Latest polls for Sunday 18th May May 17, 2014
Posted by WorldbyStorm in Economy, Irish Politics, The Left.trackback
Well, they’re coming in, here’s Sunday Times/Behaviour & Attitudes:
Excluding Don’t Know’s and compared with the 2009 Locals…
Fine Gael 25% down seven percentage points on the party’s result in 2009.
Fianna Fáil 22% down three percentage points.
Labour 7% down eight percentage points.
Sinn Féin 17% up 10 percentage points.
Independents and Others 30% up 13 percentage points.
RTÉ cautions that Don’t Know’s are running at ‘one in four voters’ which is ‘high for this stage in the campaign.
Let’s not be too hasty but interesting how the SF vote has increased. And the Independents and Others. This surely constitutes a massive shift away from the traditional parties and parties themselves – even accepting that Independent votes at local elections have always been higher than at national ones.
Data on the European elections too.
Midlands North West (what a name, what a constituency).
Headliners…
FG, McGuinness (21%)
Ind, Flanagan (17%)
SF, Carthy (14%)
Ind, Harkin (12%)
FF, Byrne, (9%)
FF, Gallagher (8%)
Dublin
SF, Boylan (19%)
FG, Hayes (16%)
FF, Fitzpatrick (12%)
Ind, Childers (11%)
GP, Ryan (11%)
PBP, Smith (10%)
SP, Murphy (9%)
LP, Costello (7%)
South
FF, Crowley (35%)
FG, Kelly (17%)
SF, Ní Riada (14%)
FG, Clune (10%)
FG, Harris (8%)
LP, Prendergast (5%)
And many more…
All the above exclude undecideds. Big pools of those, Dublin 27%, MNW 23% and South 31%.
The Cedar Lounge Revolution 
Look at the Dublin figure: 35% between FF/FG/ LAB. Close to 50% for SF/ Childers/ Smith/ Murphy
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I was just thinking that FG must be looking at Hayes figures and getting a bit concerned about the capital at the next election. Of course they’ve lost Creighton and Flanagan (the latter for the moment, but perhaps he’ll return) so perhaps that has had some impact too.
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And in the South a seismic 75% for FF+FG+Lab
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Looking at it another way, 38% for GUE/NGL candidates. Two out of three Dublin seats going to GUE/NGL would be an interesting result.
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The Dublin figures are interesting because the truism for the last couple of decades has been that elections are won in Dublin yet it looks like FG might be going the same way as FF in the capital.
On these figures, and most of the others, FF could well end up with one seat out of 11 nationwide. That’ll be curtains for Michael Martin. I predict the ascent of noble public spirited and publicity shy John McGuinness, something which will see right wing minded pundits fly to the party’s standard.
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McGuinness may be seen as toomuchof a ‘mé féiner’ for the leadership electorate of the soldiers.
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If they can’t win a seat in Connacht/Ulster I think they’ll be driven to desperate measures. Though maybe they’ll plump for O’Cuiv which would bring their vote down to DDI levels.
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That’s their problem though, isn’t it. Their limited front bench choices are between some veteran dinosaurs and some uninspiring novices who would ordinarily have had to wait a decade to be in the job they’re now in. A clever choice would be someone like Senator Averil Power, but they’re not known for clever choices.
Likewise, Labour’s options are limited as they’ve (so far) completely failed to capitalise on the new blood the party received in 2011. These anonymous backbenchers will be the first in the firing line at the next election while the old guard continue to pass the leadership around their dwindling circle.
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‘If they can’t win a seat in Connacht/Ulster I think they’ll be driven to desperate measures. Though maybe they’ll plump for O’Cuiv which would bring their vote down to DDI levels.’
That prospect is almost enough to make me say a novena. Almost.
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Extrapolating from the Euro polls in Dublin to a Dáil election is not straightforward. Each party is running one candidate in a single constituency. The poll (and actual vote next week) is/will be a combination of support or dislike for the party and, for example, Hayes.
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Click to access J.5607%20Sunday%20Times%20Report%20May%202014.pdf
Not really got the time for anything much to say, other than the fact that page 19 might give some pause for thought amongst those interested in pontificating about the nature of transfers and how that reflects on the parties concerned; small samples and all that.
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looks normal. transfer rate between smith and murphy is interesting though not entirely surprising, not so much a split vote if just under 10% transfer on the second, meaning there is no hypothetical scenario where if one stood down the other would get a combined vote in the high teens.. eammon ryan the prick will get hayes elected, nice leaflet design by the way if any of his team are reading.
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Very interesting stuff.
What caught my eye.
MNW.
1. Both Fianna Fail candidates get less votes from the 18-34 and 35-54 voters combined than they do from over 55s. That spells oblivion in the long term.
2. Carthy and Ming on the other hand hoover up half of the 18-34 vote between them which may tell us where things are going.
3. Carthy actually has more ABC1 than C2DE votes which is unusual for Sinn Fein. McGuinness and Ming are top among C2DE which I suppose in this area contains a lot of small farmers.
4. Carthy seems to be transfer toxic, the Cope who might be in contention with him for the last seat gets almost four times as many second preferences.
5. Ming is tops in Connacht, Carthy in Ulster and McGuinness, overwhelmingly, in Leinster. Ming is doing very well in Leinster, comfortably outpolling Byrne whose base is there.
