Final Phase of Dublin Euro election campaign

Party	Euro Election 2004	General Election 2007	TNS-MRBI Poll, 15 May	TNS-MRBI Poll , 26 May
Fianna Fáil	23	39.4	16	14
Fine Gael	22	18.5	26	28
Labour	23	14.2	21	25
Green Party	10	8.4	6	6
Sinn Fein	14	7.1	14	11
Socialist Party	6	2.3	7	9
Other	2	10.1 including PD's	10 McKenna 7 Simons 1	7 McKenna 5 Simons 2

The latest poll data from The Irish Times TNS-MRBI poll shows that Gay Mitchell, the outgoing MEP and Fine Gael candidate has strengthened his position by 2 points and has every prospect of being elected on the first count. The Labour Party candidate, Proinsias De Rossa could also be elected on the first count.

There will be a battle for the 3rd seat and the Socialist Party candidate, Joe Higgins has strengthened his claim at the expense of outgoing MEP and Sinn Féin candidate, Mary Lou McDonald. McDonald’s poll showing has dropped by 3 points and this follows publicity about her poor attendance record at the Parliament – 55%.

While Eoin Ryan’s running mate, Dublin Lord Mayor, Eibhlin Byrne has maintained her 5% share, Ryan’s has dropped by 2 points to 9%, the same as Higgins.  Byrne has served the city well as Lord Mayor although she was quoted in the media last week as advocating a sentence of community service for Frank Dunlop, who was convicted on his own guilty plea of bribing councillors over a protracted period in relation to planning.  The taxpayer funded a €500,000,000 million tribunal of enquiry to investigate these matters and the consequences of them – overpriced development land, appalling planning decisions and more recently, a burst housing bubble – I would have thought that Her Worship might have served her cause better by holding her breath on this matter.  Too many voters are enduring very costly consequences as an outcome of Dunlop’s bribes on behalf of property developers.

Patricia McKenna, who won 10% of the valid poll in the 2004 Euro election is showing at 5% (from 8%) but this has probably put a hole in the chances of Green Party candidate, Deirdre de Burca. de Burca has failed to make much impact in this campaign and the Green Party position with respect to the second referendum on The Lisbon Treaty is as ambiguous and opaque as the response of the Catholic religious congregations to compensating victims of child sex abuse. The Greens have been criticised for choosing deBruca as a candidate because her political base has been in Wicklow (Leinster constituency) but I don’t think that carries much weight.  But her campaign has been lacklustre, lacking either passion, or inspiration. 

I am not surprised that the Libertas candidate, Caroline Simons has failed to make any impact because she is contesting this election without having even introduced herself to her electorate. It is simply not sufficient to campaign on the basis of tittle-tattle shibboleths and overarching criticism of rivals.  The electorate would also seem hesitant about the concept of a Europe-wide political force being launched from Ireland in this election by individuals who have neither a political record of any apparent impact on community wellbeing.

Post-Lisbon Treaty Referendum Sentiment 

When the first referendum on The Lisbon Treaty was held on 12 June 2008, Dublin voted 51 - 49 against. The TNS-MRBI poll the week prior to the referendum showed 30% in favour, 35% against and 35% undecided. Those who campaigned against the Treaty last year (McDonald, Higgins, McKenna) are not achieving much traction from this in the forthcoming contest.  It will be interesting to discern public sentiment on this matter because a second referendum is pending later this year.  The outcome of the first referendum for each Dublin Dáil was as follows:

	Electorate	Valid Poll	Yes	No	For %	Against %
Central	57,864	28,265	12,328	15,816	44%	56%
Mid West	61,622	31,833	12,577	19,182	40%	60%
North	81,550	45,077	22,696	22,194	50%	49%
North Central	51,156	31,245	15,772	15,396	50%	49%
North East	52,432	29,991	12,917	16,973	43%	57%
North West	49,893	26,394	9,576	16,749	36%	63%
South	87,855	51,342	32,190	19,005	63%	37%
South Central	67,499	42,170	16,410	25,624	39%	61%
South East	81,743	27,871	17,111	10,644	61%	38%
South West	56,202	36,181	12,601	23,456	35%	65%
West	52,173	28,421	13,573	14,754	48%	52%
Dun Laoghaire	84,710	49,810	31,534	18,149	63%	36%
TOTAL	784,699	428,600	209,285	217,942	49%	51%

 

Impact on Fianna Fáil

The other factor that will be interesting to discern is what exactly will happen to the Fianna Fáil vote in Dublin on June 5th.  The party won 40.4% of the vote in the 2007 general election.  It holds seats in every Dublin constituency – two seats in seven constituencies and five others.

