Yearly Archives: 2017

leinsterhouse

Leinster House

With a General Election becoming a distinct possibility…

A personal forecast of the winners and losers.

Phryne Fisher writes:

Having seen your Electoral edition of ‘Ask a Broadsheet reader‘ I’ve made some predictions and observations. It’s a long one so grab a tay but it’s based on some fairly detailed constituency level analysis of GE2016.

I’d really welcome reader comments on my evening’s speculations.

(parties arranged in no particular order but I’ve treated smaller parties first as they will likely experience the most significant percentage swing in seat share)

Independents
Zappone and Ross (along with his embarrassing entourage of shivering, quivering, rosary incanting bumpkins) have ensured that anyone hoping for change through voting for independents will think carefully about straying from party stables and hoisting another Lowry-like Leviathan up to the Cabinet table.

SocDems
Defector Donnelly has shown his true colours and his surprise move raises questions about both the orientation and aims of the SocDems who generally reek of over-reliance on focus groups in cultivating their ideology.
Gary Gannon may help them to re-establish their gender balance in the Oireachtas but otherwise it’s no change from their present seat count of 2. I fear that their appeal is manufactured right down to the Cadbury coloured wrapper. It’s understandable why they appeal to the affluence-aspirant Broadsheet reader but I wonder if there’s anything under the foil wrapper.
They began as a lifeboat for Labour and it remains to be seen if they will sink without Donnelly on board. Catherine Murphy will definitely retain her seat but what is Roisín Shorthall but a disgruntled and increasingly irrelevant ex-junior minister who is still reeling from coming off the worst in a spat with James Reilly (no matter how correct her stance was)? No doubt her constituency support is strong but after Donnelly showed his true colours will 10,540 first preference votes still sweep this Social Democrat to the top of her poll?

Labour
Brendan Howlin’s attempt to become a Hibernian Corbyn is as pathetic as it is comedic. One of the notable differences between this parliament and the last has been the silence of Joan Burton. Without a media spotlight, I fail to see how she will hold her seat against a very impressive and rising Ruth Coppinger and Sinn Féin’s narrowly beaten Paul Donnelly in Dublin West. The question is will Labour need a 7 seater taxi to bring them to Dáil Éireann after GE17 or will a standard four door saloon do the job(stown)?

AAA/PBP
Paul Murphy has clearly consolidated his own position (despite still having a life-sentence for false imprisonment of Joan (see above) still hanging over him). The question is can the Alphabet soup of AAA/PBP consolidate their vision for change and make electoral gains by offering the electorate something more substantive than loudhailer slogans from the civil rights era? Ownership of the water movement is in disputed territory between Brendan Ogle (will he be running and if so will it be against Adams in Louth?) and AAA/PBP.
What momentum the water issue has at present is questionable with Irish Water patiently awaiting an opportunity from their bunker. Ruth Coppinger remains the more impressive but less bombastic of the party’s twin peaks (the other being Murphy).
Ones to watch include Tina MacVeigh (her strong grassroots organisation and growing profile make her a strong contender for an inner-city / west Dublin seat if run) and Gino Kenny who also performed well last time around and will likely retain his seat. Repeal the 8th will be a strong vote getter for the party generally and for Coppinger in particular.


Independents 4 Change
No change. Daly and Wallace safe. Joan Collins will make gains. Tommy Broughan safe and rising as he wisely remained clear of SomDem volatility.

Green party
Only rising sea levels can bring this party up in the polls. Their DLR seat is likely safe among Ranger-Rover driving entrepren-vironmentalists with a surfboard in the garage. Ditto for Eamon Ryan despite the fact that he only topped the poll due to massive transfer friendliness from his SocDem rival. With a better candidate in Dublin Bay South, the SocDems could steal Ryan’s seat from under him although the Gormley legacy will likely secure him his seat. Predict no change.

Fianna Fáil
Obviously standing to gain huge ground, especially in rural constituencies given popular distaste for FG among (1) socially conservative voters who have lost faith in FG over abortion and (2) downwardly mobile farmers who no longer either consider themselves part of the traditional FG rancher vote or doubt FG’s ability to return them to relative economic certainty or fight their corner in Europe.
The question for FF is not how well they will perform in rural Ireland but how they will fare in the battle with Sinn Féin (and some FG candidates) in poorer urban areas. This is the only constituency where they stand to make or lose crucial seats. One rather ominous note was sounded earlier this week suggesting FF also have prior knowledge of Garda scandal and did nothing with it (for context see this potentially explosive finding from NAMA Winelake).
This is the FG ‘kompromat’ which will be their best shot at halting FF from pulling the plug at a time of their choosing over the McCabe scandal. The final question, given the high likelihood of no clear winner is who FF will court for a governing partner. They have effectively been in shadow-coalition with FG for almost a year now but would they ever contemplate coalition with Sinn Féin?

