Dublin Central redux

Mention in the Phoenix of a Fine Gael party poll in Dublin Central. Apparently there’s been some agonising in both FG and SF over second candidates. Clearly for FG with a popular enough Paschal Donohoe (and given he is a Finance Minister that was never a given) the expectation that he could pull a second FG person in was at least in the air. Similarly with Mary Lou McDonald as leader of SF and a popular individual in the constituency. Fine Gael has added Deirdre Duffy to the ticket (the Phoenix suggests that some in FG aren’t exactly thrilled thinking they might have got the nod). And that poll suggests that Donohoe will easily come in just ahead of McDonald.

Which leads one to the thought that such polls are always to be accompanied by a health warning. Who can tell if they exist, or even if they exist that the information conveyed about them is true. According to this one it would see Donohoe, McDonald, then FF’s Fitzpatrick and Labour’s Joe Costello.

I think such an outcome is possible. But I wouldn’t count on it. I’m not entirely surprised that Gary Gannon of the SD’s might not figure. Though on the day it could be different. But the idea of Labour retaking a seat seems unlikely.

According to Adrian Kavanagh’s modelling of recent polls (and again Kavanagh would be the first to note that caveats abound in such modelling too) for April polls Dublin Central would return 1FG, 1FF and potentially 2SF (an earlier model had 1FG, 1FF, 1SF and 1 IND).

But here there’s a different problem – that is, and the Phoenix references this too, there’s no clear SF candidate to run with McDonald.

So perhaps there’d be two SF. But perhaps not.

In fairness I’d not blame anyone for being risk averse in relation to Dublin Central, it is notoriously difficult to read at times, and the last election demonstrated how close the outcomes could be.