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The Irish Times/MRBI poll - May 2003
On Friday, May 16th, the Irish Times published an opinion poll carried out on their behalf by TNS/MRBI. Voters were asked how they would vote in a general election. 1,000 voters were surveyed at 100 locations throughout all constituencies. A number of questions were asked, but this page looks only at the levels of party support which were (general election figures in brackets):- Fianna Fáil 32% (41.5%) Labour 22% (10.8%) Fine Gael 20% (22.5%) Sinn Féin 9% (6.5%) Progressive Democrats 4% (4%) Green Party 4% (3.8%) Others 9% (11.2%) What might this mean in a general election? The following are the results of a simulation:- Party Seats(*) Cands Const FPV FPV% Seats% Fianna Fáil 57(81) 106 42 588588 32.12% 34.34% Labour 40(20) 71 42 403392 22.01% 24.10% Fine Gael 33(31) 85 42 371342 20.26% 19.88% Sinn Féin 9(5) 48 42 167294 9.13% 5.42% Independent 11(13) 95 38 129830 7.08% 6.63% Progressive Democrats 8(8) 20 18 73621 4.02% 4.82% Green Party 6(6) 31 31 71463 3.90% 3.61% Socialist Party 2(1) 5 5 14891 0.81% 1.20% Christian Solidarity Party 0(0) 23 23 4728 0.26% 0.00% Workers Party 0(0) 8 7 4006 0.22% 0.00% Socialist Workers 0(0) 7 7 3333 0.18% 0.00% *=seats won at the 2002 general election The simulation results were obtained by a) running a simulation which produced the 2002 election result b) adjusting party support to reflect the poll results. Party support was adjusted equally throughout the state for all parties except Labour - the poll indicated that the increase in Labour support was greatest in the Dublin and Leinster regions c) re-running the simulation Based on these results, a Labour, Fine Gael, Green coalition would have 79 seats (84 are required for a majority). Given 11 disparate independents they should have no difficulty forming a government. Other possibilities are:- Labour/FG/Green/PDs (87 seats) FF/FG (90 seats) FF/Labour (93 seats) One lesson from this poll is that Labour should already be planning to run multiple candidates in constituencies such as Wexford and Dublin South where, based on these figures, the party has a real chance of 2 seats. In 1992, Labour threw 3 seats away by not running enough candidates. The constituency results produced by the simulation follow (although the constituencies will probably have been revised by the time the next election arrives). Constituency [Seats] [Seats won by party] Carlow-Kilkenny [5] [2ff,1fg,2lab] Cavan-Monaghan [5*] [2ff,1sf,1ind,1fg] Clare [4] [1ind,1fg,1ff,1lab] Cork East [4] [1ff,1fg,2lab] Cork North-Central [5] [1lab,1fg,2ff,1pd] Cork North-West [3] [1ff,2fg] Cork South-Central [5] [2ff,1fg,1lab,1gp] Cork South-West [3] [1fg,1lab,1ff] Donegal North-East [3] [2ff,1ind] Donegal South-West [3] [1fg,2ff] Dublin Central [4] [1lab,1ff,1sf,1ind] Dublin Mid-West [3] [1lab,1ff,1pd] Dublin North-Central [4] [1lab,1fg,2ff] Dublin North-East [3] [1lab,1ff,1fg] Dublin North-West [3] [1lab,1sf,1ff] Dublin North [4] [1lab,1gp,1sp,1ff] Dublin South-Central [5] [2lab,1sf,1fg,1ff] Dublin South-East [4] [1lab,1gp,1pd,1ff] Dublin South-West [4] [2lab,1sf,1ff] Dublin South [5] [1lab,1pd,1fg,1gp,1ff] Dublin West [3] [1lab,1ff,1sp] Dun Laoghaire [5] [2lab,1ff,1pd,1gp] Galway East [4] [1fg,1ind,2ff] Galway West [5] [1lab,2ff,1fg,1gp] Kerry North [3] [1lab,1sf,1fg] Kerry South [3] [1lab,1ind,1ff] Kildare North [3] [1lab,1ff,1fg] Kildare South [3] [1lab,1fg,1ff] Laois-Offaly [5] [1lab,2ff,1pd,1fg] Limerick East [5] [2ff,1fg,1lab,1pd] Limerick West [3] [2ff,1fg] Longford-Roscommon [4] [1fg,1lab,1ff,1pd] Louth [4] [1lab,1ff,1sf,1fg] Mayo [5] [2fg,1ind,2ff] Meath [5] [1lab,2ff,1fg,1sf] Sligo-Leitrim [4] [1ind,1fg,1sf,1ff] Tipperary North [3] [1ind,1lab,1ff] Tipperary South [3] [1ff,1fg,1ind] Waterford [4] [1lab,1fg,2ff] Westmeath [3] [1lab,1fg,1ff] Wexford [5] [2lab,1fg,2ff] Wicklow [5] [2lab,1ff,1fg,1ind] Notes: *=Ceann Comhairle automatically elected (Cavan-Monaghan)Fine Gael lost 23 seats at the last election - based on this simulation, Fianna Fáil could lose 24 seats at the next election. Obviously, there is unlikely to be a general election anytime soon. |
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