Ireland General Discussion

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Electoral timetable
Varadkar* seems keen to continue the government beyond the October 2018 budget (link). As long as he's delivering big poll leads, who can blame him? It's as good as having a majority.

That schedule would mean four national votes in 2018: constitutional amendments to repeal the abortion limits, the blasphemy ban, and the clause on woman's contribution to the family; furthermore, a Presidential election which will happen regardless of the government. In some parts of the country, there may be additional mini-referendums to allow city-dwellers to elect mayors.
Survival beyond 2018 would mean five national votes in 2019: three plebiscites to allow easier divorce, votes for overseas citizens, and votes at age 16; furthermore, two scheduled elections for local councils and the European Parliament regardless of the government. There might be an extra European MEP for Ireland if Britain Brexits promptly. Governments like these elections because notwithstanding some losses in by-elections, they give exit opportunities to MEP/Commissioner candidates with cabinet seats, allowing graceful reshuffles.
Add in a general election sometime in 2018-19, but remember that they all predicted a 2017 election and it didn't happen, so treat this as uncertain.

The closest contests among the referendums, in my opinion, are the ones in 2018. Divorce and overseas citizens should pass. Votes at 16 will fail.

* who may be gone by March if the SWP/Irish Times is correct: https://twitter.com/KittyHollandIT/status/935521034169708545 , or, not

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By the way, anyone wondering why opinion changed from "dead Varadkar" to "hero Varadkar" in the closing 4 weeks of last year can look no further than the Ipsos poll. It's the company that gets it right most often.

The most important issue in the first half of this year, at the least, will be Abortion:
A special parliamentary committee considered the recommendations from the citizens' assembly on abortion and the new laws that might follow from any change. The committee's main proposal was to repeal the constitutional provisions on abortion in place since 1983. They also suggested that the law should allow abortion up to 12 weeks into pregnancy, or at other times in case of a threat to the health of the woman.

A hard-to-read summary of the committee votes is here (Irish Times image link), and observe that a 22-week limit was defeated 4-17 and would still be more restrictive than in England. Three members supporting all restrictions instead issued a minority report calling for no change in law and a different citizens' assembly; one of them is now talking about a new political alignment to oppose abortion, which would presumably work like the current alliances of independents all across the Oireachtas.

Step 1 is for the Oireachtas to pass a bill authorising a referendum on the repeal of the previous constitutional amendment. The first column of the Irish Times image suggests a free vote would split the two main parties. The government is drafting a proposal, and I read comments by Peter Fitzpatrick of Fine Gael, one of the three dissenters, suggesting most of his colleagues would support repeal. Fianna Fáil will have a free vote. Sinn Féin, smaller parties and the pro-government independents would mainly support repeal.

Any referendum is scheduled for early summer, but it might be delayed until the Papal visit in autumn, which would be brilliant. There's no point in posting early opinion polling, because it has been so misleading as to Irish referendum outcomes in the past.

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A fair if legalistic point, but to be clear for overseas readers, it's not hard to find two English doctors who will certify an abortion up to 24 weeks, so the health conditions are not restrictive. You may have to travel in certain areas depending on local opinion, but it's not a Mississippi- or Texas-type question of prohibitive distance. The committee's proposal is much more in line with laws in other European countries than with the English model. The point is that there is little prospect of second-trimester abortions being generally permitted in the foreseeable future.

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I suppose I simply think FF, FG and the independents will squash any legal lacuna that could make abortion a wound on their right flank in every future election, and so general availability of abortions will be out out, beyond the formal legal limit. They don't want the competition, whereas if some centre-left group don't like it, who cares?

Hang on readers - there will be other issues too - but don't be surprised if political analysis looks mainly like the foregoing! Micheál Martin suggested FF's support of the government is not guaranteed to end in 2018, but is contingent on housing and health policy delivery. Housing is a huge topic - check out Eurobarometer. About 90% of people are dependent on private-sector housing, where both prices and rents have risen very rapidly in the last five years, faster than incomes. To summarise the causes and solutions is beyond my patience as someone who has lived it! Too few new housing completions to meet the demographic determinants, is the consensus.

