FF/FG/Green Government - Part 3 - Threadbanned User List in OP

Just on Bacik:

Seems Labour are a non entity. Bacik needs to get to Specsavers as her vision seems doomed from the off.

Will it? Have you at least got data to back that up?

I accept its bad in certain glaring areas of operation, but beyond the point of entry its a good system. 47% of the population have private cover anyway, so where you're going with you're outlandish claim I don't know.

You can hate the 'I'm alright Jacks' as much as you want, but thats politics in a nutshell boss, satisfying most of the people most of the time.

I don't think that occurs to some of the parties in this State.

They didn't last time.

Sinn Féin lost 50% of their Council seats in June 2019, but went on to 37 Dáil seats in Feb 2020.

It would need to be a transfer pact and a joint candidate selection strategy. That's the only way it could maximise results. Even with an electoral pact, the FF and FG candidates would be working against each other and effectively splitting the vote. The poll toppers would get elected but there could be a wipeout on the second and third seats.

The problem with these opinion polls is that they are first preference polls only. The next GE will be a battle for transfers. To see what happens when transfers dry up, look at Labour's performance in 2011 and compare it with that from 2016. Labour has always been the half-party dependent on transfers from FF or FG.

The SocDems are beginning to gain momentum. That's three opinion polls showing gains for them while Labour remains static. The RedC poll had the SocDems at 9% to Labour's 2% in the 18 to 34 year old demographics. That's Generation Rent and Holly Cairns is quickly becoming the spokesperson for that generation. That's someothing that none of the other parties, including SF, can match. If the momentum continues, Labour, and FG and, to a lesser extent, FF are in trouble. FG has been trying to attract the young "socially liberal" vote for years with the abortion and gay marriage referenda but those are in the past. The SocDems are not SF and their support is clustered in the younger demographics. If, or rather when, they start to shift as a result of seeing the effects of evictions, then support for FFG could collapse in those demographics.

As for the Greens, that action against Neasa Hourigan cost them support in the RedC poll. That loss may be the water melon vote shifting. The Greens and the government needed her vote but they acted stupidly. The optics of Pippa Hackett, an unelected senator who was then made a minister, talking about Hourigan, an elected TD, were bad and some Greens are rather upset. The dependency of the government on the Independents also changes the power equation for the Greens.

The danger for FFG is that angry voters vote. When they vote in sufficient numbers, they change the outcome of elections. That is what happened in 2016. Those extra seats for FFG may not happen and FF, FG and the Greens may lose seats. The opinion polls are, after all, only first preference polls. If what happened to Labour in 2016, or FG in 2002, happens to FF and FG then each of those parties will be struggling to get 20 seats each because the slight loss of support will be amplified by angry voters using their votes to punish FFG.

Regards...jmcc

The housing crisis effects everyone under 40 in the country, and plenty of people over 40 who have kids in their 20s (or 30s...) living at home with them. And it effects any business owner trying to get staff. The health crisis effects every single Irish person. Nobody goes a lifetime without using our health services.

I'm not claiming that FF & FG have been draining at 5% per cycle, its a fact.

1982 election combined FF & FG total - 84%

1989 election - 74%

2002 election - 63%

2011 election - 55%

2020 election - 43%

2023 election polls - 36%

Its a very consistent 10% per decade decline in support, that goes back almost half a century now, that shows no signs of slowing down.

"Middle class PAYE earners" are apparently ditching them rapidly, along with everyone else. The trend is extremely consistent over the years - FF&FG have been losing the support of approx 1% of the electorate every year that goes past, because their voters are literally dying off.

Have a look at any age based polls if you want to see where the trend is going to go in the future too: in the late February Irish Times polls the only age demographic with a majority (and slim at that, 58%) supporting FF & FG was 65+ year olds. For under 35s they're polling at 25% combined.

The current failures of the Irish state, the responsibility for which lies solely with the parties of government (FF&FG), are resulting in both parties becoming a dying ideology. They've failed the youth of Ireland and they're being punished for it.

"to totally blame the parties in government is wrong" - who else would you blame for the multiple crises facing Ireland today other than the political party that has been the major party in power for 12 years straight in FG? The opposition parties weren't the ones setting disastrous government policy.

Complaining about the "youth of today" or "populist politics" or what schools political leaders went to has distinct old man yells at cloud energy. The reason FF&FG have been hemorrhaging support for decades, and appear set to continue losing support for years to come, is their policies just aren't working for the majority of people in this country.