The Godless Metropolis.
1. Boylan has a huge advantage in the 35-54 age-group, around half of her votes come from there. She’s also top among younger voters but 39% of those are undecided.
2. Nessa Childers is top among the over 55s and gets almost twice as many votes there as from the other two categories.
3. Paul Murphy does amazingly badly with the older folk, only 1% here compared to 8% in both the other age groups.
4. Boylan has nearly three times as many votes as anyone else among working class voters. She has four times as many working class as middle class votes.
5. Labour do worse than any other candidate with the working class, almost all of their support is ABC.
6. Notable geographical discrepancies, Hayes has over twice as many votes in Dun Laoghaire and South Dublin as he does in the city and Fingal. The reverse is true of Boylan
7. Ryan scores best on second prefs but everyone is roughly the same here, no-one massively toxic or magnetic. Smith is transferring twice as much to Boylan than she is to Murphy.
The Big Yawner.
1. Liadh Ni Riada, like Lynn Boylan, has more male than female voters. This is a pattern with Sf generally.
2. Sean Kelly is actually top man with 18-34s. GAA I presume.
No vote at all in this group for Diarmuid O’Flynn which is surprising.
3. Crowley has both twice as many middle class and working class/small farmer votes as anyone else. Kelly and O’Riada are second and third in both these categories.
4.Crowley’s vote is obviously personal rather than political as more of it transfers to Kelly than to his running mate Kieran Hartley. Which means the last seat will go to either Clune or Harris, probably the first. O’Flynn isn’t even getting transfers, I can’t work out why this campaign never caught fire, he’s a personable well known bloke with lots of endorsements, good people working for him and an anti-establishment vote. But he does well nowhere.
LOCAL ELECTIONS.
1. Independents rival FF and FG for top spot with SF a few points behind.Labour have lost more than half their vote.
2. Fine Gael have as much CDE1 votes as Sinn Fein.
3. FF have the biggest vote in Dublin City Council. (Surprising).
4. Sinn Fein have the biggest vote in Fingal and are a close second to FG in South Dublin.
5. The Independent vote in Connacht is massive, 37% which is far more than either FF or FG.
6. FG’s 41% in Limerick/Clare/Tipp is the biggest share for any party anywhere int he country.
7. The only place Labour are in double figures is Dun Laoghaire/Rathdown which is the only place FF are in single figures.
8. Sinn Fein’s vote is extremely low in Connacht (excluding Leitrim), only 7%. It’s for example less than one third of what they get in Kildare/Laois/Longford/Meath/Offaly/Westmeath.
We are talking extremely numbers so this is more a rough sketch than a spoiler. But it’s interesting all the same and I found several figures both surprising and enlightening.
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Very good analysis eamonncork. Interesting to note that women have a much higher undecided levels in the europeans (33% to 19% in Dublin)
On another note, Is there a suggestion that Ming will join GUE/NGL? If that is case and Friday goes very well, it would mean six MEPS from Ireland (North & South) in the grouping- 4 SF, 1 PBP or SP & 1 ind.
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Given that we’ve used previous possibly inaccurate polls to bemoan the SP’s inevitable loss of their Euro seat in the forthcoming elections, I suppose it’s only fair to point out that on these figures they’re not out of the hunt for the last seat in Dublin. It’ll all depend on who sneaks ahead of who when. Hayes would be in for a long if probably successful night on those figures too given that he’s hardly a transfer magnet.
That is one weak field in the South, no wonder it has the most undecideds. You could say the opposite for MNW.
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The Dublin Euros are still all to play for and the left can win a seat (and by the way Childers is FF/GP/LP gene pool).
A major push by the left (including the TDs following the lead of Maureen O’Sullivan) can assist in retaining this seat.
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I was making that same point as you were making it JRG. The very best of luck. My tealeaves show recounts in your future.
I think by the way that the consistent showing of Brid Smith would seem to indicate that she is running around level with Paul Murphy, something pooh-poohed when it came up first. They’re not entirely accurate these polls but certain patterns have seemed to recur. One number which seems to oscillate wildly is that of Carthy for SF in MNW as he is alternately topping the poll or fighting for the last seat.
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Sindo has Boylan on 23. Also the Sunday times is giving SF 21 if a Dail election was called.The 17 quoted by RTE is a local election figure.
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You wouldn’t have figures for all the parties Inds and Others would you roddy for the ST? I can’t find them online and haven’t been out today (and none too keen to give the ST my money either).
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Libellius’ post above?
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Sorry, you’re right. Not up to speed.
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The political earthquake is on track- – –
I have properly combined the B&A and Millword Brown Polls for the Dublin Region (not just by averaging the stated outcomes)
The total offering a vote was 775 Dont Know 225
Probable Error is now down to +or- 3%
REJECTION OF MAIN PARTIES
Including Don’t Know FF+Fg+Lab= 31%
Excluding Don’t Know FF+FG+Lab= 39%
Combined Outcome for Candidates excluding Dont Knows
Boylan 21% Hayes 19% Childers 12% Fitzpatrick 11% Costelloe 9% Ryan 9%
Smith 8% Murphy 8%
In Dublin (3 seats only) the quota is 25%
Clearly the socialist vote(Murphy=Smith) has improved due to campaigning(well done, keep it up!)