Sinn Féin
The recent leadership change in the North has so far passed off well although elections there will be the true litmus test. The graceful exit of McGuinness has removed much of the old spectres and Michelle O’Neill heralds the dawn of a post-Good Friday party. In the South no such candidate presents her- or himself to supersede Adams. MacDonald isn’t sufficiently popular and Doherty has both the wrong gender and the wrong profile to present to a southern electorate wary of Ulstermen of any shade.
Thus Adams will undoubtedly lead the party through the next GE and will likely retire thereafter with either of the aforementioned Pope’s children the most likely to succeed in the South. The key issue for Sinn Féin is that they are caught in something of a popularity trap in which each step forward is also one step back – as they moderate and gain middle ground/swing voters, they lose more traditional voters (and especially preferences).
Thus they are stuck on somewhere between 12 and 17 percent of first preferences nationally. They performed towards the lower end of this scale in the real test in March 2016 (13.8% nationally) and despite their apparent ignorance of running campaigns south of a line running from Drogheda to Drumcliff they must have learned something from the experience of the 2016 campaign.
In the face of Dublin media and Fine Gael they stand to make significant inroads specifically in Meath East, Galway West, Dublin West and possibly Wexford. If they can break the thus far unobtainable 20% of first preferences – an unlikely scenario – they could stand to win as many as six new seats while retaining and consolidating their existing holdings.

Fine Gael
The party will undoubtedly lose seats. The past 11 months have been the politics of contrivance and stasis, weathering scandal after scandal with an invisible Taoiseach and an amicable prelude to a potentially vicious leadership battle between Coveney (the party favourite) and Varadkar (the people’s/media’s darling). FitzGerald is unlikely to emerge from Garda-gate with her reputation intact nor, for that matter, will Enda. Incidentally, FitzGerald had hoped to ride the wave of Hillary mania predicted for November but in a world of Trump FG will likely take the safe bet and send a man (and possibly a straight one) to Washington for St Patty’s Day.

Bearing all these factors in mind, despite the glow of his twitter account, @ChampagneForLeo will likely not woo big cattle farmers away from the Coveney camp at a party caucus. One seat that will definitely go is one of the FG three in Dún Laoghaire as Seán Barrett is no longer Ceann Comhairle (incidentally this gives FF a safe seat in Seán O’For-Real’s home town thus limiting Sinn Féin’s opportunities in Kildare South where they had made major inroads in GE16). Returning to FG, internally, the backbenches are heaving at the insolence of the cabinet independents and the relentless inability of government to produce good news stories for their constituents.

How well these foot soldiers will perform in the impending canvas is anyone’s guess… In terms of projected losses, FG are looking at anywhere between 3 and 7 seats down depending on the timing of the election and that is not a card within Kenny’s hand.

Don’t forget to check out the following to give you the best picture of where seats can be won or lost:
To be honest, the appropriately named ‘thirty-second’ Dáil has lasted beyond all expectations.
The end must be nigh but how will it fall and why?

I’m not a pollster and I did not ring up a thousand people to work out the following but … based on all the above (and a few hours of number crunching constituency-by-constituency … below are my predictions (2016 figure -> 2017 prediction) (FF and SocDem figures have been bracketed to reflect the Donnelly defection.

FG 50 -> 43
FF (45) -> 51
SF 23 -> 29
LAB 7 -> 4
AAA/PBP 6 -> 8
SOCDEM (2) -> 2
GP 2 -> 2
IA 6 -> 3
Ind4Change 4 -> 4
IND 13 -> 10

I’d love to hear people’s thoughts. Lots of love and have a swinging time at the polls,

Phryne Fisher is a Broadsheet reader

FIGHT!

Yesterday: Ask A broadsheet Reader

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Rufus Bluestuff is a monster.

He sounds suspiciously like Irish music-media hero Ray Wingnut, and the fact that they have seldom, if ever, been seen in the same room together is highly suspect.

John Sharpson, or Sharpy, as his parents don’t call him, is his buddy. He’d like very much to be a YouTuber, like all those other lads that get paid stupid money to fool around online.

Together, they are ShaRuf.

If you have missed the long-respected television format of fully-functional adult human beings giving out to by their puppet associates over their broadcast desk, look no further.

ShaRuf on YouTube

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Farah Elle – Dublin singer/songwriter/pianist

What you may need to know…

01. Farah El Neihum, a.k.a. Farah Elle, is an alt-pop songwriter living and working in Dubland, with a Libyan background.

02. Graduating from BIMM in Dublin, Farah Elle kicked off in earnest in 2015. Debut single So Scarlet was followed by last year’s single Silk, and attendant critical acclaim. Also recently appeared on Bantum‘s Move album, on standout track Feel it Out.

