Irish general election: 25 February 2011

[Harry Hayfield]

Ireland 2007
Fianna Fail 858,565 votes (41.56%) winning 77 seats
Fine Gael 564,428 votes (27.32%) winning 51 seats
Labour 209,175 votes (10.13%) winning 20 seats
Sinn Fein 143,410 votes (6.94%) winning 4 seats
Independents 118,951 votes (5.76%) winning 5 seats
Greens 96,936 votes (4.69%) winning 6 seats
Progressive Democrats 56,396 votes (2.73%) winning 2 seats
Socialist Party 13,218 votes (0.64%) winning 0 seats
Worker's Party 3,026 votes (0.15%) winning 0 seats
Other Parties 1,705 votes (0.08%) winning 0 seats

Since the election the Progressive Democrats dissolved (with both TD's now sitting as Independents)

[Harry Hayfield]

Breaking News: The Irish Green party withdraw from coaltion

[Harry Hayfield]

Any thoughts on whether FF's polling position will improve as a result? Will they at least scrape second place with Martin at the helm, or is Ireland not ready to give them a second chance?

There has not been a poll since Martin's election, but the last poll (conducted on January 22nd) suggested that FF were on 9% (the same as Sinn Fein). For FF to come second in the popular vote would mean a swing from FG to FF of about 11%. Seeing as compared with that last election in 2007, the FF to FG swing is 18.5% that does seem a little unlikely.

[Harry Hayfield]

RTE Exit Poll (and my forecast allocations)
Fine Gael 36.1% (+8.8% on 2007) winning 69 quotas
Labour 20.5% (+10.4% on 2007) winning 40 quotas
Inds and Others 15.5% (+9.9% on 2007) winning 12 quotas
Fianna Fail 15.1% (-26.5% on 2007) winning 29 quotas
Sinn Fein 10.1% (+3.1% on 2007) winning 13 quotas
Greens 2.7% (-2.0% on 2007) winning 3 quotas
Fine Gael short of an overall majority by by 14 quotas
Swing: Fianna Fail to Fine Gael 17.7%, Fine Gael to Labour 0.8%

[Harry Hayfield]

I would like to ask member's opinion on this ballot paper from Wicklow constituency to tell me where the elector's marks should go?