Health is a permanent issue, and though it's hard to argue it matters THAT much to macro-political outcomes because it seems the country has never been happy about it ever, it can certainly cause micro-level political realignments or, put less poetically, TDs can lose their seats in affected areas. To borrow from computer science, it's a Juncker-hard problem. On neither of these issues has any particular opposition party made many gains; it's really the small stuff that matters.

Note Martin doesn't mention Brexit so much, and I'd agree that Brexit will be consensus matter unless surprising developments happen. The polls seem to have softened his cough on Brexit as an opportunity for political dissent and he may keep his Brexit spokesman Stephen Donnelly back on the leash.

Issues like immigration and terrorism don't matter now, and are wholly contingent on fate. There was a bad incident yesterday that may change things, but we can afford to wait a day for the facts.

Overlooked electoral timetable factlet. 2017 was the first year without any kind of election or referendum since 2006. The largest vote was the Fine Gael leadership contest, at just over 11,000 voters - but this was closed to party members only!

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There might be an extra European MEP for Ireland if Britain Brexits promptly.

In fact, the Parliament's Constitutional committee has proposed 2 extra MEPs, so the national delegation will rocket from 11 to 13. This could mean a return to the traditional alignment of constituencies, being 2 in Leinster, 1 in Munster and 1 Connacht + Ulster + peripheries of Leinster and Munster.

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Fun facts saying something about differential strengths of local identity and solidarity: Leinster ex-Dublin is home to 1 MEP and 1.3 million people. County Cork is home to 3 MEPs and half a million people.

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https://www.politico.eu/article/irish-government-backs-may-abortion-vote/

"The Irish government agreed late Monday to back a referendum on repealing Ireland’s abortion ban.

Prime Minister Leo Varadkar announced that his Cabinet formally agreed to hold a vote on repealing the ban at the 'end of May.' He said the exact date would be determined after the Irish parliament, where there’s strong support for a referendum, has its formal say in March."

It's uncanny to see ministers Coveney and Harris leading the opposite sides within the government, albeit they both support a referendum. They would have been the top two in Cabinet if the Fine Gael leadership race went differently.

Maps of TD support for 8th amendment repeal

It'll pass the Dáil because no Dublin TD outside FF the pensioners' party can safely oppose the bill, but the electorate is a harder challenge. The Sinn Féin whip is visible in Laois and Offaly in the map above. Most conservative constituencies are generally in the middle-west of Ireland in a strip from Monaghan to North-West Cork, far from city commuters and with only one third-level institution in Athlone to attract young people. Contrast to the Seán Gallagher map:

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Nigel visited and talked guff about Dublin being a bubble for pro-EU sentiment and people outside Dublin being more resentful. Anyone with a bit of knowledge would have known that CAP and structural funds have made the EU more popular outside Dublin whether 1972 or 2012.

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Sinn Féin has officially elected its third leader, Mary Lou McDonald (TD, Dublin Central). She succeeds Gerry Adams, who was party president for 34 years. This was the expected outcome and she is has an established national presence in the south: she was an MEP before Leo Varadkar was a TD, and most recently vice-president of her party for the last decade.

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is Solidarity-PBP in the "Other" Category?

ObserverIE is referring to Solidarity-PBP by their legal names from the antediluvian period that was the Bertie 2000s. Perhaps I will start calling Mary Lou McDonald, president of PSF!

Note that like other parties whose brand is weaker than the constituent personalities, Sol-PBP opinion poll figures tend to be very low as their leading militants will be known by name rather than party label, or put another way, Sol+PBP+Greens+SD will get more than 1%. (Remember the ballot paper emphasises personality rather than party, and looks like this:
)

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My own memoirs on this topic. I heard somewhere that Joan Collins TD, elected for PBPA in 2011, was genuinely part of the broad left rather than SWP. Needless to say, she quit PBPA mid-term... I've also been to some meetings of new, local, ostensibly grassroots campaigns, at which it becomes clear that every headliner and speaker from the audience is also a member of both PBP and SWP.

Hard to compare them to the British, though. There's no evidence that the sins of SWP are replicated in PBP: that looks more like Sinn Féin's bailiwick at the moment, amid dozens of political resignations over alleged bullying / incompetence.

