As the general election campaign gathers pace in its second week, there is scarcely a hiding place from politicians to be found. Nine parties, plus independents, crowd the streets and the doorsteps and the airwaves and social media channels. Billions of euro are being freely promised to solve the Republic’s problems.
But what do ordinary voters make of it all? What are their priorities? And how is the campaign measuring up, in their eyes?
The Irish Times has brought together a panel of readers, from a cross-section of age groups and backgrounds from around the State to discuss the general election campaign. They were selected after responding to a call-out to readers on irishtimes.com and have been interviewed twice by Irish Times editors and reporters in order to get a picture of their background and attitudes to politics. All say they are certain to vote on November 29th.
[ Meet the Irish Times election reader panel for General Election 2024Opens in new window ]
They have a variety of political viewpoints and perspectives on the issues facing the country and its politicians. While they are not selected to be absolutely representative of the population as a whole, they come from a diversity of backgrounds and perspectives. All say they are following the election campaign closely in order to make up their minds how to vote. They are politically engaged, but not politically partisan.
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Last week, the panel assembled for a discussion via Microsoft Teams. While the discussion was moderated by The Irish Times, it was carefully structured to allow participants to express their views, and say what was on their minds, rather than answer specific questions about the campaign.
Some of the themes that emerged were clear. So far, some of the panel found the campaign lacklustre, with the barrage of promises from politicians leaving them unimpressed. One participant said it felt like they were being “bribed with our own money”; there was some agreement at this proposition. They were unconvinced by the hostile exchanges between Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael over the first week of the campaign.
There is a deep concern about the insufficiency of infrastructure in several respects – housing was only one of several mentioned – and a sense that the current strong public finances provided an opportunity to address these shortcomings. But there was little sense that they were hearing viable or credible plans from politicians to achieve this. The longer the discussion went on, the more areas in which people felt frustrations with services, infrastructure and public provision were identified.
The participants do not think that the State is a disaster-zone – but they are very clear that there are pressing needs in many areas. “We’re doing okay,” said one participant, “but we’re also not.”
The following is a summary of the discussion:
‘No one has called to my door’
Jo Cahalan (73), from Co Laois, says: “For me, it’s a bit boring. It is lacklustre. I haven’t seen any candidates, so I don’t know where they are. I get leaflets in the door but I don’t actually see anyone. Looking at the TV programmes, Katie Hannon and those, I just switched off. It was the same old, same old: politicians shouting over each other. You get a better insight reading the papers. So I think it has been a bit lacklustre but I know it has a long way to go.”
Aisling O’Reilly, a 29-year-old tech worker, says: “I agree, I haven’t seen anyone, I haven’t had a chance to speak to any politicians, no one has called to my door. It has all been leaflets in the door. I don’t know if I agree that it has been boring – the Michael O’Leary comments were interesting. The Monk joining the race in my constituency has also been something that has got people talking.”
Only one reader on the panel – Seán Ryan, from Limerick – has been canvassed by a politician so far in this election campaign.
Public-service worker Catherine Bergin (47) saysof the campaign: “I feel like we are just being bribed with our own money at the moment. It seems extraordinary how all of these torrents of cash are being promised. You can’t help but be kind of cynical, especially when the good times are not going to last forever. They are very contingent on a handful of big US corporates, and who knows what is going to happen next year?
“It is kind of a bit fantastical from that point of view. And it is all going to depend on what coalitions are going to be formed at the end of the day. So you’re taking it, really, with a pinch of salt, a lot of the spending promises that are being made.”
Primary schoolteacher Rebecca Saunders (39) agrees with the idea that voters are being “bribed with our own money”.
A lack of long-term planning and vision
Many on the panel express frustration at what they believe is a lack of long-term planning, or a longer-term vision, for Ireland’s future needs.
O’Reilly says: “there isn’t a single party that has presented a vision for what Ireland could be in 10 years’ time. It is all very short-term when, from everyone I have spoken to, (people) have just been crying out for proper infrastructure and an investment that is not outsourcing to private developers. That has been particularly disappointing.”
She adds: “It just feels like a wasted opportunity. Two years down the line we could be in a very different economic situation and we will have missed this chance to really invest in infrastructure and make things better. If we had built the Metro North during the Celtic Tiger, I think Dublin would be a completely different city. It’s so frustrating because we are just watching the exact same thing happen but without any power to make a change, in that I don’t think the other parties have really shown a strong enough plan to get behind.”
