Irish Politics Thread

Het-field wrote: It seems the first round of negotiations will be held between SF, and the smaller parties. Ultimately, the numbers amongst the established parties aren’t there, so it will need independents. A remarkable, yet generally unremarked upon is the change in the nature of the political independents. The departures, retirements and losses make it very unlikely that a coalition with independents, or even a confidence and supply could happen. If the numbers were the same, and the likes of Healy, Broughan, McGrath, Ming, Daly, Wallace, Zappone, Halligan were still there, coupled with Collins and Pringle, the numbers would be up to 75. At which point, if people were willing to work with Aontú (given their Shinner roots) you’d have been very close to the magic number. The change in the meanings of independents had majorly influenced how government negotiations can go.

Zappone is a right wing politician she dumped I4Change group to cosy up with Leo. If she had of been elected, she would not have touched the left and definitely not the 'Shinners' or PBP.                                               

There is the possibility of a Independent rural group coming together Fitzmaurice, Harkin, Naughten and Peader Toibín has mentioned he is in talks with some Independents to form a speakers group in the Dail; while the Healy Rae's have worked with Martin Ferris ex SF before.
Mick Lowry and Mattie McGrath and the Healy Rae's have their own grouping from the last Dail which may grow.
Although a cabinet of Paul Murphy, Alan Kelly(Lab), Michael Lowry and the Healy Rae's with the Shinners would be something to behold.                                                           

Varadker has announced he is headed for opposition, but probably only shadow boxing at this stage.

In the words of John Lennon 'Strange days indeed...'



   

Het-field wrote: Varadkar does seem resigned to opposition, however,I feel another election would worry FF & FG to the extent that they would work on either a straight coalition arrangement or a confidence and supply, and hope the lifetime of the next government is fruitful.  Howlin has also announced he is stepping down as Labour leader. This presents a great chance for a new and young leader.

Edited by Stickittotheman - 12 Feb 2020 at 4:27pm

Het-field wrote: Varadkar does seem resigned to opposition, however,I feel another election would worry FF & FG to the extent that they would work on either a straight coalition arrangement or a confidence and supply, and hope the lifetime of the next government is fruitful.  Howlin has also announced he is stepping down as Labour leader. This presents a great chance for a new and young leader.

Het-field wrote: Stickittotheman wrote: I can't see FF and FG going for confidence and supply or coalition. That would be the end of them and probably longer term lead to a merger which I don't think either really wants. The key question now is whether FF are prepared to go in with SF and one or two others. If not then its another election and a real possibility of a SF led administration. If SF had even close to the same result with more candidates then 50 is a realistic target. From there its Mary Lou as Taoiseach. It could be a SF/Greens/PBP/SD/Labour rainbow coalition. The difficulty for Sinn Fein is that those seats could come at the expense of the other parties they want to coalesce with. It will require picking off FG/FF seats to actually do that, and in a number of cases last weekend it was other left wing parties that benefited from Shinner transfers. Simply taking the precarious seats of PBP or Labour won’t actually help the numbers, and it would be more or less static.

Het-field wrote: Devrozex wrote: Het-field wrote: Stickittotheman wrote: I can't see FF and FG going for confidence and supply or coalition. That would be the end of them and probably longer term lead to a merger which I don't think either really wants. The key question now is whether FF are prepared to go in with SF and one or two others. If not then its another election and a real possibility of a SF led administration. If SF had even close to the same result with more candidates then 50 is a realistic target. From there its Mary Lou as Taoiseach. It could be a SF/Greens/PBP/SD/Labour rainbow coalition. The difficulty for Sinn Fein is that those seats could come at the expense of the other parties they want to coalesce with. It will require picking off FG/FF seats to actually do that, and in a number of cases last weekend it was other left wing parties that benefited from Shinner transfers. Simply taking the precarious seats of PBP or Labour won’t actually help the numbers, and it would be more or less static.   Yeah exactly. Even if all those smaller parties retained their seats such a coalition would only total 78 seats. And as pointed out it's extremely unlikely those left wing smaller parties wouldn't lose some seats to the extra SF ones - seeing as a lot of them got seats off the back of SF surpluses/transfers. Also, to what extent is the FF/FG support immovable, or at very least only adjustable on a limited basis. Yes, there was a time FF would get more seats than those combined today, and they have dropped as low as 20, but that was in the extraordinary aftermath of the collapse. Within 5 years of 2011 FF returned to the top table and now are the largest party, seat wise, albeit it at an unusually low level. If those votes are relatively locked down, SF will only be able to strengthen their position at the expense of the Greens or Solidarity, at which point we’re probably just going towards three centrist parties I was looking at the individual results earlier, and while some SF candidates did produce unprecedented surpluses, some candidates got it on respectable votes, but ones that wouldn’t produce significant surpluses, and some constituencies didn’t even return a SF TD. I think one constituency didn’t even have a SF candidate. This could be instructive for the purposes of potential growth and politics is too shifting just to the extent that they can just expect things to get better and better. Power will only be ensured by getting multiple TDs in numerous constituencies, at least a single TD in every constituency, and shifting FF/FG TDs.

Het-field wrote: Varadkar does seem resigned to opposition, however,I feel another election would worry FF & FG to the extent that they would work on either a straight coalition arrangement or a confidence and supply, and hope the lifetime of the next government is fruitful.  Howlin has also announced he is stepping down as Labour leader. This presents a great chance for a new and young leader.

Aodhan O'Riordan would be a great choice, big Irish football fan, national and grassroots.

A motion has been put forward in Clare County Council to have Joe Brolly put back on RTE.

Shedite wrote: I reckon a second election mightn't be the SF landslide some suggest. There'll be a lot who didn't vote FF/FG last time out who might now to avoid a SF government. And as Hetfield said, a lot more of those that voted PBP, Labour, Green etc might go SF, so not a huge advantage there in getting to 80

This recent election was the lowest turnout out since 1923 aswell so another election will quiet possibly have a higher turnout. Awful weather Saturday evening they reckon might have stopped some older FF people coming out but i think the Saturday election backfired on Leo as the Irish electorate don’t really like change and are happy enough with a Thursday or Friday election.

Edited by Trigboy 10 - 12 Feb 2020 at 10:08pm

FF Jack Chambers is an angry young man.

O’Riordan (not an angry man) for Lab leader....Alan Kelly (can be quite angry) is a spoofer.

FF and FG will probably still retain their core vote, although Michael Martin (opposite of angry) has come out of this election looking worse than Leo (not angry), which was quite a difficult thing to do.

FF picked up the last seat in about 15 or 16 constituencies so there is a danger they could be squeezed further if the left vote increases.
FG picked up the last seat in about 7, Greens about 5, SF only one I think.

FF should ditch MM, FG know Leo probably won’t hang around too long anyway.