03. Streaming above is Curfew, taken from her appearance at the December installment of Sofar Sounds in Dublin, alongside backing vocalists Cat Smyth and Fiona Harte.

04. Appearing at the 50th-episode special of Headstuff.org’s No Encore podcast, happening at the Workman’s Club on the 2nd of March. Also on the bill: We Cut Corners, Bantum and Windings performing live, and guest appearances from Michael Pope (Le Galaxie) and MayKay (Other Voices/Fight Like Apes).

Thoughts: Ridiculously talented, and with her whole career/body of work ahead of her, it’s surely only a matter of time before Farah Elle hits upon bigger things.

Farah Elle

Photo: Tara Thomas

3WillTour_CoverPhoto_Names_Included2

download

Look at that for a touring itinerary.

Cork/Wexford-based promotion/booking company Merakindie has a March/April jaunt lined up for three solo artists: Paula Cox, Paul Creane and The Man Whom, with a long and detailed list of non-traditional performance spaces alongside venues and theatres in uncommonly-toured towns.

Writes Emma Kelly:

“Although not exclusive to non-traditional music venues, we are choosing to put on shows in those special local independently run businesses who are keen be involved and support the indie culture of Ireland. This tour is all about community and collaboration, and is reflected by the artists themselves, who will be singing on each other’s material. By doing things this way, we want to shine a positive light on independent Ireland.”

Your thoughts on music outside of the main cities in Ireland, and your favourite non-venue music spots below, please.

Merakindie

greens

dan

From top: Green Party members led by then party leader John Gormley (centre) leaving Government Buildings on January 23, 2011 after informing the Taoiseach Brian Cowen that they can no longer continue in Government: Dan Boyle

As The Maurice McCabe scandal has shown our politics is bedevilled with a belief that the most complex path is that most likely, not so much to deliver truth, but to somehow hold reputation intact

Dan Boyle writes:

It was the fag end of the FF/Green government. The Greens had already decided and had announced that the government was working towards its conclusion.

A Budget and a Finance Bill needed to be passed. It was hoped some other bills might also be approved, but there was no real expectation.

A meeting was organised in the  Taoiseach’s office to arrange remaining government business. Brian Cowen was accompanied by Tony Killeen (not that long a cabinet minister) and the Government Chief Whip, John Curran. On the Green side I made up the numbers along with John Gormley and Eamon Ryan.

After what had been a number of horrendous months, Brian Cowen was in an euphoric mood. The previous evening he had unexpectedly won a vote of confidence from his parliamentary party. His demeanour screamed hubris.

Towards the end of the meeting he announced his intention to fill a number of cabinet positions that had become ‘vacant’. Each of us Greens said that would be a bad idea. It would, in effect, be the announcing of a new government.

Later I found myself appearing on TV3’s Vincent Browne Tonight. I like Vincent. His exposés added to his combative style, have dragged Irish politics to a better place. I was well used to his shtick. Before transmission he would have had decided what the story was, and from that he would not deviate during the programme.

In effect he called me a liar. I admit I somewhat lost it with him, challenging him as to which of us had actually been at the meeting. The story was what was or wasn’t said at that meeting.

There was a Fianna Fáil version of events and there was a Green version. This is what piqued the media’s interest. What I took from this experience was a painful lesson, that the truth mattered less than possessing the most persuasive narrative.

I’m reminded of these events, as with most people, I try to make sense of new Irish politics this week.

We have seen and heard a number of overlapping accounts of what was said by whom when. It’s possible that none of those involved have been telling an unvarnished truth. What is certain is that all involved have been trying to outspin each other, in their efforts to win the most persuasive narrative contest.

What has been most dispiriting about all this, is that none of it should really matter.
What should matter is the fate of one citizen, a public servant, who for trying to do right, has endured years having the essence of his character maligned, through many agencies of this State.

Some of these agencies, formed for the protection of actual victims of our society seem to have, at least peripherally, been actors in the blackest of dark propaganda against a man whose only crime has been the telling of the truth.

Under these circumstances the who said what is of little relevance. Even the idea of a judicial commission versus a public inquiry is something of a sideshow. Either mechanism only guarantees further delay, and certain further distress for Maurice McCabe and his family.

There instead should be an Oireachtas resolution thanking Maurice McCabe for his service, apologising for how he has been treated, and insisting that all those in public positions who sought to stymie his efforts resign.

This won’t happen because our politics is bedevilled with a belief that the most complex path is that most likely, not so much to deliver truth, but to somehow hold reputation intact.

I recently leafed through a newly published book on the FF/Green government. I came across  an admission from a Fianna Fáil person who had been at that meeting with me, that the Green account of what happened was what happened.

It seems that, eventually, truth does become the persuasive narrative.

Dan Boyle is a former Green Party TD and Senator. His column appears here every Thursdyay. Follow Dan on Twitter: @sendboyle

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