Turnout: The referendum turnout may have backfired on the Government parties, writes Dr Garret FitzGerald.
A remarkable feature of the election-cum-referendum has been the increase in the turnout of voters, especially in Dublin.
In Dún Laoghaire and in Pembroke/Rathmines the turnout on this occasion was 40 per cent higher than in 1999. On the basis of results from all but one of the electoral areas in Dublin South County and Fingal it was 45 per cent higher there than in 1999. And on the basis of results from eight of the 11 electoral areas in the North and South City it was up by 50 per cent in these constituencies.
In the cities of Cork, Limerick and Galway the increase in the turnout seems to have been much more modest: on the basis of fragmentary data, up by between 10 per cent and 20 per cent. In rural areas voting was also fairly consistently higher than in 1999 - but generally by much smaller margins.
The huge increase in the Dublin turnout will repay further study. The exceptionally high increases in working class areas of the city and in Tallaght clearly owe something to Sinn Féin. That party drew people out to vote who may not have visited a polling station for years past - reflecting their sense that the main parties lacked a commitment to the interests of people in such areas, where Sinn Féin secured 19-24 per cent of the votes - and as much as 32-33 per cent in Artane and Finglas, where they topped the poll.
But Sinn Féin offers only a small part of the explanation for the much higher Dublin poll. For that party polled badly in middle class areas such as Rathmines/Pembroke and Dún Laoghaire, and in South Dublin other than Tallaght, in all of which the turnout was 40-45 per cent higher than in 1999. And it did not poll well in Swords or Malahide, where the increase in the turnout was exceptionally high - perhaps because of the airport issue.
The main factor in boosting the turnout must have been the referendum on citizenship. The Government was right in judging that this would be carried by a big majority. But if any of their strategists thought that this would benefit their candidates, they appear to have been mistaken. Many of those who might not have come out to vote but for the referendum may have actually used the opportunity to vote against Government party candidates.
The Government also seems to have misjudged the de-centralisation issue, which lost them many civil service votes in Dublin. It is not clear that it gained them seats in the towns favoured by this political manoeuvre.
Dr Garret FitzGerald is a former taoiseach and former leader of Fine Gael