The accelerating fall in Sinn Féin support

This is the nonsense getting pushed by Sinn Fein, in fact the amount of change for the better in Ireland over the last 30 years has been incredible. Something that Sinn Fein had next to no involvement in.

Yet Sinn Fein supporters keep pushing that nothing has got better. This is totally incorrect.

In terms of health, yes the HSE has issues but the life expectancy in Ireland is growing.

Jog on now with the nonsense nothing got better, either you are very young and only born during Celtic TIger or you just are ignoring what Ireland was like before that.

Already a thread on this in politics forum, the poster you are responding to is already on it. Everyone has said the same bar Sinn Fein supporters who think after spending years giving out abuse to FF supporters online and in the streets they will suddenly forget all of that and go into government with Sinn Fein

A property portfolio and richest party how?

We all know the links with organised crime, are you saying that is a good thing?

The only vote currently available to people, is outside of ALL sittings TD’s. That’s a big gamble.

For me it’s housing. They blabber on about policy and yet collectively they have blocked thousands of houses at planning.

And I also feel that are just bandwagoners on a lot of topics.

Will alone won’t build the houses needed, which currently stands at the equivalent of all the houses currently in Cork city. This is the bluff SF are hoping the electorate will swallow, have they told you how their willingness will realise the builds they are promising?

Far right of you maybe. Which is wholly fine. But we've lost all perspective if asking for reduced levels of inward migration is far right.

I would need to see the breakdown of class support and trends in support to draw conclusions about the reasons.

My opinion is that Immigration is one of the reasons in working class areas.

If there is a decline in better off areas, it might be that the FG scaremongering about SF wanting to bring down house prices to $300,000 in Dublin might have been a factor in this group.

SF's support among the better off was never that high though in actual elections, though it had been increasing.

While support for immigration is higher among the better off ABC1 group in the Irish Times poll, 52% in this group still say they want a more closed system than we have now. In the entire sample the figure is 59%, rising to 70% among SF voters. Interestingly its 58% among Independents, They are not necessarily a uniform group as one would expect with Independents. Even so its clear that in the Dail and Seanad, most of the criticism of the open borders policies are coming from Independents.

I was always sceptical of SF. I am still concerned about its MEP Sean McManus voting against criminalising those who evade sanctions on Russia. It seems out of step with the party in the Dail voting in favour of such a measure at home. While Mary Lou has condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we have occasionally heard echoes of the earlier pro-Russian position, including Reada Cronin at an Oireachtas Committee suggesting Ukraine should cede territory. Also when the war started, there was a purge of pro-Russian stuff from SF's website. Have they really abandoned their previous views so thoroughly? Possible but my reading is there are still elements in the party who are applying a "England's difficult is Ireland's opportunity" approach to this, and that is wrong because the conflict is in Ukraine,. But it affects the West through inflation.

I also have concern that a SF led government will harm our vital relationship with the United States by their position on the war in Gaza. I actually agree with what SF has said on Gaza, but I think vital national economic interests, and those concerning Northern Ireland, should be a priority.

The country cannot handle the numbers regardless of 'will'.

We are in the midst of a housing crisis and even with plenty of money to be made building houses, we simply cannot build enough. 30k a year currently and that isn't enough to address population growth, nevermind pent up demand.

We do not have the resources for current numbers of asylum seekers, nevermind future ones. The time to take action and tighten immigration rules is now, or else we will have an even worse crisis in a few years time.

Ó Broin is becoming dangerously smug. His appearance is obviously off putting - the round glasses and trusted member of Lenin’s inner circle dress sense. But then you have the rolling of vowels, the clipped accent, and the way he speaks very slowly so the great unwashed at home can understand and internalise his profound message. Probably a friend of Glen Hansard as well. You know the type.

I’d imagine he knows about as much about the realities of building a house as that lecturer in Maynooth has. Spoofers.

This is a bit of a trend. Simon Harris is another one....it's an inability to hide the disdain they have for people they used to agree with!!!

These aren't smart men, they are idiots who have spent too long compromising their beliefs!! It's genuinely weird to witness, you get to see in realtime, how infantile many of these people actually are!

Other posters have mentioned SF’s policy is ‘Brits out, everyone else in’. I would go further and say they are more red than green (red for communists, red for the blood on their hands in both sectarian and gang violence.)

They have pie in the sky ideas. Taxing the rich doesn’t work. It’s been tried in other countries. People just cut back on investment and move money out of the country. The rich sneak away and the talented leave for better opportunities.

So basically you are supporting a party without knowing what they stand for and what policies they have.

Its pretty much the same response as all SF voters I have spoken to.

I dont understand how someone can support a party when they dont know what their policies are. But hey, its highly unlikley they will get in anyway.