Who voted No? Everyone

[imokyrok]

I just spoke to my aunt, a woman who never had any formal third level education but a woman who I always thought was somwqhat intelligent nonetheless. Anyway, she and her entire 6 person family voted no because she thought her children would be conscripted by a giant European army. I nearly spat my tea into her face with shock.

Well, when the nos lie through their teeth with a straigh face, and the centre parties cant be arsed to explain in simple words, credelous fools, no offence, will belive the most convincing story. Try spelling it out in simple terms that this is a lie and see how she feels. Of course, if were fecked out, in effect, of the EU, the kids may have to emigrate and join an army anyhow. So, bully for your aunty. She represents an unfortunately large percentage of the voters, I fear.

It's ironic - apparently the numbers of Irish joining the British army has doubled of late. Which groups were peddling that particular fallacy anyway as a matter of interest?

[ghostkc]

I just spoke to my aunt, a woman who never had any formal third level education but a woman who I always thought was somwqhat intelligent nonetheless. Anyway, she and her entire 6 person family voted no because she thought her children would be conscripted by a giant European army. I nearly spat my tea into her face with shock.

Well maybe that could have happened given the extensive powers the Treaty gives to the European Defence Agency and the fact its role will be decided by QMV.

Just an infantile remark.

[FutureTaoiseach]

Well it is a strange thing and a lazy thing that the press did not carry out exit-polls. It seems bewildering considering they normally do. But on what you're talking about, I would look at it like this (considering the lack of info):

About 1.6 million valid votes were cast last Thursday. Based on opinion polling before the vote arguing that just 2% of SF voters favoured a yes vote, I think we can surmise that virtually all SF voters said no. That's around 6-7%. FG voters were apparently evenly-split so let's say they split 50:50 - that's another 14% on the no side. The last TNS-MRBI poll had Labout voters opposed 47-30% so let's say 61% of Labour voters said no - 6%. That's 27% - about half the no vote so far. Now the question is about the FF voters. The last TNS-MRBI poll said the divide there was 41-25 in favour of the Treaty - but remember 42% supported the Treaty among the entire electorate in the last Red C poll so we can't be sure where the undecided FFers went - and Red C said 60% of FFers were going to vote yes. Assuming this happened with 40% of FFers voting no, that's about another 16% added to the no said and 25% to the yeses. That brings the no vote up to around 41% so far. So where did the remaining 13% come from? In my opinion it comes from the Independent voters (about 5% at the last election) plus a last-minute swing against the Treaty among the FFers.

Hate to break it to you FT but that last MRBI poll had FG on 23% so if we're were 50.50 that is only 11.5% only onto the SF vote. I don't give the polls as much credence as some but let us at least grant them their internal logic shall we?

Well it depends on who is right - TNS-MRBI or Red C (the latter had FG on around 27% I think).

[KingKane]

Well it is a strange thing and a lazy thing that the press did not carry out exit-polls. It seems bewildering considering they normally do. But on what you're talking about, I would look at it like this (considering the lack of info):

About 1.6 million valid votes were cast last Thursday. Based on opinion polling before the vote arguing that just 2% of SF voters favoured a yes vote, I think we can surmise that virtually all SF voters said no. That's around 6-7%. FG voters were apparently evenly-split so let's say they split 50:50 - that's another 14% on the no side. The last TNS-MRBI poll had Labout voters opposed 47-30% so let's say 61% of Labour voters said no - 6%. That's 27% - about half the no vote so far. Now the question is about the FF voters. The last TNS-MRBI poll said the divide there was 41-25 in favour of the Treaty - but remember 42% supported the Treaty among the entire electorate in the last Red C poll so we can't be sure where the undecided FFers went - and Red C said 60% of FFers were going to vote yes. Assuming this happened with 40% of FFers voting no, that's about another 16% added to the no said and 25% to the yeses. That brings the no vote up to around 41% so far. So where did the remaining 13% come from? In my opinion it comes from the Independent voters (about 5% at the last election) plus a last-minute swing against the Treaty among the FFers.

Hate to break it to you FT but that last MRBI poll had FG on 23% so if we're were 50.50 that is only 11.5% only onto the SF vote. I don't give the polls as much credence as some but let us at least grant them their internal logic shall we?

Well it depends on who is right - TNS-MRBI or Red C (the latter had FG on around 27% I think).

Now you're taking Treaty voting intentions from one poll and using party support from another? At least make some effort!

[yehbut_nobut]

I just spoke to my aunt, a woman who never had any formal third level education but a woman who I always thought was somwqhat intelligent nonetheless.

I nearly spat out my tea when I read that sentance! Such arrogance! but no matter, we'll let it pass. (Suffice to say I wonder does your aunt think "duffer", or a similar word to that effect, when she sees you coming up the path)

Anyway, does everyone remember Biffo's remark about No voters having to leave the party.

Have the pogroms and mass exodus from Fianna Fail begun yet, does anyone know?

