The alternative government of Fine Gael and Labour has moved into a strong position to win the forthcoming general election, according to the latest TNS mrbi opinion poll carried out for The Irish Times. It shows a big swing to Fine Gael and another drop in support for Fianna Fáil, writes Stephen Collins, Political Editor.
An increase of 5 per cent in support for Fine Gael since the last Irish Timespoll in January means that the Fine Gael-Labour alternative has pulled four points ahead of the Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats coalition. If the Green Party is included, the alternative government parties have a lead of 10 per cent over Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats.
The adjusted figures for party support are: Fianna Fáil 34 per cent (down 3 points); Fine Gael 31 per cent (up 5 points); Labour 10 per cent (down 1 point); Sinn Féin 10 per cent (up 1 point); Greens 6 per cent (down 2 points); PDs 3 per cent (up 2 points); and Independents/others 6 per cent (down 2 points).
The poll was conducted last Monday and Tuesday among a representative sample of 1,000 voters in face-to-face interviews at 100 sampling points around the country. The research was conducted as speculation about the date of the election was becoming intense.
It was taken after all the parties had announced the key elements of their election economic manifestos in the weeks after Easter.
The core vote for the parties is: Fianna Fáil 32 per cent (down 3 points); Fine Gael 23 per cent (up 4 points); Labour 7 per cent (down 1 point); Sinn Féin 8 per cent (up 1 point); Greens 4 per cent (down 2 points) PDs 2 per cent (up one point); Independents/others 5 per cent (down 1 point); and undecided voters 19 per cent (up 1 point).
The 3 per cent drop in the adjusted level of support for Fianna Fáil to 34 per cent has put the party back to the same level it was at in the summer of 2004, when the party suffered a serious setback in the European and local elections. It is well down on the 40 per cent it achieved only last November in the wake of the Ahern payments controversy.
Fianna Fáil can take some comfort from the fact that it has hit even lower levels on a number of occasions since the last election in 2002 but always managed to bounce back. Still, after the Budget last December, the €184 billion National Development Plan in January and the announcement by the Taoiseach of a range of tax cuts and spending plans in his ardfheis speech, the poor showing so close to the election will come as a disappointment to the party.
The Fine Gael rating of 31 per cent is the highest achieved by the party in an mrbi opinion poll since 1989. It marks a significant jump from the 24 per cent to 28 per cent band it has been in for the past two years.
If it was repeated on election day, Fine Gael would be in a strong position to gain more than 20 seats and recover all the ground it lost at the last election. The party has not won more than 30 per cent of the vote at a general election since 1982.
Apart from the swing from Fianna Fáil to Fine Gael, the most striking feature of the poll is the continued increase in support for Sinn Féin, which has now drawn level with Labour.
The highly publicised agreement between Sinn Féin and the DUP to share power in the North appears to have had a positive effect on the party's level of support in the Republic.
While Fine Gael has improved significantly, a worrying feature of the poll for the alternative government is the drop of 1 per cent in support for Labour.
The party's core vote has now slipped below that of Sinn Féin. Labour is now behind Sinn Féin in Dublin but should be able to hold most of its seats as long as there are good transfers with Fine Gael.
The Green Party has dropped back from a high of 8 per cent in the last poll to the kind of support levels it was regularly achieving over the past four years. The PDs are up to 3 per cent from the all-time low of 1 per cent in the last poll, which means that the party is not far off its last election performance when it won eight seats with just under 4 per cent of the national vote.
The poll shows that satisfaction with the Government has dropped five points to 43 per cent from 48 per cent in January. Satisfaction with the Taoiseach is also down three points to 53 per cent.
The most dramatic fall in satisfaction is with the Tánaiste, Michael McDowell, who is down 12 points to 32 per cent.
Mr McDowell is now back at the same satisfaction level he achieved when he first took over as PD leader last autumn.
Enda Kenny's satisfaction rating has remained the same at 41 per cent but there is still a substantial 25 per cent who have no opinion about his leadership.
Pat Rabbitte has risen one point to 48 per cent, despite the drop in support for his party, while the same applies to Trevor Sargent, who is up three points to 43 per cent. Gerry Adams is down four points to 46 per cent.