF 29
Green 27
FG (Madigan) 26
Labour 19
Shane Ross 0

Funnily enough, they have recorded Shane Ross's stance as 'equivocal' on every issue.

EDIT: Upon further review of his Wikipedia page I don't think I would be a big supporter of Shane Ross. "Promotes himself as standing up for small shareholders and consumers" sounds nice but doesn't excuse opposition to fluoridation and other such wacko positions.

Also took this one:


FG: 28
SF: 27
Peter Mathews: 24
Green: 23
FF: 19
FG: 18

So I guess I'd be a Fine Gael voter in the godforsaken Irish party system?

Looking at your social/economic score it would look like the nearest match. A little more leftwing economically and you would probably be comfortable with Labour.

[Antonio the Sixth]

Oh dear, is Epic Fáil actually surging?

[ObserverIE]

Oh dear, is Epic Fáil actually surging?

They were succeeded by Epic Arrogance and Epic Cronyism, so a (limited) recovery is not as surprising as it might appear to outsiders.

RedC for Paddy Power:

FG 30 (-)
FF 20 (+2)
Ind/Oth 16 (+1)
SF 15 (-1)
Lab 7 (-1)
SD 4 (-)
SP/SWP 3 (-)
GP 3 (-1)
Renua 2 (-)

Paddy Power's chairman, along with a group of other business executives, has a letter in today's Denis O'Brien DailyIndo, warning the plebs against voting for "populist Left political parties and fringe elements" and to instead vote for Denis's pet political partyparties which will "massively cut unemployment, reduce tax on work and invest ambitiously in improving public services and vital infrastructure".

It's a massive coincidence that these points match the election slogans of FG almost exactly.

[Zanas]

So SF polled high for the best part of last year, and started the campaign pretty high, and are now slowly drifting to lower double digits. Is it just a case of "reality strikes the voters", or have they campaigned very poorly ?

[ObserverIE]

Adams has performed poorly when questioned on detailed figures (this is a long-running problem for SF) and they've been subjected to a concerted media mugging (the establishment really, really don't want SF in government with the attendant risk of a lot of cosy relationships being upset).

Changing the leader may solve one problem but not the second.

[ObserverIE]

Galway West constituency poll by MRBI:

*Ó Cuív (FF) 13
*Kyne (FG) 13
*O'Mahony (FG) 11
Ó Clochartaigh (SF) 11
Connolly (Ind) 8
*Grealish (Ind) 7
Naughton (FG) 6
*Nolan (Lab) 6
Ó Tuathail (SD) 6
Hoade (FF) 4
Connolly (FF) 4
Healy-Eames (Ind) 3
Davoren (Renua) 2
Cubbard (Ind) 2
Sheridan (GP) 2
Holohan (SP) 2

Party votes:

FG 30 (-1)
FF 21 (-)
Ind 20 (-8)
SF 11 (+5)
Lab 6 (-6)
SD 6 (+6)
Renua 2 (+2)
GP 2 (-)
SP 2 (+2)

[warandwar]

SF (along with other parties) is obviously playing up the Easter Rising Centenary, but what do you all think the effect of any nostalgia for the Starry Plough will be?

[Јas]

Polling opens shortly for the 2,000 voters on the islands off the west coast.

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http://www.rte.ie/news/election-2016/2016/0225/770651-donegal-islands-voting/

[Harry Hayfield]

There will be NO coverage on BBC Parliament (as there was in 2011) but there are other others. If you are in the UK and have a Sky+ box, Irish TV (Sky Channel 191) will be hosting two special programmes at 2.00pm and 7.00pm GMT (each lasting three hours) which are sandwiched by three special half hour programmes with some of the party leaders and reactions to the results. RTE will also be showing the results (and that will be streamed on their website rte.ie) and on the Sunday BBC One Northern Ireland (Sky Channel 953, Freeview Channel 1 in Northern Ireland) will be showing a special election of the Sunday Politics show live from Dublin.

[Јas]

So, I obviously failed in my efforts to complete the constituency previews and predictions. Work and family stuff compressed my available time.

Anyway, I've got my summary prediction complete.
If it's anything like previous efforts, the next Dáil won't look remotely like this - so it's best considered an exercise for my own amusement rather than anything else.

