The country is on course for a hung Dáil if the outcome of the election is anything like the findings of the latest Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI poll, conducted in the two days before the Dáil was dissolved.
The poll result represents a setback for Fine Gael which had confidently expected to start the election campaign with a little over 30 per cent of the vote and build from there during the campaign.
Instead Fine Gael has slipped back two points from the late poll taken at the end of November and it appears to be getting little traction from its message that the choice facing the country is stability or chaos.
At the same stage in the last general election campaign in 2011 the party had moved up to 33 per cent from the previous poll in December and it subsequently put on another three points during the campaign to end up with 36 per cent.
It is starting this campaign five points behind where it was five years ago and will need a brilliant campaign and a lot of luck to get close to its 2011 performance.
One of the reasons for the slippage in the latest poll is a significant drop in support in Dublin where the party’s vote oscillates wildly from one poll to the next. In the latest poll it has dropped eight points in the capital to 24 per cent and it will need a big recovery here to have a good election. The party’s vote elsewhere is very close to where it was in the last poll with 31 per cent in the rest of Leinster; 29 per cent in Connacht Ulster and 28 per cent in Munster.
Fine Gael’s strongest support is among middle-class voters. Among the best-off AB voters the party is on 45 per cent, it drops to 31 per cent in the C1 category, 26 per cent in C2 and just 14 per cent in the DE category. Among farmers the figure is 38 per cent, but that represents a big drop on the last poll.
Spread
In age terms the party has a reasonably even spread of support across the generations while doing best among the over 65s where it is on 33 per cent.
The news for Labour is not very good either. Its national level of support at 7 per cent is still considerably short of the 11 per cent or so that it will need to mount a reasonable showing.
The party does best in Dublin where it is on 11 per cent. Its next best region is Munster where it hits 8 per cent, followed by Connacht Ulster with 5 per cent but it is only 4 per cent in the rest of Leinster.
In class terms Labour is strongest among the best of AB group but is struggling among the C2 and DE categories.
The poll will be encouraging for Fianna Fáil which has moved up at the best possible time with the election campaign geting under way. Another plus is that it has pulled ahead of Sinn Féin.
It is level with Fine Gael in Connacht Ulster and not too far behind in Munster and the rest of Leinster. However, of real concern to Fianna Fáil will be the fact that it is still struggling to make an impact in Dublin where its vote has moved up marginally to 11 per cent.
Unless that vote is concentrated in a number of constituencies the party will struggle to win seats in the capital, where it doesn’t have a single TD. In age terms it is much stronger among the over-65s – where it gets 32 per cent support – than any other age group.
In an indication that it is finally being forgiven for the mistakes of the past, the party has recovered some support among working class voters and has passed out Fine Gael among farmers.
That will give the party real hope that it can recover a number of the seats lost in the last election.
Social classes
Support for Sinn Féin has drifted back to 19 per cent with the party’s vote evenly spread across the country. It is on 19 per cent in Dublin, Connacht-Ulster and the rest of Leinster and on 21 per cent in Munster. There remains a wide difference in support levels across the social classes, with the party getting just 6 per cent among AB voters and 31 per cent among DE voters.
In age terms the party is very strong among voters aged between 18 and 34 with 30 per cent support declining to 10 per cent among the over-65s.
Support for Independents and smaller parties is up by two points indicating that a sizeable proportion of the electorate has not been swayed by the Coalition’s appeal for “stability or chaos”.
This category does best in Dublin, where 35 per cent of voters say they will vote for smaller parties or Independents, although there is a wide variation in the parties those polled say they will support
Anti-Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit comes out as the most significant element of Independent/Others in Dublin at 10 per cent, just one point behind the Labour Party. Other regions are not nearly as strongly Independent. There is a relatively even spread across the age cohorts and social classes, indicating that the next Dáil is likely to have the biggest number of Independents and small-party representatives in the history of the State.