To decline from 84% support to 36% (and falling more every year) is as damning a political measurement as you'll find. Literally half the population of the country has decided that FF&FG have failed them.

If the trend continues (and every indication is that it will, given it has for almost half a century to date and what the party support figures look like by age category) we'll likely reach a situation within 10-15 years where FF&FG are polling 20% or less between them and both are consigned to fringe/minority party status.

That's not how politics works, parties change policies and evolve, FF have already been down and almost wiped out and then back to the second largest party, people change allegiances towards the centre and centre right as they get older, they also start voting more, trends don't zero out or reach 100%.

If and when FF & FG are out of government, they'll renew and refresh their policies as SF have been doing to move towards the centre and gain ground on the existing centrist parties.

No, thats exactly how politics has worked in Ireland since the early 1980s - its literally been a solidly, consistently, one way decline in support for FF&FG from 84% to 36%, trending reliably downwards over the years.

FF and FG have swapped voters between each other, but their combined support has only been going that one way - downwards - for almost half a century now. The electorate haven't been moving "towards the centre and centre right", they've been moving in large numbers towards more left-wing parties.

SF aren't overtly left wing anymore, they're a single issue (United ireland) populist party that is abandoning left wing principles to get into power, likely alongside FF, a centre left party.

Both FF and FG have had disastrous elections and bounced back and into power since the 80s, you're attempting to conflate them to match your narrative forgetting that FG almost had a single party majority in 2010.

What we have seen is a rise in independents that wield more power than smaller parties, that may dissipate after the next election if it returns an SF/FF government.

Thinking that we're heading for a left majority is just wishcasting, the numbers aren't there and SF have played a great trick (which works when not in power) of hoovering up the leftist vote while moving to the centre. Gino's manifesto has put the left left (i.e. socialist) project back another decade or two.

That might be the only way to 'maximise' results but IMO if FF were just to signal they would prefer another deal with FG over one with SF that would help a bit. Hardcore anti-SF people would still be voting FG and nobody else but more centrist types would be happy to transfer from FG to FF on the basis that if FF and FG had the numbers they would be likely to be forming another government.

Blaming the war in Ukraine, or covid, or climate change, for the Irish state crises is an incredible level of intellectual dishonesty. There are plenty of other European countries that have been subject to all of the above international crises, and that are just as successful economically, and just as attractive to immigrants, which aren't suffering the same problems.

To take one example - Denmark is an extremely similar country to Ireland under every metric available - population, size, wealth, position in Europe, number of immigrants etc. Average monthly net salaries are 10% higher in Copenhagen than Dublin, but average rents are 25% lower. How? Denmark's healthcare system has consistently better outcomes than Irelands, and much shorter wait times. How? Denmark's infrastructure is consistently better developed and more efficient than Irelands. How? etc

The answer is consistently bad governmental policy. Which, FG as the party of government since 2011, bear full responsibility for.

Yeah but surely there has to be a ceiling to this rise of the left at some point? The only countries where people 'vote' in excess of 90% 'left' are the likes of Cuba and North Korea...And the corollary of that ceiling is that the decline of FF and FG will have a floor due to the dearth of credible alternatives on the right or even in the centre.

I'd be surprised if the combined FF/FG vote is as low as 36% at the next GE, the government is in the middle of its term and likely at the nadir of its fortunes due to the eviction ban and other stuff. This guy is currently predicting they'll come back with almost exactly the same number of seats they have now, which should give them a shot at forming another government, despite the likely annihilation of the Greens, if FF are interested...

Opposition going into government would be on a hiding to nothing trying to clean up the coalitions mess. We are ten years behind in housing needs, no one can sort it in the next term. You can't get back the 10 years FG spent pushing austerity and building nothing.

You are quite correct.

Where the real intellectual dishonesty is is in pretending that other countries (other than a handful of Nordics, Switzerland and Luxembourg) are in a better place than Ireland. I also note that you didn't produce a single link for your assertions, another form of intellectual dishonesty. Here is one for you:

https://www.courthousenews.com/the-great-housing-divide-how-wealth-inequality-in-denmark-starts-with-property/

And a quote "Last year, housing costs accounted for over half of the total salary for homeowners in Copenhagen."

"Since then, Denmark has experienced a housing bubble, as prices went up 21% since the first Covid-19 lockdown in 2020. "

Maybe you could find another example of a country without a housing problem?