KashmireHawker
Member
Our Irish Cousins go to the polls on Saturday, with it set to be an extraordinary and political plate shifting result in sight.
Sinn Fein, who kissed and made up with the DUP last month and helped reform the Northern Ireland Executive, were IN THE LEAD, of the latest IPSOS Mori poll for Monday’s Irish Times and also led a party commissioned poll, for Survation yesterday too.
This is despite them only having 42 candidates across the country, when a majority in the Dail Eireann (Ireland's lower house) is 80 seats. There are 160 seats across 41 constituencies, with the Speaker automatically re-elected, meaning 159 are running to become Teachta Dala's (TD's)
It seems from indications, that Fianna Fail, who were swept out in a seismic defeat in 2011 and ended up in a distant 3rd place, are set to be the largest party, with ruling Fine Gael led by PM Leo Varadkar in danger themselves from going from largest party, to third biggest themselves.
Both FG and FF are centre right, with SF being centre left, whilst smaller parties including the Greens, Labour, Social Democrats and Solidarity-People Before Profit are all on the left, with a usually substantial bloc of Independents also being crucial to government formation deals too.
Any sort of result, that enables Sinn Fein to have seats around the cabinet table at Government Buildings and front bench places, in the Dail based at Leinster House, could be the start of real pressure for an Irish Unity referendum and thus this Saturday, will no doubt be watched extremely closely in all 4 UK capitals and Brussels.
Note, the Tipperary Constituency was thought to have postponed it's poll, due to an Independent candidate's death and probably won't have been held til Feb 29th, but lengthy legal related discussions have resulted in the green light being given on 5th February and means all 159 TDs will be elected.
Sinn Fein, who kissed and made up with the DUP last month and helped reform the Northern Ireland Executive, were IN THE LEAD, of the latest IPSOS Mori poll for Monday’s Irish Times and also led a party commissioned poll, for Survation yesterday too.
This is despite them only having 42 candidates across the country, when a majority in the Dail Eireann (Ireland's lower house) is 80 seats. There are 160 seats across 41 constituencies, with the Speaker automatically re-elected, meaning 159 are running to become Teachta Dala's (TD's)
It seems from indications, that Fianna Fail, who were swept out in a seismic defeat in 2011 and ended up in a distant 3rd place, are set to be the largest party, with ruling Fine Gael led by PM Leo Varadkar in danger themselves from going from largest party, to third biggest themselves.
Both FG and FF are centre right, with SF being centre left, whilst smaller parties including the Greens, Labour, Social Democrats and Solidarity-People Before Profit are all on the left, with a usually substantial bloc of Independents also being crucial to government formation deals too.
Any sort of result, that enables Sinn Fein to have seats around the cabinet table at Government Buildings and front bench places, in the Dail based at Leinster House, could be the start of real pressure for an Irish Unity referendum and thus this Saturday, will no doubt be watched extremely closely in all 4 UK capitals and Brussels.
Note, the Tipperary Constituency was thought to have postponed it's poll, due to an Independent candidate's death and probably won't have been held til Feb 29th, but lengthy legal related discussions have resulted in the green light being given on 5th February and means all 159 TDs will be elected.