Yesterday's poll suggests that Fianna Fáil is well placed for the April-May Election. However, the presentation of the poll seems to me to have failed to highlight the underlying trend in voting patterns during the last 12 months, writes Garret FitzGerald.
For this poll actually shows Fianna Fáil's core support to have fallen by two to three points from the average of the two MRBI polls held last year.
Insofar as there is an advantage to Fianna Fáil, it derives simply from the fact that core support for Fine Gael/Labour has fallen even more, viz by four to five points below last year's average level.
As a result of these developments, less than 60 per cent of the electorate are currently minded to vote for any of the three main parties.
Where has this support gone? Four to five of the points lost by the three main parties have gone to Sinn Féin and Independents, but the proportion of people who are undecided or who intend to abstain has also risen by three points to a very high 20 per cent.
This process has been progressive: since 1999, a swing of almost nine points from Fine Gael and Labour has more than doubled the proportion of voters disposed to vote for Sinn Féin and Independents.
What all this reflects is a classic situation of general disillusionment with political parties, and, in the absence of any commitment to form an alternative government, a shift against the Opposition among those still intending to vote for the principal parties.
It is, of course, true that the constituency polls carried out by MRBI for TG4 show a sharply contrasting situation, with Fianna Fáil at risk of losing seats in four of these constituencies.
Admittedly, the eight constituencies that were chosen for these polls have included a disproportionate number where Fianna Fáil seats are marginal.
Nevertheless, what these polls have drawn attention to is the fact that, because in the last election Fianna Fáil won many more seats than its share of the vote appeared to warrant, in no fewer than a dozen marginal constituencies Fianna Fáil starts into this campaign very much on the defensive.
Moreover, the margins by which almost half of these seats are held by Fianna Fáil are remarkably slender: a swing of as little as 2 per cent would be sufficient for them to lose five seats.
In addition, Fianna Fáil clearly faces a particular problem in holding on to its seat in Kerry North, and, while it will win a seat in the new Dublin Mid-West constituency, it is likely simultaneously to lose a seat in each of the two neighbouring constituencies, from which this new one has been carved out - Dublin West and Dublin South-West. That will leave Fianna Fáil one seat short in this west Dublin area.
On the other hand, the two recent additions to the PDs' candidate list in Laois/Offaly and Dublin South-East open the possibility of compensating gains for the FF/PD/Independent bloc - partially offset, perhaps, by the possible loss of Des O'Malley's seat in Limerick East to Fine Gael.
And, of course, Fine Gael is also vulnerable in a number of constituencies where it holds marginal seats.
For its part, Labour will be the loser as a result of the reduction of Dublin North-West to a three-seat constituency, and either it or Fine Gael is also likely to lose out because of the reduction in seats in Dublin North-East.
And in Tipperary South the traditional Labour seat seems now to be firmly in Independent Socialist hands. But, in general, at constituency level Labour faces less problems than the two main parties, and even has a prospect of gaining some seats, for, in addition to the three potential gains from Fianna Fáil already mentioned, it also has possibilities in Tipperary North, Meath and Dublin South-Central.
What all this suggests is that unless Fianna Fáil, which is vulnerable in so many seats, ends up with an increase in its vote a good deal more substantial than the 41 per cent suggested by this poll, its ability to hold its present representation in the Dáil will actually depend largely on increasing the already very substantial seat bonus that it secured last time through the wastage of most of the votes cast for Independent candidates.
The reality is that if the present Fianna Fáil/PD/Independent bloc loses three of the seats won in 1997, it forfeits its Dáil majority. However, that would not necessarily imply the emergence of an alternative government with such a majority.
For, in the absence of an actual disbandment of the IRA within the next few months - which the Taoiseach has bluntly identified as a precondition for the formation of a government that would be dependent upon Sinn Féin saet support, the present Fianna Fáil-led bloc could be left in a minority, but without the other bloc winning the additional seats that it would need in order to form an alternative government.
Ruairí Quinn's refusal to rule out at this stage another Fianna Fáil/Labour coalition is presumably because, in such a deadlocked Dáil, Labour participation in a Fianna Fáil-led government might offer the only stable government free of dependence upon Sinn Féin.
What I do not understand, however, is why the Labour leader has not made it clear that this is the rationale of his stance. By leaving the issue obscure, he has attracted to himself the accusation of simply being ambitious for office at any price.
AS seems very clear from the trend of the polls, in a general election what a lot of floating voters want is a clear alternative government - and, in the absence of such a prospect, many who may be unhappy with the government in office will nevertheless feel they have to vote for its re-election.
Accordingly, it seems to me that Labour would have benefited significantly from a pre-election agreement with Fine Gael that incorporated its policy priorities, even if in present circumstances Labour had felt it necessary to qualify that commitment by making it conditional on the post-election situation being such that a Labour/Fine Gael government would not be dependent on Sinn Féin support.
Moreover, looking at the situation objectively, it seems to me that, subject to a caveat on this issue - which would be widely understood and indeed seen as a responsible condition to propose - Labour would in fact have been in a stronger position before the election to secure from Fine Gael acceptance of its policy requirements than it is likely to be afterwards.
For, while at present Fine Gael badly needs a deal with Labour - as Jim Mitchell's recent remarks made clear - in a post-election situation in which Sinn Féin did not hold the balance of power, Labour would need Fine Gael just as much as Fine Gael would need Labour.
In those circumstances, a Labour/Fianna Fáil coalition would simply not be credible and would deeply divide the Labour Party. Fine Gael's bargaining position would, as a result, have become much stronger than it is today.
If, from a Labour point of view, there is some flaw in this analysis - and it is from a Labour standpoint that I have tried to view the matter here - no doubt someone will tell me where I have gone wrong.