I think Fine Gael did very good

[jasonlambe]

Hi all I have to say fine gail gave the opposition a run for there money this time simply FF had a difficult time in this election,but i do have to say the majority of the country are afraid of change,especially the ones in higher class sociaty as they are afraid to lose all the have.

[The Earl of Desmond]

You are right Jason. Fine Gael did very well but jsut not well enough this time and now that there are no opposition parties except Fine Gael and Labour they can do even better next time.

[beardyboy]

You failed ha ha

[Defeated Romanticist]

jasonlambe posted:

I think Fine Gael did very good

Well. You think Fine Gael did very well.

[Insider2007]

You failed ha ha

FG + Labour were 30 seats from a majority before the election. They are 13 away from it now. Given that over 30 seats changed hands in the election, 13 is a shoo-in.

In Irish history, the biggest comparative seat increase in the history of Irish politics was achieved by . . . Enda Kenny; bigger than Dick Spring, bigger than Jack Lynch's landslide, bigger than ever achieved by de Valera, bigger than anything ever achieved by Ahern.

In non-comparative terms it was third biggest increase ever, after SF in 1918 and FG in 1981. As the former had many uncontested seats and the latter coincided with an increase in the size of the Dáil by 18, both results are usually described as non-comparative because they were special cases. In terms of comparing like with like (full contest of seats; no change in Dáil size) Kenny is the one going into a political version of the Guinness Book of Records.

[Meursault]

I am sorry I dont want to come accross as an anti-Fine Gael crank, but I do think that a lot of their recovery was to do with the Mullingar Accord with Labour.

The election that we have just had has often been compared to the 1992 election in Britan or less frequently 1993 in Spain. However I think that if Labour had undertaken a different strategy this time out, a more likely result would have been 2001 in Britain. In that election the largely competant and at that stage untainted by the Iraq war Labour government where challenged by a Conservative Party who had been demolished in the previous election. Going into the election, it was widely known that they had little chance of winning the elction. Their William Haugue was widely disliked by the British public and The Tory's made a net gain of one seat, leaving them more than 40 seats short of where Labour where at in the election when Michael Foot led them. Labour lost a few seats, but were pretty much as you were, and smaller parties, the largest obviously being the Lib Dems made modest gains.

This is what I believe may have happened in this election to a pactless Fine Gael. I am not trying to play down the role that Kenny has played in re-energising the party but even the most rabid Fine Gaeler will have to acknowledge that much of the electorate where unconvined by him. He generally came accross poorly on the media and when challenged on the issues. The Labour leader Pat Rabitte on the other hand, caused the electorate no such worries regarding his competancy. I believe that if he had not been their to articulate and subjegate his parties self interest, for the need for a Fine Gael led change and instead promoted his own party, I believe Labour would have done better and Fine Gael worse in the final result. I am not suggesting that Labour would have overtaken Fine Gael as there are large chunks of the country where Labour means nothing, I am just suggesting the result would have turned out differently.

Just something I've mused over and I am ready for your brickbats.

[wombat]

The problem is they're in & we're out. Enda Kenny was not the problem. Apart from Richard Bruton, there was no one able to take on the FF big boys. The media like to present elections as a presidential race but people vote for a team and Kenny's was weak. He also had the problem of being based in Mayo, unless you live in Donnybrook parish you don't get to comment on current events. People were not hostile to Enda, they just didn't get to know him until the campaign started.

[Richie Nixon]

Credit where credits due. They radically increased their seat share. In fairness it was impossible to see a change in goverment before the election. However, the next five years will be key in the long term success of Fine Gael

[Defeated Romanticist]

Meursault Posted:

I am sorry I dont want to come accross as an anti-Fine Gael crank, but I do think that a lot of their recovery was to do with the Mullingar Accord with Labour.

The election that we have just had has often been compared to the 1992 election in Britan or less frequently 1993 in Spain. However I think that if Labour had undertaken a different strategy this time out, a more likely result would have been 2001 in Britain. In that election the largely competant and at that stage untainted by the Iraq war Labour government where challenged by a Conservative Party who had been demolished in the previous election. Going into the election, it was widely known that they had little chance of winning the elction. Their William Haugue was widely disliked by the British public and The Tory's made a net gain of one seat, leaving them more than 40 seats short of where Labour where at in the election when Michael Foot led them. Labour lost a few seats, but were pretty much as you were, and smaller parties, the largest obviously being the Lib Dems made modest gains.

This is what I believe may have happened in this election to a pactless Fine Gael. I am not trying to play down the role that Kenny has played in re-energising the party but even the most rabid Fine Gaeler will have to acknowledge that much of the electorate where unconvined by him. He generally came accross poorly on the media and when challenged on the issues. The Labour leader Pat Rabitte on the other hand, caused the electorate no such worries regarding his competancy. I believe that if he had not been their to articulate and subjegate his parties self interest, for the need for a Fine Gael led change and instead promoted his own party, I believe Labour would have done better and Fine Gael worse in the final result. I am not suggesting that Labour would have overtaken Fine Gael as there are large chunks of the country where Labour means nothing, I am just suggesting the result would have turned out differently.

Just something I've mused over and I am ready for your brickbats.

I agree with you but for different reasons. The alliance with Labour gave Fine Gael credibility as a party who could concievably get into government. Without Labour they would have had no such credibility and there would have been a stagnation in the FG numbers. But fair play to them they pulled it off. I dont belive that Rabitte had anything to do with the sucessful performance of FG in competancy terms. The FG vote is as it always has been, an anti-FF vote. FF have been in power for 10 years. That that their vote has increased is the story of this election. I doubt in any normal democracy that a leading government party has seen its vote increase for the third successive time. Fine Gaels achievment was laudable but FFs was astounding.

[Meursault]

You're right DR, the main factor was making FG a plausible party of government, I just think that Rabitte generally came accross as a much more convincing figure.