Constituency	FG	FF	SF	Lab	Other
Carlow-Kilk	2	2	1
Cavan-Mon	2	1	1
Clare	2	1			1 Ind (Harty)
Cork E	1	1	1	1
Cork NC	1	1	1		1 AAA-PBP
Cork NW	1	1			1 Ind (O’Shea)
Cork SC	1	2	1
Cork SW	2	1
Donegal	1	2	2
Dub Bay N	1	1	1		1 IndAlliance (McGrath); 1 Ind4Change (Brougham)
Dub Bay S	1			1	1 Renua, 1 Green
Dub Central	1		1		1 Ind (O’Sullivan)
Dub Fingal	1	1	1	1	1 Ind4Change (Daly)
Dub MW	1		1	1	1 AAA-PBP
Dub NW			1	1	1 SocDem
Dub Rathdown	2				1 IndAlliance (Ross)
Dub SC	1		1		1 AAA-PBP, 1 Ind4Change (Collins)
Dub SW	1	1	2		1 AAA-PBP
Dub W	1	1	1		1 AAA-PBP
Dún Laoghaire	2	1			1 AAA-PBP
Galway E	1	1			1 IndAlliance (Canney)
Galway W	1	1	1		2 Inds (Grealish, Connolly)
Kerry	2	1	1		1 Ind (M. Healy-Rae)
Kildare N	1	1		1	1 SocDem
Kildare S	1	1		1
Laois	1	1	1
Limerick City	2	1	1
Limerick Co	2	1
L'ford-W'Meath	2	1			1 IndAlliance (Moran)
Louth	2	1	2
Mayo	3	1
Meath E	2	1
Meath W	1	1	1
Offaly	1	1	1
Roscommon-Gal	1	1			1 Ind (Naughten)
Sligo-Leitrim	1	1	1		1 IndAlliance (Casserley)
Tipperary	2	1			1 WUAG, 1 Ind (Lowry)
Waterford	1	1	1		1 IndAlliance (Halligan)
Wexford	2	1		1	1 Ind4Change (Wallace)
Wicklow	2	1	1		1 SocDem
TOTAL	56	37	27	8	30

Totals
56 Fine Gael
37 Fianna Fáil
27 Sinn Féin
  8 Labour
  6 AAA-PBP
  6 Independent Alliance 
  4 Independents 4 Change
  3 Social Democrats
  1 Renua
  1 Green
  1 WUAG
  8 Independents

158 Total


Which would result in who knows what.
Possibly a FG minority with FF support on confidence/supply, to be followed with another election within a year or so.

We'll see soon enough.

[Јas]

The weather forecast for election day is mostly miserable.

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http://www.met.ie/forecasts/

[Јas]

The Irish broadcast media are now into the election moratorium period.

Meanwhile we have, what I presume is, the final election poll - and the first university-type polling effort in Ireland that I'm aware of.

TheJournal.ie commissioned Dublin Institute of Technology Market Research, who came up with:

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http://www.thejournal.ie/new-poll-2623859-Feb2016/

[Јas]

Below is a summary of the final polls from each of the national polling companies - with the simple average included. (Note that two companies didn't seem to poll the Independent Alliance separately from independents/others.) All polls below were published within the past 5 days.

Also included for reference are the 2011 General Election results.

	2011	B&A	MB	I-MRBI	RedC	DIT	Average
Fine Gael	36	30	27	28	30	32	29.4
Fianna Fáil	17	22	23	23	20	20	21.6
Sinn Féin	10	15	19	15	15	15	15.8
Labour	19	4	6	6	7	8	6.2
AAA-PBP	2	5	5	3	3	2	3.6
Soc Dems		3	4	3	4	4	3.6
Renua		3	2	2	2	2	2.2
Green	2	3	2	2	3	2	2.4
Ind Alliance		5		4	2		3.7
Ind/Oth	14	10	14	14	14	14	13.2

[Tetro Kornbluth]

Prediction Time... stealing Jas' format however here I won't distinguish between the various groups of independents because I can never remember who is in who... Compared to a few weeks ago I'm much less positive about a surprise FG sweep and a bit more optimistic about FF's chances, at least outside Dublin.

Constituency	FG	FF	SF	Lab	Other
Carlow-Kilk	2	2	1
Cavan-Mon	2	1	1
Clare	1	1	1		1 Ind (Harty)
Cork E	2	1	1
Cork NC	1	1	1		1 AAA-PBP
Cork NW	1				2 Ind (O’Shea and Flynn)
Cork SC	1	2	1
Cork SW	2	1
Donegal	1	1	2		1 Ind (Shiels)
Dub Bay N	1		1	1	2 Inds (McGrath and Broughan)
Dub Bay S	1			1	1 Renua, 1 Green
Dub Central	1		1		1 Soc Dem
Dub Fingal	1	1	1	1	1 Ind (Daly)
Dub MW	1		1	1	1 AAA-PBP
Dub NW			1		1 Soc Dem, 1 AAA-PBP
Dub Rathdown	2				1 Ind (Ross)
Dub SC	1		1		1 AAA-PBP, 1 Ind (Collins)
Dub SW	2		2		1 AAA-PBP
Dub W	1	1	1		1 AAA-PBP
Dún Laoghaire	3				1 AAA-PBP
Galway E	1	1			1 Inds (Canney)
Galway W	1	1	1		2 Inds (Grealish, Connolly)
Kerry	1	1	1		2 Inds (M. Healy-Rae, D. Healy Rae)
Kildare N	2	1			1 SocDem
Kildare S	1	1	1
Laois	1	1	1
Limerick City	2	1	1
Limerick Co	2	1
L'ford-W'Meath	2	1			1 Ind (Moran)
Louth	2	1	2
Mayo	3	1
Meath E	2	1
Meath W	1	1	1
Offaly	1	1	1
Roscommon-Gal	1				2 Inds (Naughten, Fitzmaurice)
Sligo-Leitrim	1	1	1		1 Ind (Casserley)
Tipperary	2	1		1	1 Ind (Lowry)
Waterford	1	1	1		1 Ind (Halligan)
Wexford	2	1		1	1 Ind (Wallace)
Wicklow	2	1	1		1 SocDem
TOTAL	58	31	29	6	34

