Political World
Less can mean more when it comes to election strategy
World of Politics with Harry McGee – harrymcgee@gmail.com
For a political generation Fine Gael had but a single Dáil deputy in Galway West, Pádraic McCormack. On several occasions his running mate was strong but it was, as the Americans say, close but no cigar.
The party played second fiddle to Fianna Fáil in those years which never had less than two TDs in Galway West and on one heady occasion could command three out of five.
Of course, the bulk of the vote that followed Bobby Molloy into the Progressive Democrats could directly trace its roots to Fianna Fáil.
All of that changed in 2011. For three years the fate of Fianna Fáil had read like the plot of a disaster movie and the election in February that year stayed true to the narrative arc.
So who was going to benefit? Fine Gael obviously.
But its election strategy was a tad strange. For one, McCormack failed to get through convention which was unusual for a sitting TD. He accepted the decision.
Eventually the party decided on a rather unusual course of action, to run four candidates.
The party’s most senior representative in the constituency at that stage was Senator Fidelma Healy-Eames but she found herself in the unhappy position of being one of three Fine Gael candidates in the eastern quadrant of the constituency, along with Brian Walsh and Hildegarde Naughton. Geographically, Sean Kyne was in a much stronger position, based in the north west of the area. But even on a rising tide that strategy seemed a little strange.
The party did not have enough first preferences collectively to come near winning a third seat but would arguably have made the task of winning two much easier by running three rather than four. Healy-Eames in particular had cause to feel aggrieved – in the end Walsh and Kyne prevailed.
Still the party achieved its aim of winning two seats. If it had ran ten candidates and still won two it would still have been a success.
Since 1997 the accepted wisdom in our form of elections, proportional representation by single transferable vote, is that the party maximises its chances by minimising the number of candidates.
This technique was first used by Fianna Fáil in the 1997 elections that saw Bertie Ahern being elected as Taoiseach for the first time. The Fianna Fáil vote in 1997 was more or less the same as its vote in 1992, when Albert Reynolds fell far short of a majority and went into coalition with Labour.
However, the outcome on almost the same percentage of support five years later was incredible – bringing Fianna Fáil close to an overall majority. It achieved this by ending the practice of running multiple candidates and running only probables and possibles.
There were a few no-hopers of course but they remained if the party needed a presence in a corner of a large constituency or if a strong local organisation had asserted its will over party headquarters.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
World of Politics with Harry McGee
Academically, politics is described as a science. But in the real world, it’s more of an art – and one of the big decisions a Government has to make is to decide when to call an election.
Will they see out the full term, or will they go early – either to mitigate the damage they will ship, or to secure a victory before things go awry, or the economy takes a dip, or some kind of controversy erupts?
Timing is everything.
And there’s a bit of art to that – not to mention a lot of luck. If you call it early and win big, you’re a genius. If you call it early and lose, you are the political version of the village fool.
Charlie Haughey was a poor judge of the public mood. Twice he called snap elections and on both occasions they backfired. Haughey succeeded Jack Lynch as Taoiseach in late 1979 and did not – technically – have his own mandate. He tried to remedy that by calling an election in 1981. But it recoiled. Ray MacSharry warned him not to hold it during the H Block hunger strikes when republican prisoners were dying each day. He did not listen to the advice and found himself out of office.
After his return to power in 1987, Haughey tired of presiding over a minority government that kept on losing votes in the Oireachtas (the opposition won nine private members motions).
So he called a snap general election and it backfired. Fianna Fáil lost seats and had to broker a coalition deal with the Progressive Democrats and his long-standing political adversary Dessie O’Malley.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
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World of Politics with Harry McGee
I was cycling down Mount Street in Dublin on Tuesday. It’s a wide esplanade that links the Grand Canal with Merrion Square. The street is a mixture of fine Georgian buildings and modern office blocks.
About half-way down is the office of the International Protection Office, which deals with asylum seekers who have arrived in the country.
Needless to say, the office has been overwhelmed in the past year. Besides an estimated 80,000 refugees who have arrived from Ukraine, there have been about 20,000 people from other parts of the world who have arrived into Dublin (mostly) claiming asylum.
The numbers peaked around Christmas, but they have been falling a little. In January, more than 1,300 people arrived seeking asylum but the numbers fell back to 831 and 858, in February and March respectively.
They are still huge numbers in a historical context.
So back to my cycle on Tuesday. I knew that some asylum seekers were camping outside the International Protection Office, but I was taken aback by how many. There were six tents lined up on the pavement directly outside. Then on the ramp that led down to the basement carpark on the side of the building, there were about another 20 tents.
It looked like what it was, a refugee camp in the middle of Dublin’s business district. If you pan out from Mount Street, you will find tents here and there in nearby streets and alleys. There were a good few tents in an alleyway off Sandwith Street about 500 metres away.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
World of Politics with Harry McGee
God that was a dramatic and historic weekend in England, wasn’t it? So much excitement, so much change, so much hype, so much out with the old and in with the new, and what looks like the coronation of a new leader. Yes, the local elections in Britain were something else weren’t they!
Apologies for not going on about King Charles III but the contract I signed when I became a lifelong republican forbids me to discuss the topic!
I know the British local elections sound a bit boring by comparison, but the results were stunning.
The Conservatives lost nearly 1,000 seats, the British Labour Party gained almost 500 and both the Lib Dems (with 350 gains) and the Greens (gaining over 200) also had amazing days at the polls.
It was Labour’s best day since 2002 but its victory was only partial. The Greens and the Lib Dems actually made gains at the expense of Labour in more affluent areas, and in parts of Britain where there were high numbers of graduates.
It was in the Red Wall constituencies in the North of England where the Labour recovery was strongest. These are working class constituencies with pockets of deprivation where people voted for the Labour Party forever. But all of those constituencies voted for Brexit and then voted for the Tories in the next general election. Labour is now winning back some of those votes.
Local elections are classified as second-tier elections which essentially means – from a national perspective – they are not life-or-death affairs, and not everything turns on them. Of course, it’s really important to have good local representation. But they are not an amazing weather vane for who rules the country.
For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.
Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App
Download the Connacht Tribune Digital Edition App to access to Galway’s best-selling newspaper.
Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
Or purchase the Digital Edition for PC, Mac or Laptop from Pagesuite HERE.
Get the Connacht Tribune Live app
The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.
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