Voters will go to the polls today in one of the most hotly-contested and unpredictable elections of recent times. Over three million people are entitled to vote and all the parties are hoping that the competitive campaign will reverse the trend of declining turnouts in elections.
Polling stations open at 7.30am and will remain open until 10.30pm. The counting of votes will begin at 9am tomorrow, with the first counts expected in the late afternoon. Voters will elect 165 of the 166 TDs to the 30th Dáil, with the Ceann Comhairle, Dr Rory O'Hanlon, being automatically returned.
When the 29th Dáil was dissolved on April 29th Fianna Fáil had 80 TDs, Fine Gael had 32, Labour 21, the Progressive Democrats 8, the Green Party 6, Sinn Féin 5, the Socialist Party 1 and Others 14.
Senior Fianna Fáil figures have refused to speculate on how many seats the party will win in the election. The Minister for Finance, Brian Cowen, and the party's general secretary, Seán Dorgan, said that they would make no prediction. However, senior Ministers are hoping that Fianna Fáil can emulate the performance at the last election, when the party won 81 seats.
Fine Gael's director of elections, Frank Flannery, predicted yesterday that his party would win between 52 and 58 seats, on the basis of a consistent poll rating throughout the campaign. His final forecast was 55 seats for the party.
A Labour spokesman said that his party expected to gain seats and to be in the middle to high 20s with a bit of luck. He emphasised the importance of transfers between Fine Gael and Labour to maximise the gains for both parties.
Tánaiste Michael McDowell forecast that the PDs would win 10 seats, while a spokesman for the Greens said that they were making a modest forecast of eight-plus.
The Sinn Féin president, Gerry Adams, has predicted that his party will double its number of seats to 10.
A total of 466 candidates are standing for election to the 30th Dáil in 43 constituencies. Fianna Fáil is fielding 106 candidates, followed by Fine Gael with 91. The Labour Party is running 50 candidates and the Progressive Democrats are putting up 30. The Green Party is fielding candidates in all 43 constituencies while Sinn Féin is contesting 40. There are 104 other candidates in the field.
The Workers' Party, the Christian Solidarity Party and the Socialist Party are registered as political parties and their candidates will be described as members of these parties on the ballot papers. Photographs of all candidates will also appear on the ballot papers.
All voters should have received a polling card detailing their number on the register of electors, the date of the election, the voting hours and the location of the polling station.
However, people who have not received a polling card for any reason will still be entitled to vote as long as their name is on the register of electors.
Voters may be asked to produce a driving licence or other form of identification at polling stations. The acceptable forms of identification include a passport, a driving licence, employment cards containing a photograph, official student identity cards or travel documents containing photographs.
Candidates and canvassers may not come within 50 metres of the entrance to polling stations from 90 minutes before voting begins and they must not attempt to make any appeals to voters as they enter polling stations. When voting concludes this evening the ballot boxes will be brought to the 43 count centres. They will be opened at 9am tomorrow. The returning officers will verify that all paperwork is correct before counting begins.
Voting took place earlier this week on a handful of islands off the west and north-west coasts. Yesterday about 1,000 voters on the four islands of Inis Mór, Inis Oír, Inis Meáin and Inis Bofin, off the Galway coast, cast their votes in the Galway West constituency.
