Sinn Féin rise and low Labour support reflected in polls

Two surveys put Eamon Gilmore’s party at 6-8% with Gerry Adams’ party at 20-23%

The low support for the Labour Party and the strong prospects for Sinn Féin shown in today's Irish Times Ipsos/MRBI poll is also reflected into two other polls which have been published today.

With just days to go until the local and European elections, a Red C poll for The Irish Sun today puts Labour at 8 per cent, 11 percentage points below its 2011 General Election showing of 19 per cent.

The Irish Sun poll also reflects the increase in support for Sinn Féin which is up 10 percentage points on the 2011 General Election result to 20 per cent. The party’s support is up two percentage points since the last Red C poll on May 4th.

Sinn Féin looks like getting three seats , one in each European constituency, according to today’s Ipsos/MRBI Irish Times poll

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The Sun poll shows that Sinn Féin is now on par in the poll with Fianna Fáil, which is three percentage points above its disastrous 2011 general election showing at 20 percent.

The Red C poll looked at the state of the parties, asking over 1,000 voters last week, if a General Election was held tomorrow which party would get a first preference.

Fine Gael remains the most popular party with a quarter of voters surveyed supporting it, according to the Red C survey. The result is 11 percentage points below its General Election result.

Independents continue to grow very strongly at 24 per cent, up from 17 per cent in the general election.

The most popular groupings in the Dublin European constituency are Fine Gael and Independents with Sinn Féin in third place, according to the Red C poll.

Despite Labour's poor showing generally, when voters are broken down by European area constituency, it polls at 13 per cent in Dublin, a glimmer of hope for its candidate Emer Costello and stronger than the Fianna Fáil Dublin vote at 12 per cent.

Today's Irish Times poll shows that in Dublin Sinn Féin's Lynn Boylan and Fine Gael's Brian Hayes are the frontrunners for the European seats in the Capital with the third and final seat being a three-way battle between Mary Fitzpatrick of Fianna Fail, Eamon Ryan of the Green Party and Emer Costello of the Labour Party.

A Millward Brown poll for the Irish Independent also confirms the low rating for Eamon Gilmore’s Labour party, at 6 per cent, unchanged since the paper’s last poll three weeks ago.

This poll finds that Sinn Féin has the highest party support in the country at 23 per cent, two percentage points higher than its last poll.

It shows a decline in support for Fianna Fail in recent weeks at 21 percent (down 2 points) while Fine Gael’s support has also fallen to 20 per cent (down 5 points since the last poll). Supports for the Independents continue to grow up by by 4 per cent age points to 27per cent.

The poll also finds that just 20 per cent of voters surveyed are happy with the Government. Of party leaders Gerry Adams has the least number of dissatisfied voters at 57 per cent (up 5 points), Tánaiste and Labour leader Eamon Gilmore has the highest dissatisfaction raiting at 72 per cent (up 2),followed by Taoiseach and Fine Gale leader Enda Kenny (at 67 percent up 4) and Fianna Fail's Micheal Martin at 60 per cent (up 8)

Genevieve Carbery

Genevieve Carbery

Genevieve Carbery is Deputy Head of Audience at The Irish Times