In one of the polls Costelloe (Labour) was down to 7% below both Brid Smith and Paul Murphy. At 9% in the Combined Polls Costelloe seems doomed. We can also take it that Labour has lost its seat in Dublin West and will do very badly in the local elections-even worse outside of Dublin where it depends on a more working class vote.
It will be difficult for Fianna Fáil to win a seat in Midlands Northwest. As Fianna Fail no longer constitutes a strong “cause” and the two candidates are widely seperated geographically, transfer rates will be very low. Failure of Fiann Fail to get a seat in the West of Ireland would surely herald an earthquake!!!
It is difficult to make sense of the Munster constituency as Brian Crowley is getting a very big non-Fianna Fáil sympathy vote due to his physical disability. His surplus will scatter widely.
On the basis of all the polls it now seems probable that the outcome will be:
FG 4, SF 3,FF 1, Lab 0, Others 3
Note the tendency towards polarisation of political allegiances which is common during prolonged economic and political crises.
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Do you feel that there has been a missed opportunity in Munster where Fine Gael will probably scrape the last seat by default by comparison with Connacht where it’s the strength of the two independent candidates which seem to be forcing Fianna Fail out.
I’ll believe that Fianna Fail can’t win one seat out of four in the West when I see it but in many ways their performance is almost worse than Labour. Most people would have thought their performance in the last general election was an anomalous rock bottom moment in the same way that 2002 was for Fine Gael. But after being the main opposition to an unpopular government and doing their old number of opposing the very same austerity measures they’d enacted in government, they’re not doing one bit better.
The network on the ground will keep them from further losses in the local elections but they seem an almost superfluous party at the moment.
Whingebag David Quinn, who appears to be on TV every time I look up, was complaining again yesterday that he’s not in the media enough. But that pretence that these extremists speak for some large ignored constituency will bite the dust when Mullen fails to figure in Connacht. RTE take note.
Labour will be at a lowest ever ebb after this one and the fact that Prendergast is doing no better than Higgins shows that even pretending to be a dissident is going to save anyone’s bacon when the deluge comes.
And of course when the electorate shows its displeasure with austerity by electing a majority of candidates who, if they are not left-wing, are at least centrist social democrats, the media will tell us that this proves they want a new right wing party. Which is to get the thing back to front altogether.
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‘Not going to save anyone’s bacon.’
I also think we should take note that the more Labour attacked Ming and even the more Fianna Fail attacked Sinn Fein, with Martin’s lurid suggestion that the Boston College people were somehow being set up for assasination, the worse things got for the attackers and the better they got for the subject of their ire.
The USP of Sinn Fein, Ming and other independents is precisely THAT the mainstream parties hate them. It does them good for the electorate to be reminded of that.
You know what would do Paul Murphy a lot of good? Labour coming out to attack him concertedly in the manner of Roisin Shortall’s ‘ragbag’ rant during the general election.
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The second preference transfers between Paul Murphy and Bríd Smith are intriguing in the Behaviour and Attitudes Poll- – –
Bríd to Paul 35%
Paul to Bríd 9%
In an earlier Poll the transfer from Paul to Brid was 43% but each had a much smaller vote at that point. But the transfer from Brid to Paul has actually increased!
The highest proportion of the seconds of both go to Sinn Féin (35% from Paul!!) These are,of course very small samples and should be treated with caution. But they are the No2s of those who were actually polled.
Because the score of both candidates has improved considerably both will now be eliminated seperately and the actual transfer will be viewed publicly.
If Lyn Boylan were already elected, I suspect that the transfer between the two would be greater as both second preferences and the third preferencees for which the recipient of the second preference was Sinn Féin would be effective. However as the quota is 25%, it is unlikely that Lyn Boylan will be elected before at least one of the two is eliminated.
The transfers show that Brid and Paul are now getting a much wider popular vote which is much to be welcomed.
Let us hope that only one will be eliminated as there is a week to go!
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Paddy, If you look at page 83 of the pdf I’ve linked to above you’ll see that Murphy’s transfers are based on an unweighted sample of 27. The margin of error there being 18.86%; so next to useless I’d say.
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Brian Crowleys 2nd Preferences
Hartley FF 13%
Combined FG+ Lab candidates 36%
The biggest individual recipient is Sean Kelly FG 16%
This means that only 16 of the 122 individuals who said they would give Brian Crowley their fisrst preference said that they would give No 2 to his Fianna Fail running mate!!
Incidentally, the possibility of FF getting a seat in Midlands Nortwest would be greatly enhanced if Thomas Byrne were eliminated first!
Byrne’s 2nds are going 60% to Pat Cope but Pat Cope’s are only going 30% to Thomas Byrne! (Caution-All 2nd preference predictions are based on very small samples)
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Your great with the sums – you should be a teacher
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Despite the relentless opposition of Eoghan Harris the rise and rise and rise of Sinn Fein continues. Could there be a Satanic explanation?
“most of Sinn Fein’s southern stars have never seen blood spilled. But they seem to like the smell of sulphur, which in Christian folklore forms part of hell’s fire.”
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/columnists/eoghan-harris/the-sinn-fein-project-is-shrouded-in-night-and-fog-30282798.html
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Misprint there I think CL. ‘Despite’ should read ‘partly because of.’
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So a bit like Mr Harris in his association with the WP and Group B back in the seventies then?
