{"id":185294,"date":"2024-11-30T00:13:08","date_gmt":"2024-11-30T00:13:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/11\/30\/sinn-fein-and-fine-gael-neck-and-neck-to-be-largest-party-in-ireland-election-exit-poll-suggests\/"},"modified":"2024-11-30T00:13:09","modified_gmt":"2024-11-30T00:13:09","slug":"sinn-fein-and-fine-gael-neck-and-neck-to-be-largest-party-in-ireland-election-exit-poll-suggests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/11\/30\/sinn-fein-and-fine-gael-neck-and-neck-to-be-largest-party-in-ireland-election-exit-poll-suggests\/","title":{"rendered":"Sinn Fein and Fine Gael neck and neck to be largest party in Ireland election, exit poll suggests"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Sinn<\/div>


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Sinn Fein and Fine Gael are neck and neck to be the most popular party following Ireland’s election, an exit poll suggests.<\/p>\n

Sinn Fein have picked up 21.1% of the vote, with Fine Gael on 21% and Fianna Fail on 19.5%, the poll by RTE, The Irish Times, TG4, Trinity College Dublin and Ipsos B&A suggests.<\/p>\n

The poll has a margin of error of 1.4% and was published after voting ended at 10pm on Friday. Counting will begin on Saturday morning at 9am.<\/p>\n

While the exit poll is a good indicator of how well each party has done, how many seats they will pick up is still unclear due to Ireland’s electoral system.<\/p>\n

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Voters in Ireland<\/strong><\/a> rank their choices rather than choosing one candidate. Prospective politicians must then reach a quota after rounds of vote counting, with between three and five seats up for grabs in each constituency.<\/p>\n

Explainer: How Ireland’s election voting system works<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Fine Gael’s Simon Harris<\/a><\/strong>, Fianna Fail’s Micheal Martin<\/a><\/strong> and Sinn Fein’s Mary Lou McDonald<\/a><\/strong> are all in contention to become Ireland’s next taoiseach.<\/p>\n

A coalition is inevitable as no party has put forward enough candidates to win a majority.<\/p>\n

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\n Micheal Martin, Mary Lou McDonald and Simon Harris during the final TV leaders’ debate. Pic: PA
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But Sinn Fein’s vote share may not translate into enough seats to be in a strong position to form a government – meaning a Fine Gael-Fianna Fail coalition is likely, along with other parties.<\/p>\n

Mr Martin and and Mr Harris have vowed not to join a coalition with Sinn Fein, which has never been in government.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Green Party is on 4% in the exit poll, Labour on 5%, the Social Democrats on 5.8% and Solidarity-People Before Profit on 3.1%.<\/p>\n

Independent candidates are on 14.6%, Aontu is on 3.6% and Independent Ireland has 2.2%.<\/p>\n

Fianna Fail and Fine Gael fare better on second preferences in the exit poll, gaining 20% each, with Sinn Fein picking up 17%.<\/p>\n

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A comeback for Sinn Fein – but Mary Lou McDonald as taoiseach remains unlikely<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n
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\n \"David
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\n David Blevins<\/a><\/p>\n
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Senior Ireland correspondent<\/p>\n

@skydavidblevins<\/a>\n <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

It is the mother of all comebacks for Sinn Fein.<\/p>\n

Having plummeted in the polls over its stance on immigration and internal scandals, many had written the party off at the start of the campaign.<\/p>\n

While the lead is narrow \u2013 just 0.1% – it tops the other two big parties in the exit poll.<\/p>\n

But that doesn’t necessarily mean Mary Lou McDonald will be Ireland’s first female taoiseach.<\/p>\n

It’s not about the popular vote in Ireland \u2013 Sinn Fein won that last time too.<\/p>\n

The country has been governed by coalitions since the 80s, so it’s about who’s best positioned to form a government.<\/p>\n

Last time around, the two centre-right rivals \u2013 Fianna Fail and Fine Gael \u2013 set their century-old differences aside to rule together.<\/p>\n

With less than 2% between the three largest parties for the second consecutive general election exit poll, another five years of that coalition looks likely.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The exit poll is based on 5,018 completed interviews conducted immediately after people voted at polling stations in 43 constituencies across the country.<\/p>\n

The three-week campaign – though largely uneventful – saw support for the three main parties narrow within a few percentage points of each other.<\/p>\n

Read more: How Trump looms over Ireland’s election<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Sinn Fein, for years seen as a government in waiting, saw their longstanding lead in opinion polls plummet before the election after internal party scandals and an unclear stance on immigration.<\/p>\n

But the party climbed back into contention, with Fianna Fail’s support remaining steady.<\/p>\n

Fine Gael’s popularity appeared to slump over the campaign after a damaging video emerged of Mr Harris appearing to dismiss a voter’s concerns about disability care.<\/p>\n

Almost 700 candidates are contesting the election. It may take days for all 174 seats in the Dail, Ireland’s lower house of parliament, to be filled – and even longer to form a coalition.<\/p>\n

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It took almost five months after the 2020 election for the last coalition government to be established – though the COVID pandemic impacted negotiations.<\/p>\n

In that election, Sinn Fein won the highest vote percentage with 24.5% – translating into 37 seats.<\/p>\n

But Fianna Fail was the largest party with 38 seats on 22.2%. Fine Gael won 35 seats with 20.9%.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sinn Fein and Fine Gael are neck and neck to be the most popular party following Ireland’s election, an exit poll suggests. Sinn Fein have picked up 21.1% of the vote, with Fine Gael on 21% and Fianna Fail on 19.5%, the poll by RTE, The Irish Times, TG4, Trinity College Dublin and Ipsos B&A […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":185295,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/public.flourish.studio\/visualisation\/20549808\/thumbnail","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[50,6556,3250,286,10800,2375,3493,7811,1697,2775,3249,3433],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185294"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185294"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185294\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":185296,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185294\/revisions\/185296"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/185295"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}