The following table illustrates the strength of Fianna Fáil in each of the Dublin Dáil constituencies in the last general election:

 

Dublin Constituency	FF Share of Valid Poll, 2007
North West	48.8%
South	45.6%
Central	44.5%
North Central	44.0%
North	42.1%
North East	39.7%
South West	39.3%
West	37.4%
Dun Laoghaire	34.9%
Mid West	33.0%
South East	28.7%

Dublin Euro election campaign picks up pace.

There are 32 days remaining to the Euro election on June 5th. Opinion polls are beginning to reflect the sentiment of a changing mood among the electorate. There are 9 candidates in contention, the latest being Patricia McKenna the former MEP and Green Party member.


The Redc national poll on 23 April asked:

if there was a European election tomorrow, which party, or independent
candidate, would you vote for?

The result was charted against the national outcome in the 2004 Euro poll and the findings were:


2004 Euro Poll -- Voting Intentions, Apr 2009

Fianna Fáil 29%, 25%
Fine Gael 28% , 32%
Labour 11% , 17%
Sinn Féin 11%, 8%
Greens 4%, 7%
Libertas 0%, 2%
Others 17%, 10%

The Red C 2009 figures actually add to 101% - presumably allowing for statistical rounding.


If the Redc poll national trend on Euro voting intentions was to be applied to Dublin and the opinion swing nationally was to impact in a similar pattern in Dublin an interesting pattern evolves. The quota next month will be 25% of the valid poll because there are just 3 seats instead of the current 4. If the valid poll next month is similar to the valid poll in 2004 there will be about 420,000 votes and a quota of the order of 105,000, an increase of 21,000 over the last Euro election. The following pattern might emerge:


Fianna Fáil


The incumbent MEP, Eoin Ryan and his running mate, Royston Brady, polled 97,750 votes in 2004. The corresponding figure this time maybe closer to 84,000, but will the party pick up sufficient transfers to bridge the gap? Fianna Fáil voters don’t normally transfer to other parties and there might be difficulties for them in securing transfers.



Fine Gael


Gay Mitchell, the sole FG candidate and outgoing MEP, won 90,749 votes in 2004. The opinion polls would suggest that Mitchell, again the sole candidate, could make quota. This would be a formidable accomplishment given the fragmented impact of Fine Gael in Dublin and the absence of Dáil representation in three Dublin Dáil constituencies.



Labour


Labour and the parties that lean towards Labour have polled will in each of the European elections since 1979. deRossa is the sole candidate this time. His running mate, Ivana Bacik, polled 40,707 votes in 2004 eclipsing the incumbent Green MEP, Patricia McKenna. While deRossa is not a familiar figure in many parts of the Dublin constituency, especially in the south-side, the surge in Labour popularity could see him comfortably make quota and become the catalyst in deciding the 3rd seat.



Greens


The Greens are enjoying favourable polls, having won 4% in 2004 and picking up support in 2009 may lay the ground for them to win over 50,000 votes if there candidate, Déirdre de Búrca makes sufficient impact.



Sinn Féin


The 11% of the poll won in 2004 is morphing into 8% national support in the Red C poll. McDonald won 60,395 votes in 2004 which was quite a feat at that time. But the weak performance in the 2007 General Election imply a trend of waning support and current poll trends would imply that next month’s election will yield 40,000+ votes – perhaps in the mid 40’s. If the mood of the electorate becomes more favourably disposed towards The Lisbon Treaty, as Redc poll suggest, this would put McDonald on the losing side and the incumbent MEP to disappear.


Libertas


If they win 2% of the vote in Dublin as the national opinion poll implies that would be equivalent to about 8,500 votes. Their candidate has no profile whatsoever and over the past 20 years the Dublin electorate has been slow to embrace strangers!


Socialist


Joe Higgins polled over 23,000 votes in 2004. He and his running mates polled 11,500 votes in the 2007 General Election. He lost his Dail seat in 2007. As a TD and leader of a parliamentary party he recevied an annual allowance of €64,210 in 2006 but this was reduced to €22,408 in 2007. It is expensive to fund an election campaign and the absence of this allowance will not make it easier.

Others

The former MEP, Patricia McKenna, has announced her intention to run as an independent candidate. Formerly a member of the Green Party, she lent her shrill and strident voice to the No campaign when The Lisbon Treaty was held last year. She was beaten in the 2004 Euro election by Mary Lou McDonald despite securing 40,000 votes after two terms in Europe and would seem intent on at least being a spoiler of McDonald's chances this time. "Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned"! Her emergence may cajole to current Green Party candidate, deBurca, to come out of hiding and make an impression on the voters before it is too late.

