THE Fianna Fail/Progressive Democrats lead over the Rainbow parties has narrowed to 4 percentage points to suggest a hung Dail as the most likely outcome of the general election.
These are the main findings of an IMS opinion poll in yesterday's Sunday Independent. With 15 per cent of voters undecided, the state of the parties in the poll is: Fianna Fail 41 per cent, down 1 point since the last IMS poll on May 14th; Fine Gael 26 per cent, unchanged; Labour 14 per cent, up 2 points; PDs 5 per cent, down 1 point; Green Party 4 per cent, unchanged; Democratic Left 2 per cent, unchanged; Workers' Party 1 per cent, unchanged; Sinn Fein 2 per cent, down 1 point; Independents 5 per cent, unchanged.
The combined first preference vote of the three Coalition parties is 42 per cent, up 2 points, compared to 46 per cent, down 2 points, for the Fianna Fail/PD alliance. The poll, conducted last Thursday, shows that satisfaction with the Government has risen by 2 points to 54 per cent. The Fianna Fail leader, Mr Ahern, is the preferred choice of 46 per cent as Taoiseach, seven points ahead of Mr John Bruton on 39 per cent.