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I’m glad to have him explain the connotations of the phrase ‘whiff of sulphur,’ which I’m sure nobody else in Ireland twigged. When I heard journalists use it the previous seven hundred times or so I thought they were suggesting Sinn Fein were prone to flatulence.
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“Fianna Fail provides a populist bulwark against the Provos. That was why I backed Bertie Ahern in 2007, believing correctly that he alone could stop Sinn Fein’s relentless rise. The failure of Fianna Fail to follow Ahern’s populist path opened a political abyss.”-Harris
For Harris, Sinn Fein has followed a populist path and filled the ‘political abyss’.
Is this the ‘political earthquake’ Paddy Healy is talking about?
Harris concludes: “all across Europe extreme nationalist populist parties are on the rise.” And, for Harris, Sinn Fein is just another one of these.
How does Sinn Fein’s populist nationalism differ from other varieties? Is it more left-wing? more anti-imperialist?
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“At the May Day rally, the politician accused the government of “helping the richest 1%, to reassure credit ratings agencies and international finance”.
She inveighed against a “draconian policy of austerity” that favoured “globalised elites at the expense of the people”….
The transformation of the Front from fringe group into France’s leading working-class party is not sudden. In the 1980s Jean-Marie Le Pen – the founder of the FN and the current leader’s father – targeted urban voters who were leaving the Communist Party in droves.”
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-27404016
To add to the confusion Ralph Nader has a new book out advocating a Left/Right alliance to dismantle the corporate state.
http://www.salon.com/2014/05/02/ralph_nader_the_left_is_seized_by_fear_and_the_right_is_driven_by_brass/
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And indeed how so SF or indeed the many other nationalist parties that in some way identify themselves as being on the left define anti-imperialism.
I suspect that the couple of years after the current European elections will be very interesting in Europe in terms of defining nationalism in our part of the Eurasian landmass.
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“To advocate an imperial foreign policy is to call for a foreign policy that attempts to organize the world along certain principles affecting relations between states and conditions within them. The U.S. role would resemble 19th century Great Britain….Coercion and the use of force would normally be a last resort; what was written by John Gallagher and Ronald Robinson about Britain a century and a half ago, that “The British policy followed the principle of extending control informally if possible and formally if necessary,” could be applied to the American role at the start of the new century (Richard N. Haass, http://www.brook.edu).”
http://monthlyreview.org/2003/05/01/imperial-america-and-war
Haass, the President of the ‘Imperial Brain Trust’ is visiting Ireland shortly to meet with the Foreign Minister, Eamonn Gilmore. Whether Haass’s view of imperialism is useful in dealing with Ireland’s past remains to be seen, but Sinn Fein and Haass seem to be on the same page.
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I see Diarmuid O’Flynn has come out as a ‘Pro-Lifer.’ Scratch one vote.
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Oh holy bejaysus – are Clare Daly and Joan Collins pulling their endorsements
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With you all the way on that one Eamonn.
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Tweeting at someone who asked if this meant he didn’t support women being in charge of their bodies, “A pregnant woman controls two bodies, unless you are saying a foetus isn’t a body. She can end its life any time she pleases?,” does not cast him in a particularly good light. And to another woman, “Your right to choose what to end the life of a foetus you’ve decided you don’t want? To that I say no.”
He’s said he’s in favour of abortion if the life of a mother is in danger but against ‘abortion on demand.’ And that abortion is a ‘make or break issue’ on which he’s prepared to lose votes.
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Hired Knaves has a typically good piece on the issue.
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Is there a difference between `eamonncork’ and `EamonnCork’? Just wondering.
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It appears to be totally random as to which comes up Michael (I am extremely inept technically). They’re the same me, it’s not a cunning plausible deniability strategy or anything.
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On that subject if anyone was e-mailing me in the last couple of days, my account is gone down.
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No Mr. Cork. We’re just holding it in escrow until the hostilities are over.
Toodle pip!
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This goes back to Breda O’Brien and socially conservative left-wingers though, doesn’t it? I’ve no issue with anyone having the principle not to vote for someone with a pro-life position, believing it to be a fundamental affront to women’s rights etc., but it raises the question of how a committed ‘anti-austerity’ movement effectively does or doesn’t exclude that point of view while attracting broad popular support.
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I know this is a different question but I think the prevalence of the anti-abortion viewpoint is over-estimated at this stage.
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And also that if you have prominent people in an anti-austerity movement who hold ‘the foetus is a person’ views you’ll probably alienate a great deal of your core support. So from a pragmatic point of view you’d probably lose supporters.
I think it’s also the case that for the likes of O’Brien it’s the social conservatism which trumps everything. They’re prepared to come out with a bit of old SVP stuff about ‘the poor’ but it’s beating back womens rights and gay rights which really motivates them. In the same way, for example, that pre-ceasefire SF had policies on many things but all were subsumed under the necessity to support the armed struggle. Most parties, if they’re not catch alls like FF, have principles which are more important than anything else.
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It’s probably over-represented amongst politically active, passionate activists, for sure. Unfortunately they’re more likely to want to be part of an anti-austerity movement as well, whether their other views have broad support or not.
To be fair, when it comes to it ‘the left’ seems fairly clear on not working with those people but at the same time it seems to be inevitably a factor when trying to build or use broad anti-austerity movements.