Plus, Solidarity + PBP both happily adopt populist left stances far from any doctrine. They can change the weather: the most remarkable fact about 2011-16 was that on water charges, Paul Murphy (Solidarity, then called, maybe, AAA? I don't remember) won the by-election and scared SF into joining the intransigent opposition, SF thereby scared FF, and that canned water charges. As for PBP, they are much more successful, almost retail politicians, than British SWP.

The SP-SWP mutual hostility was something to behold in the 2000s when they had 0 to 1 seats in the Dáil. I once asked one SP militant what was the difference. Quick as a flash, "We don't think Hezbollah is good". KKE-Syriza circa 2010 is a good comparison. Dear outside observers: these people are not built to take power, or even participate in power.

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Is Richard Boyd-Barrett an especially good politician - like Joe Higgins was? PBP support to me seems entirely based on its participation in, & leadership of, social & other protest movements in the Dublin suburbs. Which gives them grotesquely exaggerated coverage on RTÉ, in my opinion.

Surely the ex-Labour gap has already been filled by SF, with TDs throughout the old Leinster and Munster industrial towns, save Seamus Healy's Clonmel. SF now stuck in Labour's old position, FF or FG or opposition, choose your poison. In contrast Social Democrats, PBP and the rest are bunches of TDs' local organisations, with the important caveat that Labour also retain trade union leadership support. SD in particular was 3 TDs, plus a bunch of protest candidates collectively polling less than the Healy-Rae brothers in Kerry. There was never potential there, compare to Democracy Now.

Among them all, left and centre-left outside SF, I think a figure like Clare Daly might have what it takes to win the vacant Dublin Euro-seat in 2019. The crucial fact is that SF has more seats than all of their parties combined. Yet none of them exude a sense that they are doing strategic thinking beyond the next election.

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FF 24 (-5)

Pretty big drop, any idea what might have caused it?

Irish turnout models are quite obscure and most Irish poll companies produce volatile and imprecise results, except Ipsos, who poll infrequently. Unless and until change is sustained, consider most support changes to be outliers. You'll note that REDC's four most recent FF scores have been 26-26-29-24, so the 29 looks like the outlier.

If you've seen Irish election maps, you'll know there are very few individual election results per election; only 40 in general elections and perhaps 150 in local elections every 5 years. Compare to the UK with hundreds of constituencies, Italy that reports votes by comune, etc. And post-election surveys are sporadic. So the micro-data about voting in Ireland on which to calibrate any model of voter behaviour are low-frequency and low in observation count. That's before we consider the weak social basis of FF/FG/Independent party preference, so low in observable correlates as well!

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Put simply, the combination of Sinn Féin on the left, and Fianna Fáil on the centre and right, and both parties reaching out to the centre-left, poses big strategic questions for any other opposition movement. It also drains them of opportunity. Opportunity is pretty limited at the moment, anyway: check out the economic statistics. It's even a difficult question for SF to address its position vis-a-vis the other two major parties, so doubly so for the remainder of the left. A combined force of Labour + Green + SD would be in double digits and that would give it a say in coalition brokerage. However, I must reiterate that none of them broadcast aspirations beyond getting the current TDs re-elected.

Speaking of FF, they had a reshuffle, the only detail of note being that their Brexit spokesman was moved on to health, in the middle of Brexit, and after only a year.

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And so, we're pretty much back to 2013 or 2015 poll figures.

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Since these two polls are so similar, just an annotation on the change since the last election.
Gaining: FG +5 to +8; SF +7 to +8; FF +1 to +2

Losing: Labour -1 to -2; PBP etc - 2 to -3; SD -1 to -2; Greens -1 to -2

Everyone else: -7 to -12

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I wonder if there will be a 3-seater in the next election where FG, FF and SF only run one candidate apiece and all three candidates exceed quota in the first round?  With the nationwide polling numbers it seems like a possibility, like in a seat where SF runs slightly better than nationwide, and maybe FG slightly worse (so they don't ruin this scenario by running a 2nd candidate).  If the northern ROI European constituency got reduced to a three-seater in the next boundary review (which could already be happening for all I know with the country slated to gain 2 seats with Brexit), I could see such a result occurring there.

