Just landed to quite the exit poll! FF/FG/SF all on 22%. As predicted, #ge2020 marks the true completion of the fragmentation of Irish politics started by the crash. irishtimes.com/news/politics/…
Bear in mind though, all of this is to play out in the constituencies. 40 constituencies makes the system relatively disproportionate for a PR system. Much will come down to the individual results and relatively fine margins seat numbers will be crucial.
Still, consider, FF/FG used to regularly account for 60-70% of the vote between them. On these figures they’re not touching 45%. Gamechanger. Even with SF, that’s only 2/3s of the vote.
Could be a tough tough night for
Fianna Fáil. Consider this result would mean they’d only be 5% up on their *disastrous* 2011 performance. They’re going backwards after 9 years of opposition (remind you of anyone?) Worse they might end up the *third* party (in popular vote).
Fianna Fáil. Consider this result would mean they’d only be 5% up on their *disastrous* 2011 performance. They’re going backwards after 9 years of opposition (remind you of anyone?) Worse they might end up the *third* party (in popular vote).
FF is a party which was in office for 61 of 79 years from 1932 to 2011. It was *the* party of Ireland and the Irish state. It might just get into office, it might not. But it’s a shadow of itself still.
SF’s breakthrough remarkable. Had they chosen to stand in every seat they could well have achieved near parity with FF/FG. As it is, they’re vying for first place in popular vote. Looks like big surge with every voter group under 65.
Still, SF might struggle to pick up transfers.
Has to be said, it’s not a terrible result for Varadkar. Yes, it’s more retreat for FG, down from 25% in 2016 but still- they were 12 points behind at the start of the campaign. On these figs they are still in front, by half a hair on half an eyebrow but still in front. #ge2020
But overall headline is, given the various antipathies at play and the highly fragmented nature of the result, marshalling any sort of majority will be very difficult.
And SF seems to be emerging as the sustained left of centre alternative in Irish politics. It has all but displaced the Labour Party which was once a moderate size player and now exceeded it. Changes everything.