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The problem with the ‘foetus is a person’ argument is that it logically follows that a woman who has an abortion is at the very least least an accomplice in murder.
The pro-lifers didn’t beat around the bush with the implications of this back in the eighties. Bishop, later Cardinal Daly, used to describe women who had abortions as, “the murdering mothers.”
They know that they won’t get away with this kind of rhetoric today so that kind of stuff has faded away and been replaced with insincere stuff about caring about the hurt caused to women etc. But it’s still there at the back of it all.
The problem about saying that you can make common cause with pro-lifers is that it’s saying you can make common cause with people who think women who had abortions are complicit in murder. And that this won’t be problematic because they agree with you on cuts in social welfare spending.
If economics are all that matters, you could also sit down with someone who thinks black people are inferior to whites or that the Jews are behind the world’s financial problems, all in the interests of creating a broad front.
This may make for a stimulating debate in the abstract but it’s hardly something the left will ever aim to do.
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I don’t believe Breda O’Brien for a minute anyway. Look at the Iona site, they are almost entirely inspired by the extreme political right in America whose arguments Quinn parrots on a regular basis. That stuff about socially conservative left-wingers is a smokescreen, it’s the old Fianna Fail thing of telling the republican guy you’re a bit of an oul republican really, telling the working class guy you always stood up for the small man, telling the businessman a story about the time you were in the tent in Galway and so on.
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Look at Waters. Since his conversion there’s as many attacks on the Lefties as you’d find in a Richard Littlejohn column.
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“This may make for a stimulating debate in the abstract but it’s hardly something the left will ever aim to do.”
But by following the anti-austerity, anti-water charges line isn’t that effectively what the left is doing? Or at least is trying to build consciousness/awareness in communities that are primarily affected by the economic issues. The problem here seems to be that people did that for themselves (Ballyhea Says No!) and at least some of them have emerged with unpalatable views, to the left. So you disassociate from them but what happens to their movement? At what point does the left define itself as part of a broad struggle but not only against capitalism, but patriarchy, etc.? That may be an abstract question but it seems pretty fundamental.
I’m sympathetic to (though not entirely convinced by) the argument that the pro-life constituency is marginal enough in this area to ignore, and given the choice I would do so (thankfully I vote in Dublin), but I think that should be a more of upfront and explicit stance, based on an articulated set of principles, rather than just a reaction to finding out who you’re standing behind. As it is it seems people are looking to be part of something broad but then finding there are cleavages they can’t bridge.
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Also on the prevalence of anti-abortion views, there are only about 10% completely opposed to abortion, few of whom are likely to be economically left-wing, but on the polling between X case legislation and the ostensible X minus suicide option (which O’Flynn seems to fit more into, in that it’s the line he’s taking a political stance on, according to his statement), that’s by my estimation another 10%. So a small minority but not completely insignificant (and of course, vocal).
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Yeah O’Flynns a lifer ffs. Who do people recommend for a vote down south? I am thinking of Godsil the mortgage candidate and then the inevitable transfer to SF.
Locals I have no alternative but SF as D O’Cadla of the CPPC is the only other and that’s a bridge too far.
I suppose at least SF votes will to counted as anti austerity and anti government for all the good it’ll do
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More votes for SF will drive the Independent and FG nuts though.
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LM, I’m not telling you who to vote for. But Godsil used to live in an enormous mansion in Wicklow and is looking to have a million euro mortgage written off. She’s also declared her intention to emigrate to take advantage of British bankruptcy laws. She doesn’t seem like your sort.
I’m not a great fan of the Greens but if you don’t want to vote Sinn Fein number 1, Grace O’Sullivan, who spent years at the sharp end of environmental protest (She was on the Rainbow Warrior when the French bombed it for example), mightn’t be a bad choice. I’d almost do it myself except for the fact that the Greens rubberstamped NAMA, water charges and every other dodgy FF decision when in power. Maybe SF will do something similar down the line, but they haven’t done it yet so they strike me as the most palatable vote in Munster from a left point of view. It’s an underwhelming field though. I’d like to have a Paul Murphy, a Brid Smith or a Ming Flanagan to vote for.
It’s struck me over the past week that Ming seems to be the one candidate who’s trying to win a seat, he’s being combative about his policies and is reaping the benefit. Most other candidates seem to be trying to not lose any votes by offending anyone, the ‘careful now’ approach.
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Yep. Good point on Ming’s style and approach, Eamonn. When he first entered the race, I said on here that I thought he’d get a hammering from the electorate. It appears that I was wrong … I will never forgive him for this.
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Does Ms Godsil put on her campaign literature what she wrote in the Journal a while back, “To be a bankrupt often implies the person was an entrepreneur, a doer, a creator of jobs and wealth, not just a PAYE worker or public servant”?
http://www.thejournal.ie/readme/column-exporting-our-troubles-is-an-irish-speciality-405928-Apr2012/
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It shows the value of properly informing yourself about these things. How many people have simply said, Clare Daly and Gene Kerrigan are plumping for O’Flynn, so he’s a man of the left and I’ll vote for him.
Or looked at Godsil and the words ‘mortgage forgiveness’ and thought ‘I’m struggling with my mortgage, here’s someone like me.’
Though actually given the poll figures for both maybe people have twigged it.
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” not just a PAYE worker or public servant”
Will she also bring some excitement into our humdrum lives?
