Two weeks to go to the byelections in Galway and Dublin and the campaigns are in full flight.
Posters adorn the two constituencies while the crowded fields of candidates – there are 17 in Galway and 14 in Dublin – jostle for space on the lamp-posts and for media and online attention.
As predicted, the Government parties are in the business of managing expectations – “Governments don’t win byelections”, etc – though Seán Kyne’s strong showing in The Irish Times/TG4 poll published on Thursday evening will give Fine Gael a new hope. Now, it’s a long way from Kyne’s 17 per cent to the 50 per cent he needs to get elected. But he’s in the game.
The prospect of a Fianna Fáil flop – just as the party prepares to celebrate its 100th birthday – is strong and could mean that they can get the grumbling going about the leadership early at the ardfheis next weekend. Would be sort of fitting, I suppose.
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Do you know how many byelections Bertie Ahern won as leader, one expectation-managing Fianna Fáiler asked me this week. How many? “Zero out of eight.” True, but he won two as party leader in opposition in 1996 that – had he lost them – might have resulted in a heave against him.
The lesson from history is that byelections don’t matter. Unless they do.
It feels like this one matters for Mary Lou McDonald. Recent chatter within the party about the alleged precarity of her leadership is a new departure. Maybe it shows that Sinn Féin is slowly becoming more like the other big parties. But it has not been welcomed by the party hierarchy and it has upped the stakes for the leader. Winning one of these contests – and on the basis of Thursday’s poll that will have to be in her Dublin Central home patch, because they are goosed in Galway – will quieten the subterranean sedition, at least for now. Not winning one of them would do the opposite.
But for all the focus on the implications for the party leaders, even before the results, there are two other things to watch out for.
The first is whether the efforts to build on the presidential victory of Catherine Connolly by encouraging transfers between the left-wing parties gains any momentum. The two fractured fields and the lack of any clear favourites – as well as the arithmetic of a one-seat contest – mean that transfers attain an even greater importance: whoever wins, will win on transfers. And while obviously things work differently in a general election, winning the two seats for the left because of co-operation would be significant. Electoral success is the strongest message you can send in politics. As Keir Starmer is finding out, that also applies to electoral failure.
The second is whether those to the right of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil can generate any political momentum from the recent fuel protests. In Galway, where the poll suggests the fuel protests will be an important factor in voter choice, this is about Independent Ireland, which has a strong candidate in former Independent (and former Fianna Fáiler) Noel Thomas. Independent Ireland has clearly pitched for the unfocused but substantial political energy on the right. The Galway byelection will tell us if that’s working. A win for Thomas would further spook already jumpy rural Fianna Fáil backbenchers.
If the byelections show that either or both of these two political trends are gaining strength, that would be a significant development in Irish politics. The present Government is unloved and probably was even when it was returned to office at the end of 2024. But swing voters, most of them on the centre-left or centre-right, did not see a viable alternative. A greater degree of left unity (in defiance of its most honoured traditions) and/or a sizeable alternative to the right of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil would be a new and unpredictable dynamic in a general election. It would add to the momentum for change.
But the biggest possibility for change in Irish politics does not stem from improving fraternal relations on the left, or providing a vehicle for the anger on the right. It comes from the war in the Middle East. At the time of writing, a peace deal is said to be in prospect. That could change with the next social media post from the White House. Never has American leadership looked so unstable; never have its allies been so horrified; never have its enemies – especially those whose goal is to threaten western interests – been so emboldened. Anything could happen.
Even if the war ends tomorrow, the energy squeeze will continue. If the war does not end soon – and the oil, gas, helium, sulphur, and all the other petrochemical products on which our economies depend do not start to flow through the Strait of Hormuz – then we are in for a profound economic shock. (Would it be better if our economies were not so oil-dependent? Of course it would. But they are.)
Last week, a series of oil traders and analysts warned the Financial Times that global stocks of crude oil, gasoline, diesel and jet fuel would hit critically low levels by the end of this month – at which point prices will shoot up and stay high. One predicted oil prices of $150-$200 a barrel; another warned that industries would have to shut down due to lack of fuel.
If that happens, economies everywhere will be plunged into deep recession. That will mean lower revenues for businesses, lower tax receipts for governments and higher social costs. It is a recipe for political upheaval. How do we know this? Because it always is. So do the byelections matter? Sure they do. Just not half as much as other things.
