Early September polls: Presidential election victory for Higgins and potential for a Fine Gael landslide?

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Adrian Kavanagh, 4th September 2011

The Sunday Times/Behaviour & Attitudes opinion poll, published on 4th September offers varying fortunes for the two government parties, amounting to very good news for Fine Gael but dismal fortunes for Labour. My constituency level analysis suggest Fine Gael would win a landslide victory based on these figures if they transpired in an election and would easily win enough seats to form a single party government, with many of their seat gains to be at the expense of their coalition partners, although Labour would also be predicted to lose seats to Sinn Fein.  Better news is offered to Labour by the Red C-Paddy Power presidential election poll however, with my analysis suggesting that Michael D Higgins would win the election based on these figures, edging out Gay Mitchell on the final count by a margin of almost two hundred thousand votes.

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Constituency-level analysis of June 22nd Irish Independent/Millward Brown Lansdowne opinion poll

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Adrian Kavanagh, 22 June 2011

The latest edition of the Irish Independent-Millward Brown Lansdowne series of opinion polls almost mirrors last month’s Red C-Sunday Business Post-Red C opinion poll and offers very good news for Fine Gael whose support levels are seen to stand at 5-6% higher than the levels attained in February’s general election. Applying my constituency level analysis to these figures, seat estimates based on the simulated constituency support estimates suggest that Fine Gael would win a more than sufficient number of seats to form a majority single-party government if these figures were to be replicated in an election held today.

The opinion poll figures estimates the party support as follows: Fine Gael 42%, Labour 19%, Fianna Fail 16%, Sinn Fein 11%, Green Party 1% (not included in Red C poll), Others 13%. Based solely on assigning seats on the basis of the constituency support estimates (simply using a d’Hondt method to determine which party wins the seats), party seat levels would be estimated as follows:  Fine Gael 90, Labour 32, Fianna Fail 19, Sinn Fein 11, Green Party 0, Others 14. When the factors of vote transfers and vote splitting/management (based on vote transfer/management patterns oberved in the February 2011 election) are accounted for and constituency marginality levels at the February 2011 election taken account of, the party seat levels would more than likely be as follows: Fine Gael 85, Labour 36, Fianna Fail 16, Sinn Fein 16, Green Party 0, Others 13. Continue reading →

Sunday Business Post-Red C poll 10 April; Kenny-a believe it?

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Adrian Kavanagh 14th April

A new Dail and a new series of opinion polls leading up to a future general election in 2015 or 2016! As the constituency level poll analysis held up remarkably well in light of the eventual election results (and the last analysis involving the results of the Millward-Brown poll of 23 February was remarkably close to the actual result in terms of seats allocations), it is interesting to see what seat allocations would be based on the first of the post-election polls, the Red C poll published in last Sunday’s (10 April) Sunday Business Post.  This estimated party support as follows: Fine Gael 39%, Labour 18%, Fianna Fail 16%, Sinn Fein 11%, Independents and Others 16% (including 2% for the Green Party). What is striking about these figures is the degree to which they largely mirror the February 25th election results, but when seats are allocated based on the constituency-level poll analysis model the difference is somewhat more pronounced – this estimates seat levels as follows:  Fine Gael 80, Labour 29, Fianna Fail 22, Sinn Fein 13, Independents and Others 22 (including 6 seats for United Left Alliance candidates). When the effect of vote-splitting between multiple candidates is accounted for, particularly amongst the independent and Fianna Fil ranks, the numbers would probably read as Fine Gael 80, Labour 33, Fianna Fail 20, Sinn Fein 15, Independents and Others 18 (including 5 seats for United Left Alliance candidates). Continue reading →

What next for Labour and the Irish party system?

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Eoin O’Malley (28 February, 2011)

Although the election was a seismic event in the redevelopment of the Irish party system, the decisions made in the next week as to the structure of the government will have a greater long term impact. The decision Labour has to take as to whether to go into government or not seems to have already been taken if we consider the noises made by senior Labour members at the weekend. But if the party were considering more than getting bums on seats in ministerial mercs (or the share of a Prius) then it should pause for thought. Continue reading →

Seat estimates for Irish Independent-Millward Brown Lansdowne and Paddy Power-Red C opinion polls, 23rd February

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The Millward Brown Lansdowne opinion poll, published in the 23rd February edition of The Irish Independent estimates party support as follows: Fianna Fail 14%, Fine Gael 38%, Labour 20%, Green Party 1%, Sinn Fein 11%, Others 16%. Based solely on these poll figures, my uniform-swing constituency level analysis models seat estimates for the different parties/groupings as follows: Fianna Fail 17, Fine Gael 78, Labour 37, Green Party 0, Sinn Fein 14, Others 20 (11 Left-leaning (including 6 ULA), 9 Right-leaning).

The Red C poll for Paddy Power (23rd February) estimates party support as follows: Fianna Fail 15%, Fine Gael 40%, Labour 18%, Green Party 3%, Sinn Fein 10%, Others 14%. Based solely on these poll figures, my uniform-swing constituency level analysis models seat estimates for the different parties/groupings as follows: Fianna Fail 21, Fine Gael 80, Labour 34, Green Party 0, Sinn Fein 13, Others 18 (11 Left-leaning (including 6 ULA), 7 Right-leaning). Continue reading →

Poll of Polls with seat projections: Is Fianna Fáil support underestimated?

