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E-mailI am writing to you in response to the amazing conclusions drawn by Shane Coleman and Conor McMorrow (News, 21 March).
Having read their article re the three by-elections, I am astonished at their conclusions and apparent contradictions. In Donegal South West, where Fianna Fáil got over 50% of the first preferences in the last general election, Fine Gael (23%) is tipped to take the seat, with even some hope given to Labour, who got 2.79% in the last election. If Fianna Fáil don't win the by-election in the home constituency of the Tánaiste, the result could only be interpreted as a public vote of no confidence in her and the government, and if the government had any sense of shame (which I seriously doubt), it would then have to call a general election.
If we then look at Dublin South, Labour with 10.4% of the vote in the last general election is tipped to take the seat. There is absolutely no basis for this assumption. Alex White got 1% more than the third Fine Gael candidate in the last general election; he even got less votes than the PDs. If we look at the by-election in Dublin South, Labour got slightly more than one-third of the Fine Gael vote and was only slightly ahead of Fianna Fáil. If we ignore the George Lee factor and look at the local election results for the four electoral areas that more or less correspond to Dublin South, Fine Gael got 35.1%, Labour 21.3%, Fianna Fáil 20.4%. With the recent rise in Fianna Fáil support it is quite conceivable that the party would come in ahead of Labour in second place and Fine Gael with the help of transfers from Labour would hold on to the seat won so comfortably last June. Even if Labour was to come in ahead of the Fianna Fáil candidate, the likelihood of Labour taking 60% to 70% of Fianna Fáil transfers is very remote. It is far more likely that the probable Fine Gael candidate, Jim O'Leary, who got over 34% in the local elections in the Dundrum ward, would get a large transfer from Fianna Fáil and other candidates. This time last year Coleman and McMorrow were predicting a Labour win, and we all know how wrong they were last June. They should have learned that the numbers simply don't add up for Labour to win a by-election in Dublin South, no more than they do in Donegal South West.
Labour performed better in Waterford than in the other two constituencies in the last general election, yet by some strange reasoning it was given less of a chance there than in Dublin or Donegal. Dublin South is not a hot-bed of socialism – not even the salmon-pink socialism of the modern-day Labour party. Statisticians and economists have received a lot of bad press recently, but would the Sunday Tribune please get someone who can add up a few figures and come up with some reasonable conclusions. Those drawn in last Sunday's article would do credit to the composer of the annual accounts of our main banks for the last few years.
Séamus Ó Dea,
Ráth Fearnáin,
Baile Átha Cliath
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Seamus while I agree with your assumption that these figures maybe over exaggerated it must also be noted that the Tánaiste's home constituency was one of the few that voted "No" in the Lisbon 2 referendum-a massive vote of no confidence. Donegal is experiencing massive unemployment like the rest of the country and is unlikely to recover faster than anywhere else in the country and the Tánaiste has not done herself any favours in this respect.
It must also be noted that Fíanna Fáil as you rightly state above have no shame so two years to wait.
In conclusion it should be noted however that barring some miracle there shall be a seismic shift in Irish politics after the next General Election and the figures stated while they may be a little over the top might not be too far away. I can only hope this is the case!