Non-aligned candidates polled 6,200 votes in the 2004 election. There are no such candidates in this election. The field of 8 candidates is the smallest since direct Euro elections were inaugurated in 1979. The Progressive Democrats no longer exist. They did not field a candidate in 2004 so their legacy support base will find expression and is likely to scatter across the established parties with Fine Gael and Greens probably being the main beneficiaries.

Dublin Gears Up for Euro Election on June 5th

It is 20 years since Dublin voters first directly elected MEP's. There have been 6 Euro elections since then and slightly more than 2 million valid votes to elect candidates to 24 seats - 4 for each election. Fianna Fail have won 27% and Fine Gael have won 25% of these 2 million votes. Fianna Fail and Fine Gael have each won 7 of the 24 seats. Labour also won 7, if the seat won by Proinsias de Rossa as a Workers Party candidate in 1989 is included. The Green Party won two and Sinn Fein won one.

The next Euro election will take place on June 5th. The Dublin constituency has grown by almost 33% since 1979 and its 820,000 voters comprise a very ethnically diverse population.

This election will be different becuase the Dublin Euro constituency has been made a 3-seater, which means that the quota will be higher, possibly as high as 105,500 votes.

The current cohort representing Dublin are:

• Gay Mitchell, Fine Gael
• Eoin Ryan, Fianna Fáil
• Proinsias de Rossa, Labour
• Mary Lou McDonald, Sinn Féin
  

Eight candidates have been declared so far:

• Eoin Ryan and Eibhlin Byrne (Lord Mayor of Dublin), Fianna Fáil
• Gay Mitchell, Fine Gael
• Proinsias de Rossa
• Déirdre de Búrca, The Green Party
• Mary Lou McDonald, Sinn Féin
• Caroline Simons, Libertas
  

Twelve candidates contested this election in 2004. The election will be based on the 2006 Census of Population revealed that Dublin had a population of 1,187,186, an increase of 5.7% over 2002.

2004 Election

The total poll was 435,136 of which there were 13,239 spoilt votes leaving a valid poll of 421,897 valid votes. The quota was 84,380.

Mitchell was elected on the first count with 90,749 votes or 1.08 of the quota.

Ryan was elected on the fifth count with 61,681 votes or 0.73 of a quota. But the second FF candidate meant that the party’s total vote in the election was 97,950 votes, or 116.1% of a quota.

De Rossa was elected on the 6th count with 54,344 votes, or 0.64% of a quota. But he had a running mate who brought the total vote of The Labour Party to 95,051, or 112.6% of a quota.

McDonald was the sole Sinn Féin candidate and polled 60,395 votes, or 14.3% of a quota.

2009 Election

The revision of the constituency to e 3-seater means that the quota rise to 25% of the valid poll and if the turnout is similar to the last Euro election that will translate into approximately 105,500 votes. The turnout is likely to be about 85% of the number that voted in the last general election. How will this impact the parties?

Fianna Fáil

Despite being hammered in the opinion polls and the appalling state of the economy, FF would need a drop of catastrophic proportions for Eoin Ryan to lose. They won 196,000 votes in Dublin in the 2007 general election.

Their challenge is to win an extra 7,500 votes above the number won in 2004 from a cohort of voters who have supported the Party before.

FF has 19 Dáil deputies in the Dublin Euro constituency. 90% of these made quota in the general election and FF has at least one TD in each of the 11 constituencies. The prospects of Eoin Ryan being returned to Europe are strong notwithstanding opinion poll trends.

Fine Gael

Mitchell won 90,749 votes in 2004 and the party won a total of 91,891 votes in the 11 Dublin constituencies in 2007. But FG has no representation in 3 Dáil constituencies and just 7 of its 10 Dublin deputies made quota in 2007, an election of revival for the party.

Fine Gael have been politically castrated in Dublin since the early 1980's. That was the era of pro-life referendums, divorce referendums and the beginning of Ireland becoming a more liberal, luralist society. But a rump of Fine Gael found it difficult to abandon its posture as pussy cat to the Archbishop of Dublin. The consequence of this is that Fine Gael have never broken 91,000 votes in Dublin so the 15,000 extra votes needed this time must come from voters who have never supported Fine Gael before. Are there enough of these? Probably by the end of the count

Given more favourable opinion poll ratings, a realistic challenge for FG would be to win 100,000 votes in Dublin in the Euro election. That would signal a basis of recovery in the capital in the run up to the next general election.

The Labour Party

If zombie trade unions, such as those on the brink of closing Lufthansa Technik at Rathcoole, the only business with serious investment plans in Ireland today, do not torpedo the advances made in the opinion polls, Labour should win a Euro seat in Dublin. Its total vote in 2004 was a very respectable 95,051 and in the 2007 general election Labour won 70,681 votes in Dublin – which means that it needs to win 35,000 more votes to make quota in the Euro election. deRossa polled 54,344 votes in the 2004 Euro election and it was the 40,707 votes of his running mate, Bacik, which secured his seat on the 6th count. But this candidate will be 69 years of age when this election takes place and I suspect his profile and impact may not be as strong across Dublin to successfully fight this campaign as a loner, as he would like to believe. Ronald Reagan won the US presidency at this age. But deRossa is not an actor and he has work to do this time round to demonstrate that he has the vitality and freshness for another 5 years!