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She doesn’t want your stinking vote peasant.
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Is she aligned with or connected (politically, that is) to David Hall who is running in Dublin West?
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I suppose we could take O’Flynn as the proof that Breda O’Brien’s mythical Economically Left-Wing and Socially Conservative beast actually exists. But then there’s the Donnelly, Gurdgiev, Mathews, Ganley and Ross connections.
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That’s the thing though, anti-austerity or anti-bank debt are not automatically left-wing positions, least of all in a social sense.
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The anti-austerity camp is certainly a broad ‘church’:
Le Pen, IBEC, SP. SWP, Sinn Fein, Larry Summers, Paul Krugman, etc etc….
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Which means that even if the anti-austerians receive more than 50%, of votes and/or seats, it does not signify an ideological shift.
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Even if Stephen Collins and Fionnan Sheahan declare the results an “earthquake”…..
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Liberius You are correct
I posted this earlier on the new thread started by WBS
Mainstream media now taking up earthquake theme– — –
For the EU Election in the Dublin Region, I have now combined Millward Brown, Behaviour and Attitudes and IPSOS MRBI Poll in Irish Times to-day
The combination of three polls confirms the earthquake!
BASE 1500 Error +or- 2.6% 3 seats Quota 25%
Including Don’t Knows FF+FG+Lab =455= 30%
Excluding Don’t Knows FF+Fg+lab= 455= 40%
Candidate Scores
Excluding Don’t Knows
Voted 1125=75% Don’t Know 375= 25%
Boylan 22% Hayes 20% Fitzpatrick 12% Childers 11% Ryan 9%
Costelloe 9% Smith 8% Murphy 7% Others 2%
Boylan and Hayes are certainties.
Technically any of the others named could take the third seat. Despite the reduced error on the 1500 sample, they are very close together. If you subtract 2.6% from Fitzpatrick and add 2.6% to Murphy, the outcome is the same figure!
Second Preferences given by repondents are informative and indicative but very unreliable due to very small samples for each candidate. In practice the outcome is so finely balanced that factors such as location(eg Northside/Southside) and order of elimination could have a big influence..
The rates of actual transfer in the election between Smith and Murphy will be heavily dependent on how many, if any, Boylan needs to reach the quota. If Boylan is already elected it gives Smith/Murphy some chance.
My gut instinct is that Fitzpatrick and Costelloe will not make it because transferring to them requires a big political leap from the rest and from each other. Caution:I may be biassed!
I hope either Bríd or Paul makes it.
But if I were betting and in need of money, I would back Chlders. It is relatively easy for the rest to transfer to her.
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The views expressed above have caused me to rethink my own take on the Other/Independent votes. Originally I was chuffed to see polling indicators of a significant increase in the vote. I assumed it meant they were automatically left-wing.
Now I can notice Independent candidates popping up everywhere. To be sure, they say that they are against the current establishment. But that doesn’t mean that they are socialist or social democratic as even the lowest common denominator.
We will see them increase their vote, proclaiming that they are ‘non-party’; especially those for whom it is a badge of convenience. But, caveat emptor.
I was also surprised to see how many candidates are using commercial leafleting, including those for councillor posts.
Today An Post delivered to me a leaflet addressed to ‘The Household’ advocating a No. 1 for Brid Smith. Interestingly, it also called for ‘Vote No. 2 Paul Murphy MEP (Stop the Water Tax – Socialist Party).’ I don’t know how prevalent this is.
How voters perform in general elections is different; we all know that. I draw the conclusion — go get the austerity merchants now! I will canvas and vote for candidates of struggle, including those whose politics I don’t necessarily fully agree with, excluding the Lifers, of course.
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Agree with you BB on the foolishness of adding the Independents vote to the left parties vote and proclaiming it as a left vote. Or even an ‘anti-establishment’ vote. There will be among it plenty of people whose problem with the establishment won’t be the same as the left’s problem with the establishment.
Quite a few of them will be defectors from the traditional two and a half main parties.
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Meanwhile, in Greece, it looks like it’s all to play for.
Quite what will happen should Syriza get the mayorship of Athens, as well as a lead in the EU Parliament is going to be interesting. But let’s wait till the 26th before counting chickens.
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Paddy Power prognostications:
http://www.paddypower.com/bet/politics/other-politics/irish-politics?ev_oc_grp_ids=1620537
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In fairness Paul Murphy was outstanding on the Vincent Browne debate, don’t know what good it’ll do him but I think he definitely banjaxed Labour. Intelligent and passionate. And Brid Smith came across well too, rattled Brian Hayes a couple of times. Dire performance from Nessa Childers which would have done her no good, Ryan seemed to be fighting to stay awake after an enormous dose of Xanax which he’d apparently shared with the equally somnolent Mary Fitzpatrick. Lynn Boylan was grand but like Hayes seemed to be playing it cautiously, like a football team holding on to a two goal lead.
Liadh Ni Riada was easily the most convincing performer in the Munster debate on RTE. Everyone else was so bad perhaps they should think of only awarding two seats because of the low standard. The intervention of the Bald Brummies would have improved the thing immeasurably. Grace O’Sullivan seemed lost. And there was a right wing catholic woman who may well have been Bobby Channels in drag. Phil Prendergast was the second best which says a lot. Cirque De Clune provided a compelling argument for the end of the hereditary factor in selecting candidates.
