In the last couple of weeks, Fine Gael director of elections Frank Flannery and Labour Party general secretary Mike Allen have both been central to the spin emerging from their party's respective "think-ins", writes Noel Whelan
In Sligo, Flannery was reported as suggesting that Fine Gael could win an additional 30 seats in next year's election, which would give them a total of 61. In Cork, Allen talked of the Labour Party winning up to nine additional seats, which would give them a total of 30 seats.
When given the time to explain his scenarios for the next election (as he was on the RTÉ programme The Week in Politics in July) Frank Flannery himself is the first to introduce caveats about the party's prospects in individual constituencies and to warn that the most benign scenarios he advances for Fine Gael seat gains are contingent on many factors - only some of which are within Fine Gael's control.
But in recent interviews Enda Kenny and other senior party spokespeople have been less careful, casting all caveats aside and replacing them with bullish assertions of massive seat gains.
In the circumstances it was understandable that Labour also felt the need to beat its chest about its electoral prospects. Talk of Fine Gael's electoral vigour prompted many commentators to ask the obvious question - to what extent will Fine Gael's rise narrow Labour's room to make gains and even threaten some of Labour's current Dáil seats?
There is a reason why Fine Gael and Labour have put so much time and effort into talking up their prospects of having the seat numbers to form a government on their own. It allows them to deflect questions about whether, assuming they can agree policy between themselves, Kenny and Rabbitte can then go on to agree it with the Green Party and others. They have wheeled out their in-house number crunchers as a line of defence against the charge from Michael McDowell and others that the alternative government would be reliant on the Green Party and "a rag bag" of left-leaning or other independents (including, perhaps, Michael Lowry).
None of us can predict the future; psephologists are not psychics. Fine Gael could win an extra 30 seats in next year's election and Labour could win nine extra seats. Either scenario is extremely unlikely but nothing can ever be completely ruled out in politics. The twists and turns which politics can take, even in the relatively quiet month of September, renders anything possible. However, some of the heady talk of seat gains for the two main opposition parties needs a reality check.
Among the facts worth bearing in mind are the following:
The bloc made up of Fianna Fáil, the Progressive Democrats and "gene-pool independents" has a clear majority of 11 seats in the current Dáil. They can lose a lot of seats and still remain in power.
Fine Gael and Labour combined need to win in or about 30 additional seats to be in government on their own after the next election. These 30 seats have to be taken from Fianna Fáil, the Progressive Democrats or the gene-pool independents. Fine Gael gains at Labour's expense or at the expense of the Greens or pro-Kenny independents will not bring the alternative government any closer.
Winning 30 additional seats would require the Rainbow bloc to gain at least one seat from the pro-Bertie bloc in almost three-quarters of the 43 constituencies - no mean feat considering that 12 of the constituencies are three-seaters.
In addition to winning an extra 30 seats, Fine Gael and Labour must hold all of their seats, which they will struggle to do. Fine Gael has three sitting TDs retiring putting seats in Donegal South West, Westmeath and, to a lesser extent, Galway West in jeopardy. Labour also has three sitting TDs retiring. It will almost definitely lose a seat in Kerry South, probably lose a seat in Dublin North and, on a bad day, could lose its seat in Carlow-Kilkenny.
Fine Gael's talk of gaining 20 to 30 additional seats needs to be analysed in a particular electoral context.
In the history of the State, seat gains on that scale have occurred only once. That was a quarter of a century ago in 1981 when Garret FitzGerald's Fine Gael gained 22 seats.
However, at that time the Dáil had 18 spare seats, having increased its size from 148 seats in 1977 to 166 seats in 1981.
By comparison in 2007 all of the seats which Fine Gael is targeting have a TD sitting in them and each of those sitting TDs has enjoyed at least five years of incumbency.
Labour's talk of winning 30 seats also needs to be seen in context. Labour has only won 30 seats or more on one occasion in its history. That was in 1992 when the party soared to 33 seats on the "Spring Tide". If there is a similar tidal wave of support coming for Pat Rabbitte's Labour Party in 2007 then there has been little sign of its early currents in any of the recent polls.
The favourable Fine Gael and Labour scenarios are contingent on a large number of Fianna Fáil losses. However, even if Fianna Fáil loses as many seats as Fine Gael and Labour hope, these losses will not all accrue to the benefit of the Rainbow. The same poll data on which both Flannery and Allen are relying to justify their talk of massive seat gains for their own parties also suggests that Sinn Féin is set to win at least four additional seats, and there are no votes for Enda Kenny as Taoiseach there.