Sinn Féin

McDonald won 60,395 votes in 2005 ousting the incumbent McKenna from The Green Party who won 40,445 votes. However, SF only polled 35,356 votes in the 2007 general election so there is quite a gap of 70,000 votes to attain the quota of 105,500 votes needed next month. The incumbent candidate has made little impact on the electorate and it is hard to see how she will overcome the deficit.

The Green Party

Christopher Fettis was the first candidate to contest the Euro election in Dublin. He did so in 1984, won 5,242 votes and lost his deposit. Trevor Sargent built on this base and won 37,317 votes in the 1989 European election. Patricia McKenna was triumphant in 1994 winning 40,388 votes, when the quota was 55,569. She was also successful again in 1999 but polled 35,659 when the quota was a tad higher at 56,135. She won 40,445 votes in 2004 but lost to Mary Lou McDonald

The Greens won 41,813 votes won in 2007 general election– enough to return 5 candidates to Dáil Éireann and the performance of their Ministers has been fairly solid.

Their Euro candidate, Deirdre de Búrca, has never held elected office in Dublin and her press release of April 22nd pandering to overtures to her to stand for Libertas does not define a candidate terribly sure of herself or with a compelling loyalty to the Greens. A waffling quotation from her to the effect that she refused the Libertas invitation for many reasons is pitiful. What next? Perhaps a press release to confirm that she does not use Jeyes Parazone bleach as a shampoo!

Their deputy, Paul Gogarty, managed to trivialise his stature in a recent Hot Press interview. He may as well have stood under the GPO and shouted "I am an inconsequential, marginalised political buffoon", so if the Greens want to the considered heavy political hitters their candidates need to sop scoring 'own goals'.

The Socialist Party

Joe Higgins won 23,218 in the 2004 Euro election and he and his candidates won 11,518 votes in the 2007 general election. Any advance on this will be progress!

Progressive Democrats

The PD's did not contest the 2004 Euro election. The won a total of 20,481 votes in Dublin in the 2007 general election acrosss nine constituncies but won only one Dublin seat - Mary Harney in Dublin Mid West. The wake before annihilation.

Others

Four independents won 14,089 votes in 2004 – 4% short of a quota between them. This would imply that the established parties garner over 75% of the votes . Dublin voters have been fairly conservative and consistent in their voting habits. But the pain felt in May as a consequence of lower pay packets, the absence of a job or the prospect of a job could test their patience.

Conclusion

Both FF and FG should reach shouting distance of quota. A battle over 40,000 votes will determine the 3rd seat and nothing is absolutely certain!

A convincing campaign by deBurca could return the Greens to Europe from the capital. Is there a catalyst for a recovery by Sinn Fein and what is this?

The voters will not respond to the narcisstic social science experiment manifested by Libertas, especially in such uncertain times. Their founder may rant about the anonymous bureaucratic control from Brussels but his own derring-do is, frankly, anonymous ill-defined!

It would appear from opinion polls that voters are experiencing a certain amount of 'mature reflection' with respect to The Lisbon Treaty and recovery in the context of prevailing and prospective economic prospects.

deBurca Scores an Own Goal!

I have felt since we first directly elected MEP's in 1979 that The Green Party (Comhaontas Glas) had something special to offer as a component of Ireland’s representation at The European Parliament.

Déirdre de Búrca seemed like a potentially interesting candidate despite never having won elected office in Dublin. The last Green MEP to represent Dublin was Patricia McKenna, whose droning, middle-aged whinging voice excited every misogynist instinct in my body and has become an obsolete irrelevance to electoral politics in Ireland.

It is said that British Royals neither ‘complain nor explain’. I was astonished to discover that the web site of The Green Party contains a press item, dated April 22, on behalf of Ms de Búrca explaining that she had rejected an invitation to run as a candidate for another party and attributed her decision to “many reasons”. Is this woman utterly naive or just totally lacking in political judgement and political self-esteem? What political party would allow itself to be demeaned by referring to a rival unproven political entity that is founded on nothing but the vacuous narcissism of an individual with nothing to offer but personal vanity and unascertainable credentials? The least that the electorate expect of any candidate representing a political party is loyalty to that party.

I must conclude that this maybe the nemesis of Ms de Búrca’s political career and the prospects of The Green Party doing the business at the European Parliament election on June 5th.