Don’t know if many people watch these debates or if they affect the result. If they do, Murphy, Smith and Ni Riada did themselves some service and Childers, Ryan and O’Sullivan might all take a dip.
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Murphy was quite good, especially towards the end reminding everyone about Labour’s infamous 2011 leaflet. If he had a bad debate it would’ve killed off his chances at the seat.
Didn’t think Brid was that good tbh, while I was reminded about Ryans nervous eye blink during the debate.
Didn’t know what to make about the two DDI candidates. Costello is dead on arrival IMO – all she’s useful for now is for her transfers to get Hayes over the line. She wasn’t nearly half as annoying as that awful Lorraine Higgins, however
Second south debate was a bit of a freak show all right.
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If banksters’ useful idiot Ryan gets in I will be not best pleased.
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Paul did brilliantly on VB last night and I would concur with EC’s assessment. Just on the point’s Paddy makes earlier about Brid polling better than Paul because of her base in The working class. While this is a perfectly valid point there is also the element about Euro elections where people get elected with no base or previous electoral record. Patrcia McKenna is the obvious example. I canvassed for her in the 1999 Euro election and there were half a dozen out with her (less than many council candidates would have working for them). She still got elected. Granted she had a five year stint as an MEP under her belt, but Paul had over three years and a very impressive record. What I am saying is that Euro elections are very, very unpredictable, despite the polling. The TV debates might well have a decisive impact as people make up their minds this week.
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Has anybody seen a “don’t know” figure for the national MRBI poll published this morning In IT?
Red C gave 13% but it is probable that those unlikely to vote should be added to this.
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“Almost 30 per cent of voters expressed no opinion or said they would not vote.” http://www.irishtimes.com/news/elections/labour-faces-wipeout-in-euro-elections-as-poll-gives-ff-chance-of-three-seats-1.1800628
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Thanks HCFN
National Tremor a little less than in Dublin!!!
IPSOS/MRBI National Local Election Poll May 20 Irish Times
Base 1500 Error= +or – 2.6%
Including Dont Knows (30%)
FG FF SF Lab Others dont Know
16 16 13 5 20 30
FG+ FG+LAB= 37
Excluding Don’t Know
FG FF SF Lab Others
23 23 19 7 28
FF+ FG+ Lab = 53
The other big feature is confirmation of the Labour “wipe-out”
While regional figures are not yet available this often approximates to 10% in Dublin and 5% outside
The quota in a 9 or 10 seat ward is about 10%. Even in the bigger wards outside of Dublin, they will get very few seats.
SF should get two in the bigger wards and one in almost every other ward.
Many “others” will be elected despite their lack of political coherence
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The VB debate last night will boost the left vote in the Euros among those who watched the programme. Joe Higgins and RBB demonstrated on Six-One last night how to agitate for a left vote in the elections. The time has now come for left activists with a national profile to put their shoulder to the wheel and make a big push to get votes of left candidates in the Euros, by-election and locals. In particular if Joan Collins and Clare Daly can endorse O’Flynn then they should be screaming from the rooftops that working class people in Dublin should be voting for Paul Murphy and Brid Smith. It would be an utter shame if the extend of their intervention in the Euros was to back a dodgy populist candidate in South while ignoring two long-standing left activists in Dublin. A big push for the Euros can have a knock-on effect on the locals and visa-versa. It would be a tragedy if they remained tight-lipped and the left lost the euro seat by a small number of votes.
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It would be a shame and there’s not really any excuse for it.
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You can be certain that if Murphy had stayed silent about endorsing either Daly or Collins this place would be white hot with outrage.
There are some candidates who are SP members of the AAA who worked themselves to the bone for her 2011 election campaign – 7 days a week for four weeks – and who won’t be there in 2016, and she hasn’t endorsed these candidates either.
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CMK – I don’t know about that but I do know Murphy was fairly vocal when it came to running her down in the media when Daly left the SP. He wasn’t the only one either. You and others here who are following JRGs passionate support for the left have short memories about just how developed the campaign by the SP to destroy Daly was. There was screaming from the rooftops (to quote JRG) but it was aimed at destroying her thankfully it failed. The SP can’t have it both ways.
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Can you give one example of this “campaign by the SP to destroy Daly”?
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I can’t remember any SP campaign to destroy Daly. Could you provide any links to statements from prominent members attacking her?
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JRG – your comments on these matters are very disingenious. Firstly the left are not going to lose by a few votes – neither Murphy or Smith have a realistic chance of winning. I do find it amusing how your championing of the cause of the left has only happened since Paul’s campaign has failed to get off the ground in a real way. Correct me if I’m wrong but where was the calls for endorsements in January, February etc ?
Can you confirm if the SP have directly asked Daly to support the campaign? I know you did ask Collins.
Can you also answer why having decided Daly was so damaging to the ULA your party had to bring it down that now her endorsement could make all the difference to the left (the SP) getting an MEP, TD and councillors. Something doesn’t add up for me I must say!
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More on the O’Flynn discussion above: Fintan O’Toole in the Irish Times today gives O’Flynn his endorsement, but doesn’t mention either of the two socialist candidates in the constituency where he actually lives, who have been campaigning against the Troika longer and harder than O’Flynn, and whose views on abortion would be much closer to his own. Sigh ….