Jobseeker Tommy Cole, who is 26 and living in Tralee, Co Kerry says he believes politicians are “just saying the same things they were saying in the last election. They want a future for Ireland but the future they want to bring is the same thing. It is the same, same, same thing. I haven’t been impressed by any of them.” He felt that “corporations were buying out the whole country”.
Primary schoolteacher Rebecca Saunders says she believes investment in infrastructure is a “huge” issue. “This talk of establishing a department of infrastructure. I think almost everyone just rolls their eyes when they hear something like that. We don’t need more bureaucracy, we don’t need more fingers in the pie of our disastrous infrastructure record. It does not sound like a solution.”
Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael skirmishes
The readers are not fully convinced that the ongoing rows between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are genuine, although some feel there is a real competitiveness beneath the surface.
Saunders says that “one of the things that is kind of getting to me is this falsified drama between Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil when they know they are almost certainly going to be in coalition again; it is just very tiresome. All of this stuff about Micheál Martin being grumpy and them getting aggro with each other. I know they are just wrestling for dominance but it’s boring. The specifics of their manifestos, they are so similar as to be … they are the same, the same party.”
Seán Ryan (54) from Limerick says he believes there is “a genuine competitiveness between both parties. Two things have dampened the election. One is that we are after coming from a very consequential US election which is probably more exciting and more impactful on the next five years than our own election.
“Secondly, it is coming after our local and European elections which have, more or less, ordained how this is going to work out. The whole ‘is it going to be Sinn Féin versus the current Government’ thing seems to be gone now as a discussion point. It has taken some of the excitement out of it. It is kind of a spoiler.”
Gretta Fitzgerald, a 36-year-old advocacy adviser, says: “I think it is all a bit tit-for-tat … it is very same-same in terms of accountability for some of the gross failings. The recent Budget and the election just reek of Celtic Tiger – that kind of delusion that was there. It reeks of ‘we are doing great, we are awash with money’, but there’s very little long-term strategy and vision and minimal talk around genuine accountability when it comes to things like the national children’s hospital, failed housing targets, homelessness, the HSE, et cetera. It’s all very delusional.”
On the smaller parties
Saunders says that she believes the Green Party “will likely be punished for the Government failures, as the minority party always is. In that regard you are almost hoping for the Social Democrats to have five or six seats or Labour to have a couple of seats to get some kind of counterbalance to the carry-on of the other pair. I wonder if the Social Democrats or Labour might manage to be in coalition.”
Ryan agrees and says he thinks the Green Party will struggle. “I think the Greens have ruined themselves. It’s like their philosophy is ‘two wheels good, four wheels bad’. There are cycle paths everywhere with no one using them while people are stuck in traffic. I think ideology has overtaken what people actually want. I do think [climate] is vitally important and is the most important question we have. But I think they have gone too far.”
Ken Harper (67) says, a former railway executive from the UK who lives in Donegal, says: “The Greens here in rural Ireland and not very well liked. They are associated with restrictions on extracting turf and nitrates derogations and all of this sort of thing. They are the only party that I hear antagonism against amongst people locally.
“I fully accept the need for a green agenda, and in some ways other parties have tapped into this. The Greens did really well out of the Coalition Government in their achievements; they can certainly point to a lot of achievements but whether that is going to save their seats, I don’t know. I think they will be lucky if they retain half a dozen.”
On the party leaders
Kim Walshe, a 26-year-old communications worker who lives in Drimnagh, Dublin, says of the party leaders: “I don’t like most of them but I think Simon Harris is stronger than Micheál Martin. I like Mary Lou McDonald a lot of the time.”
Ciarán O’Sullivan, a 40-year-old Irish IT professional who lives in Dublin, says of Fine Gael leader, Taoiseach Simon Harris: “If you were talking to him last week, he is going to reopen the Greystones walk after four weeks. This week he is going to do no college fees for everybody. He is [scrolling] through TikTok, going ‘What’s cool this week?’ and spitting that out.”
O’Sullivan says the leader “does set the agenda. The leader is the person we are putting in front of people when it comes to negotiating, when it comes to the behind-the-scenes deals on what goes where in Europe, what is happening in America. We have to believe in them.”
Cole says: “Yes, the leaders are important but I would really say it is about priorities. What are they bringing to the table?”
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