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Eoin O’Malley (20 February, 2011)

The three most recent polls by Red-C,  Millward Brown and Ipsos-mrbi in today’s Sunday Business Post and Sunday Independent and tomorrow’s Irish Times are broadly consistent and are also consistent with recent trends. Fine Gael’s position is solidifying (not surging) and Labour is slipping slightly (not falling). The Greens look unlikely to return any seats. Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin also seem not to be moving. In fact it was the week between the 2nd of February and the 10th February is where there seems to have been movement (see below) not the week just passed. That’s not to say the final week of the campaign can’t see some significant changes. The results of the weighted poll of polls are

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Sunday 19th and Monday 20th February polls: Potential overall majority still on cards?

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Adrian Kavanagh, 19th February 2011

The Red C opinion poll, published in the 20th February edition of The Sunday Business Post estimates party support as follows: Fianna Fail 16%, Fine Gael 39%, Labour 17%, Green Party 2%, Sinn Fein 12%, Others 14%. Based solely on these poll figures, my uniform-swing constituency level analysis models seat estimates for the different parties/groupings as follows: Fianna Fail 25, Fine Gael 78, Labour 31, Green Party 0, Sinn Fein 13, Others 19.

The Millward-Brown opinion poll, published in the 20th February edition of The Sunday Independent estimates party support as follows: Fianna Fail 16%, Fine Gael 37%, Labour 20%, Green Party 1%, Sinn Fein 12%, Others 14%. Based solely on these poll figures, my uniform-swing constituency level analysis models seat estimates for the different parties/groupings as follows: Fianna Fail 23, Fine Gael 75, Labour 36, Green Party 0, Sinn Fein 13, Others 19.

The Ispos-MRBI opinion poll, published in the 21st February edition of The Irish Times estimates party support as follows: Fianna Fail 16%, Fine Gael 37%, Labour 19%, Green Party 2%, Sinn Fein 12%, Others 14%. Based solely on these poll figures, my uniform-swing constituency level analysis models seat estimates for the different parties/groupings as follows: Fianna Fail 26, Fine Gael 74, Labour 34, Green Party 0, Sinn Fein 14, Others 18.

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Updated ‘poll of polls’ with with Red-C and Millward Brown Polls: FG-Labour government still most likely

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Eoin O’Malley (19 February, 2011)

We have a tendency to see new polls and take them as indicating some real change in the fortunes of the parties since the last comparable poll was taken, when possibly much of the variation is caused by differences in samples – the luck of the draw. One way to alleviate the tendency to overstate the importance of the most recent poll is to take a poll of polls. The two most recent polls by Red-C and Millward Brown in tomorrow’s Sunday Business Post and Sunday Independent are broadly consistent and  are also consistent with recent trends. Fine Gael’s position is solidifying and Labour is slipping slightly. The Greens look unlikely to return any seats. The results of my weighted poll of polls are

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What’s gone wrong for Labour?

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Eoin O’Malley (15 February, 2011)

There’s is some degree of agreement in the opinion polls of all types (different companies, candidate based ballot paper questions and party questions, local polls and national polls) that over the course of the campaign Fine Gael has trended upwards and Labour downwards. As we can see from the Red C first preference vote trends, which is the only properly comparable trend of polls, that where Labour was within touching distance of Fine Gael in October and November (Millward Brown had Labour ahead of Fine Gael in September, but its estimates for Labour are usually above the Red C ones for some reason) since then Fine Gael has pulled away. The closeness of the race last autumn, with Kenny’s unpopularity, presumably gave rise to the ‘Gilmore for Taoiseach’ strategy. Continue reading →

Irish Independent/Millward Brown poll, 16th February: Kenny Krusades on and the unlucky thirteen…

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Adrian Kavanagh, 15th February 2011

The Millward-Brown opinion poll, published in the 16th February edition of The Irish Independent estimates party support as follows: Fianna Fail 12%, Fine Gael 38%, Labour 23%, Green Party 3%, Sinn Fein 10%, Others 16%. Based solely on these poll figures, my uniform-swing constituency level analysis models seat estimates for the different parties/groupings as follows: Fianna Fail 13, Fine Gael 78, Labour 42, Green Party 0, Sinn Fein 13, Others 20.

(Update: 17th February Daily Star poll: Fianna Fail 17%, Fine Gael 39%, Labour 18%, Green Party 2%, Sinn Fein 10%, Others 14% - seat estimates based on these figures: Fianna Fail 31, Fine Gael 77, Labour 31, Green Party 0, Sinn Fein 8, Others 18.  Two points to note here: there is a level of support in mid-teens that Fianna Fail must not fall beyound otherwise their losses will accelerate, Fine Gael’s prospects of edging towards the magic 83-seat number decrease when Fianna Fail poll ratings improve.) Continue reading →