5 takeaways from the Local and European Elections by Dr Kevin Cunningham
This article was originally published on RTÉ Brainstorm.
Dr Kevin Cunningham is a lecturer in Politics and Chair of the MA in Journalism course in the School of Media at TU Dublin. He is also a former Targeting & Analysis Manager for the British Labour Party.
Analysis: Here are some of the trends which have emerged from the votes cast by the Irish people
The overall shape of the political landscape
Relative to what might have been expected a few months ago, Sinn Féin performed poorly in the local elections. This reflected, in some sense, the party's sharp decline in support and its inability to convert votes into seats in the local elections.
While support for Fianna Fáil had dipped slightly in recent months, and the party lost the most seats of any political party, its result can be seen as a success: 22.9% of the vote, higher than its popularity in general election opinion polling. In retrospect, this showing should not be surprising, as Fianna Fáil has tended to do significantly better in recent years in local rather than national elections.
According to Dr Stefan Mueller's estimates, Fianna Fáil’s local election performance was 3.1% higher than general election polling in 2009 and 5.9% higher in 2014. While it was fractionally lower in 2019, opinion polls asking about party preferences in 2019 were 7% lower than what the party achieved. Indeed, in both the 2011 and 2020 general elections, Fianna Fáil performed 8% worse in 2011, 1% worse in 2014 and 4.7% worse in 2020.
Support for Fine Gael remains in line with its general election support and, therefore, in line with current general election polling it should be considered to be the most popular party today. Collectively the government party’s vote of 49.5% suggests that their brands at the very least are not toxic. But with voter volatility the way it is, one cannot be certain whether that would last in a general election campaign.
The scale of the ticket-splitting
We know that the Irish electorate is volatile, but these local elections give a better understanding of the nature of that volatility and uncertainty in the electorate. We know from the Irish national election study that 28% of voters switched from one party to another in each of the three elections (1997, 2002, 2007) before the financial crisis. After the crisis, in excess of 40% changed their mind in the elections in 2011, 2016 and 2020. This changeability of voter preferences also explains how Fine Gael rose to 37% in 2020 and fell to 20% and how Sinn Féin rose to 36% in 2022 and has now collapsed to the same level.
In this environment, it is easier to understand how voter preferences are moving around. In a polling day exit poll, we asked voters to fill out a ballot indicating which candidate in their local they voted for. We also asked them which party they would vote for in a general election.
In total, 43% of those that issued a preference for the general election identified a candidate in a different party for the local elections. You can see that, for example, 56% of Sinn Féin general election voters opted for a Sinn Féin candidate in the locals, but 12% went to Fianna Fáil, 14% to independents, 6% to Fine Gael and 10% to other left-wing parties. 65% of those opting for Fine Gael in the general election picked a Fine Gael candidate in the locals. 14% opted for a Fianna Fáil candidate and 11% opted for an independent. 69% of Fianna Fáil’s general election vote selected a Fianna Fáil candidate while 16% selected a Fine Gael candidate.
The scale of this ticket splitting may come as a surprise to those involved in politics who might assume the electorate to be as partisan as they are, but the reality is that voters are motivated by candidate preferences and are far more fluid in their preferences. It does show, of course, that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael can win voters from across the political spectrum if they have the right candidates. The scale of the animosity towards two government parties is not sufficient to drive voters away from candidates standing for them.
People before parties
You can also see in the above table that Sinn Féin won relatively little from other parties. The survey also asked voters what determined their choice in the local elections in an open-ended text response and it was very clear that the characteristics of the candidate was far more important. It we were to break out these characteristics into three groups, they would be 'hard working', ‘local’, and ‘personal contact’ in a political environment which could be described as relatively cynical when it comes to party politics.
It should not be too surprising that individual candidates are being preferred over party allegiances regardless of where these candidates are coming from. This is clear from the number of people who say that they would vote for the candidate regardless of the party that they are in. Overall, 27% said they would, 26% said they would not and 47% say that 'it depends'. Clearly lots of voters are floating between at least two parties.
For Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and Labour, over one in three of their voters said they would vote for their candidate if they stood for a different party, though approximately one in five would not. These three parties are also the three that performed well relative to general election polling. This contrasts sharply with the Sinn Féin voter which was more partisan, where two in five would not vote for the candidate if they were in another party.
The weakness of the Sinn Féin machine on the ground
The primacy of the candidate in this election plays into the hands of hard-working incumbents, especially where the campaign period lasts just three weeks. Sinn Féin understandably selected a lot of candidates, but this made it more difficult for any one individual party candidate to stand out. Either way, it would appear that Sinn Fein candidates were comparatively less visible.
The following graph shows the share of the population reporting that they had met candidates of each party. It adds up to more than 100% because some people will have met candidates from more than one party.
Again, these differences between candidates and parties become more obvious. Relative to opinion polling where Sinn Féin has been neck and neck with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, they seem to have been comparably less visible to the voters. In relative terms among the smaller parties, Labour candidates appear to have got around, which reflects the relative performance of the party and the relative prominence of voters stating that they voted for Labour candidates.
Localised gains for smaller parties
Support for smaller left-wing parties was strong in certain parts of Dublin in particular. The Social Democrats are now the second largest on Dublin City Council, while the Labour Party is now the joint largest in Dublin Fingal. These two parties hold approximately 17% of the vote across Dublin and are quite competitive collectively with Sinn Féin who have 11% of the vote across the county. Indeed, in the European elections, votes for Labour and the Social Democrats fractionally exceed Sinn Féin.
People Before Profit made the most gains in South Dublin and the three parties have approximately 21% of the vote across the capital (this block rises to 29% when you add in the Green Party). Outside of Dublin, support for these parties is patchy, but Labour topped the poll in Drogheda,Wexford Town, Newport Tipperary and Kinnegad, while the Social Democrats topped the poll in Naas.
100% Redress saw four councillors elected in Donegal and the Wexford Independent Alliance had five councillors elected in the county. Independent Ireland got 23 candidates elected, putting the party on a par nationally with the Greens in terms of seats. Much of these wins were, of course, incumbents who had defected to the party.
While there has been significant focus on the potential rise of right-wing political parties, the total vote for The National Party, Irish Freedom Party, The Irish People and Ireland First was 1.7% of all votes cast in the local elections, up from 0.5% showing in 2020. As they did not run in every electoral area, their average vote in the places that they did run was a little bit higher than this. Collectively, these parties ran 108 candidates, one fewer than that of the Labour Party.
Across the European elections, these parties performed a little better on 4.9%, where the salience of the issues they stood on were more prominent. It was a larger vote than the Labour Party, but split far too thinly and transfer toxic outside of its base. This obviously doesn't include like-minded independents, which might, in fact, double this figure.
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of TU Dublin.