Totals
58 Fine Gael
31 Fianna Fáil
29 Sinn Féin
  6 Labour
  7 AAA-PBP
  4 Social Democrats
  1 Renua
  1 Green
21  Independents

Going a few long shots here, which I'm bound to get wrong (Cork NW, Donegal, Dublin Central) but there are always a few every GE where independents and others are a major force. Oh, and Jas you seem to have forgotten that Louth has five seats, not four.

[Јas]

Oh, and Jas you seem to have forgotten that Louth has five seats, not four.

Ah. Thanks.
Transposition error. I also had an error in Cork SW.
Should be corrected now.

[Jens]

Fun test - did a few different Dublin constituencies and got the Green candidate on top each time. But I've got some questions.
What is the deal with Irish Water? '
What's NAMA and JobBridge?
That hospital question. Is that about private hospitals or am I just being ignorant about the Irish healthcare system?
And that water metering deal. Is that based on the, for a Scandinavian, totally bizarre left-wing resistance against water feeds?

Thanks for the answers - very informative. (and sorry about the late reply. Not really active here anymore)

Have an interesting election tomorrow
Irish Water is a recently established (by the incumbent government) state-run company that is in charge of the water supplies throughout the entire country. Historically the management of water has left to the county councils, a situation which has regularly led to problems with the supplies, but has meant that water was and has been free at the point of use (i.e. for the overwhelming majority of consumers). As part of the government's financial restructuring following the 2010 'bailout' by the International Monetary Fund, charges on the use of water have been introduced and it is Irish Water that will collect them which according to themselves which allow them to modernize the water supply and end many of the issues surrounding it as well as raising money for the state. However, the company has been dogged with problems, senior management have all come from the traditional Irish semi-state pseudo-entrepreneurial management class with expectations of high very salaries and bonuses at taxpayers' expenses. The idea of charging for water is extremely controversial and has bought one of the biggest public resistance campaigns in Irish history with, at present, only half paying. This shortfall in funds has required it to get more and more state subsidies to stay afloat. Finally there are constant rumours often only half-heartily denied that the long-term objective of the government towards Irish Water is to privatize it and end the public provision of water supplies with all that that would entail.

Wrt water metering. Before the introduction of Irish Water there was nothing in place to monitor the level of water usage by the public. In order for this to rectified and thus relate water charges to water usage Irish Water has gone around Ireland trying to install water meters outside people's homes. It is here where a lot of the resistance to Water Charges has taken place with residents regularly blocking roads and preventing the installation of meters. This has sometimes gone as far as threats and harassment of those installing the meters.

NAMA stands for National Asset Management Agency. It was a body set up under the Previous Fianna Fail led administration to administer the assets from the 'bad loans' that had been created during the property bubble of the previous decade. In short as the government nationalized the banks (which it would eventually do for all Irish banks) it would move the failing assets from these banks to NAMA which would then control the property. This has made NAMA the largest landowner in Europe(!). Now that property prices are rising again and this is absolutely not a new bubble because it's absolutely not a new bubble NAMA is starting to offload its massive portfolio. However, there are still swathes of unused and unoccupied property throughout the country which is held by NAMA and nobody is quite sure what to do with it.

Jobbridge is a social welfare scheme set up by the current government in which companies (very much including the civil service and state-run companies) can apply to the Department of Social Welfare to set up internships for the unemployed whose salaries will be paid by the Department. However, these salaries are not bound by minimum wage laws but rather at the rate of unemployment benefit + €50 a week. For someone over the age of 25 that would mean being paid €238 a week for a job which might be the standard 35-40 hours (and for someone 25 or under it would be even less). It is widely seen as exploitative of the workers involved and is widely hated on the left and the far left. Its record of giving long-term employment to either first time job seekers or long term job seekers is mixed at best and it has allowed the government to claim that unemployment is lower than it actually is. Many companies have been found trying to downgrade part of its 'main jobs' off to Jobbridge as to cut costs.

No, the hospitals question refers to all hospitals, whether public or private although in the Irish healthcare system the distinction isn't as clear cut as it is in other places.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

One thing should be noted. In the last locals there are quite a lot of people who preferenced independents 1, 2, 3 before going on to the 'party' candidates. That is to say, they voted for independents because they were such (regardless of ideology) and preferred them over non-Indos. If this happens again in the General today, we could have some freak results.