Most seats where FF, FG and SF enjoy significant combined strength also exhibit substantial local bias in voting, not that this is absent anywhere in ROI. So the scenario where they win a quota each is hard to imagine, because if there are only three candidates, then some other candidate from a fourth, fifth and sixth town in the area will inevitably stand, and win lots of votes in their hinterland.

E.g. if in Meath West you just have Cassells (FF), English (FG) and Tobin (SF), all from Navan, then someone from Trim, Kells, Castlepollard or Ballivor is going to stand and get a few thousand votes. This is the basic motive to running more candidates than you expect to win, and also the reason why it is so unlikely nowadays to defend such a numerical situation from independents or even Labour (it would have been very imaginable in the 1960s or 70s).

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Carol Nolan TD is out of Sinn Féin permanently. Ostensibly the pro-life issue, but note that under the proposed boundary changes, she would have been #1 on the list of TDs likely to lose their seats, as the weaker of 2 SF candidates in a 5-seater that's mediocre for them. As a pro-life independent incumbent, a loss is less likely for her, I believe. It's not clear whether she will or will not stand again in Laois-Offaly if the boundary changes are legislated, or Offaly if the Dáil falls before then.

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Er, have you seen this? "Varadkar backs Madigan over female ordination comments". Lay Irish women criticising the Church radically from within is by no means new, Irish folk history is full of "strong female characters".

FF endorsed Higgins for the second presidential term he promised he would never serve. It looks like the party system is trying to arrange no election in late 2018, but that requires Sinn Féin and the county councils to comply. The rival candidates so far are pretty weak, a bunch of independent non-university Senators, which is the absolute nadir of "elected" office including county councillors. More interesting would be anti-immigration artist Kevin Sharkey, but maybe his declared bid is performance art, it doesn't have political traction or any nominators. Higgins will be 85 if he completes a second term.

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(It's almost sad to follow a post about Ulster hero, top secular-and-canon lawyer and best ever FF politician president McAleese with one about part-time poet, Chavez and Castro sympathiser president Higgins)

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Latest presidential news: names being floated now include even more independent senators, Joan Freeman and (with no evidence) Frances Black (she says no way). Senators Craughwell and Ó Céidigh are said to have mooted a primary: the winner receives the support of both men's backers in the Oireachtas, while the loser tours the country looking for four local council nominations.

It's certainly even more silly than the final season of The West Wing but not yet clear that this rigmarole will yield an election. The likely course of affairs is now that the incumbent announces a re-election campaign this week. Sinn Féin then chooses whether to nominate a candidate. If they do, an election is a certainty anyway, and the independents will nominate another candidate, I think. If not, expect significant pressure to allow an uncontested re-election.

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Well, it is profoundly relevant. I mean, it looks like abortion will be illegal in most US states within the next five years.

The incumbent is indeed running. Frances Black may not be running but she did pass an occupied territories boycott through the Senate. Probably one of senators Freeman and Ó Céidigh will also run, I can't over-emphasise how little name recognition these people have, unlike the incumbent or Frances Black who recorded the best-selling album in Irish history.

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Just to highlight the sarcasm for the uninitiated - just in case it's necessary - the typical Fine Gael voter, basically a big farmer or his solicitor daughter, would not actually pay attention to the Murdoch press!

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But there's no evidence, it's just speculation. Do the Sun or Rees-Mogg have any mindshare in Irish vote intention at all? The Sun in my experience is a foreign paper mainly purchased by people who are already pretty cynical about media, and who may not even be regular voters, with little impact on anyone else. Rees-Mogg falls into a huge category where British politicians are concerned: if you are Irish and know who he is, you are probably well-informed about politics and probably won't decide vote intention on the basis of him.

I'd look to the recent weather, myself, to explain what is going on. Though medium-term, we wouldn't be seeing these numbers if unemployment were still 10% or even 7%.

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Two narratives: RedC says FG gains from everyone else, while Ireland Thinks says FG and SF consolidate support from the parties on their flanks - but didn't we hear the same message in 2014-15 right before the election disproved it? Either way, intriguing that this suggests "Independents, non-party and others" are back up to their 2016 figures that gave them a record seat total and the balance of power.