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There is an enormous condescension in some of the O’Flynn endorsements. It’s as if they see him as the equivalent of the Gardener in Being There. None of them would have glossed over the fact of the abortion thing had it been an urban candidate. It’s kind of a ‘we’ll let him off, sure they’re all bogmen down there anyway.’
Meanwhile Ming, who backed Clare Daly’s abortion bill, is forging ahead in Connacht. He’s actually a far more interesting phenomenon, and a far more successful one, yet they’re not tripping themselves up to endorse him.
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“It would be impertinent to suggest to anyone how they should vote – especially since I don’t live in the constituency. But I have (in a personal capacity) endorsed his campaign for the simple reason that he has shown courage, intelligence and genuine patriotism. His election would be the right kind of shock: an electrifying suggestion that Ireland is not supine.”
So says O’Toole, which begs the questions A) why doesn’t he say a word about the constituency where he does live – you’d hardly expect him to endorse SF given the baggage on both sides, but Murphy and Smith are the only other candidates actually opposing the Troika programme, and their election at the expense of Labour or FF would hardly be less electrifying; and B) in what other capacity might he have endorsed O’Flynn? On behalf of Fintan O’Toole as a corporate entity?
What can you do but roll your eyes?
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And also the question (C), does he churn this shit out by the yard? it’s another reason why I won’t be voting for O’Flynn, I’m afraid. Fintan won’t recommend left candidates in Dublin because they’re too political for him. And he won’t recommend Ming because Ming is too disruptive. He will recommend Diarmuid because next time someone suggests Fintan is some kind of out of touch metropolitan intellectual whose only interest in rural Ireland is building a house there, he can point to this and get a frisson of pride about it. And also because, like Shane Ross, Constantin Gurdgiev and Clare Daly, the campaign is so vague that he can inscribe his own fantasies on it.
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I started the campaign as an O’Flynn voter before seeing who was endorsing him.
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So O Toole is the real enemy – good stuff
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Ah not really. But this is hardly his finest hour. What he’s said doesn’t really make any sense.
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He opens with an attack on Noonan and Trump, having had people telling me Trump is a great man who will bring jobs I am thankful for small mercies
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If he was the enemy I wouldn’t be sighing and rolling my eyes, the columnists I consider to be the enemy have me growling and banging my fist on the table (this is not a metaphor – my partner once banned me from reading the Sindo or Stephen Collins for this kind of carry-on). O’Toole can just be a bit of an eejit sometimes for someone who’s obviously very bright.
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We can all be ejits sometimes and nearly everyone on this blog is very bright
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I was being nice Bob, it’s not really a case of him being an eejit, it’s a case of him not wanting to step too far outside of the consensus. I think Eamonn’s take on his endorsement of O’Flynn is right on the money.
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Bob, there’s a point where your smart cracks at people here gets a bit wearing. O’Toole isn’t the real enemy but his column today was absurd. No word as EC notes about the Dublin constituency, let alone MNW or whatever it is called and instead a frankly weird endorsement of O’Flynn. I’ve no particularly gripe about O’Flynn, though the lifer line is problematic, not least that it came so late in the day, but why not SF, too much for Fintan and his delicate sensibilities? Or the SP, or PBP or…
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Speaking of Trump- did anyone catch Noona’s justification for it on radio one recently? He more or less repeated three or four times that “you(the interviewer) wouldn’t be asking me that question if it was the IDA bringing in a factory with three hundred jobs”; Isn’t that the whole point? A rich person has bought a golf resort- who mentioned 300 jobs. Pure fantasy land, I was going to say fairlyand but that would be unfair to all decent fairies:-)
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It’s an absolute disgrace that whole exercise, and any state involvement was absurd. As you say, what precisely is the net gain from the ego feeding frenzy that was on show?
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“As he stepped onto Irish soil, Trump was greeted by a shucking ‘n’ jiving parody of Gaelic culture, complete with plinking harps and warbling colleens. Local dignitaries and officials might have some excuse but the presence of a senior government figure like Noonan amidst this mawkish pageant of panhandling Paddywackery was cringe-inducing.”
http://www.independent.ie/opinion/analysis/kicking-ass-not-kissing-it-is-what-noonan-is-paid-for-30279888.html
Bizarre. Perhaps devolution towards a kitschy, celtic cargo-cult. Is the video available.?
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Always found O’Toole to be good at taking on a soft target.He went on the late late one night to confront the wolfe tones about their “rebel” songs.He never would have tried the same thing with Christy Moore who would have been a much more formidable adversary.
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Interesting. As a betting man I like to check the odds from time to time. Earlier today the four main candidates for the Dublin West by-election were more or less neck in neck in the odds. However I now see that Ruth Coppinger has become a strong 2/5 favourite with Fianna Fail pegged as her main challenger. Hall and Sinn Fein have moved out significantly in the odds.
Don’t know what precipitated this. Either Paddy Power have gotten wind of some interesting poll figures or JRG, CMK and Mark P (where is Mark P by the way?) have taken a break from conducting imaginary campaigns against Clare Daly to horse a ton of money on Ruth Coppinger. If it’s the former it’s good news. If it’s the latter I applaud this bold new synthesis of Trotsky and John McCrirrick. But they might have let the rest of us know so we could have gotten on before the price came in.
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