[Destiny's Soldier]

i voted no. I better get out of ff as per my dear leaders ultimatum.

[caulfield-the-yank]

The speculation (in the absence of exit polls) about possible correlations between party preference in 2007 and the vote on the referendum could be satisfied (to some extent) by regression analysis.

There is a general assumption that SF first-preference voters were virtually 100% NO voters. Let us assume that is true -- it means that we are only interested in knowing how the different non-SF voters voted.

So begin by subtracting the SF % in the GE in each constituency from the NO vote % in that constituency. Then rank the constituencies according to the resulting YES/NO ratio.

Mathematicians will have to fill in the next couple of steps, but, basically, by comparing non-SF party preference in the GE in a given constituency with the ratio of YES to non-SF NO votes, you can discern if there are any correlations between the two.

I did not actually do a sophisticated regression analysis myself, so what I am about to present now is only a crude suggestion of what such an analysis might show. (And I did not parse out the SF vote as a starting point, as that would have required me to do much more detailed calculations.)

What I did was to look only at the 6 constituencies in which YES got over 51%, and the 9 constituencies in which NO got (rounding to nearest %) 60% or better, and then weighted the first preference GE votes for each party in proportion to the % garnered by the side that carried that constituency in the referendum. (Part of the reason for choosing this combination was to get anomolies to cancel out.)

Below, for each party, are the percentage of first preferences that party got in the GE in the best YES constituencies, followed by the percent of first preferences for that party in the best NO constituencies:

Fianna Fail 42.16 35.52
Fine Gael 26.13 26.88
Labour 10.09 11.98
Greens 6.93 4.37
PDs 5.86 1.70
Sinn Fein 3.16 12.19
Independents 3.57 5.07
Small Leftist Parties 1.98 2.11
Small Conservative .11 .18

The first correlation that I see is that higher numbers of voters for any of the three parties currently in govt tended to correlate with an increase in YES votes, and any increase in the number of voters for parties or Independents not in govt tended to correlate with an increase in NO votes.

(And, not surprisingly, the hugest correlation was in the percent of SF and NO votes. Interestingly, the smallest of all correlations between GE vote and Lisbon vote was in the case of FG voters. If the above numbers are roughly what a more rigorous regression analysis would suggest, it appears that FG voters in the last GE voted on Lisbon in almost the exact same % as the nation as a whole -- i.e., about 54% against.)

[easygoing]

My housemate voted NO because the sugar factory in Mallow closed. A cracking example of the sophistication of the Irish electorate.

[adamirer]

I just spoke to my aunt, a woman who never had any formal third level education but a woman who I always thought was somwqhat intelligent nonetheless. Anyway, she and her entire 6 person family voted no because she thought her children would be conscripted by a giant European army. I nearly spat my tea into her face with shock.

Well maybe that could have happened given the extensive powers the Treaty gives to the European Defence Agency and the fact its role will be decided by QMV. The mothers of Ireland have every right to vote against their children being sent into foreign wars by the Eurocrats.

Oh my dear god. I don't agree with you on much, but I still had you down as an intelligent person. Guess thats two things I got wrong in two days... jesus... did you actually believe your own bull************************??

[DeGaulle]

The speculation (in the absence of exit polls) about possible correlations between party preference in 2007 and the vote on the referendum could be satisfied (to some extent) by regression analysis.

There is a general assumption that SF first-preference voters were virtually 100% NO voters. Let us assume that is true -- it means that we are only interested in knowing how the different non-SF voters voted.

So begin by subtracting the SF % in the GE in each constituency from the NO vote % in that constituency. Then rank the constituencies according to the resulting YES/NO ratio.

Mathematicians will have to fill in the next couple of steps, but, basically, by comparing non-SF party preference in the GE in a given constituency with the ratio of YES to non-SF NO votes, you can discern if there are any correlations between the two.

I did not actually do a sophisticated regression analysis myself, so what I am about to present now is only a crude suggestion of what such an analysis might show. (And I did not parse out the SF vote as a starting point, as that would have required me to do much more detailed calculations.)

What I did was to look only at the 6 constituencies in which YES got over 51%, and the 9 constituencies in which NO got (rounding to nearest %) 60% or better, and then weighted the first preference GE votes for each party in proportion to the % garnered by the side that carried that constituency in the referendum. (Part of the reason for choosing this combination was to get anomolies to cancel out.)

Below, for each party, are the percentage of first preferences that party got in the GE in the best YES constituencies, followed by the percent of first preferences for that party in the best NO constituencies:

Fianna Fail 42.16 35.52
Fine Gael 26.13 26.88
Labour 10.09 11.98
Greens 6.93 4.37
PDs 5.86 1.70
Sinn Fein 3.16 12.19
Independents 3.57 5.07
Small Leftist Parties 1.98 2.11
Small Conservative .11 .18

The first correlation that I see is that higher numbers of voters for any of the three parties currently in govt tended to correlate with an increase in YES votes, and any increase in the number of voters for parties or Independents not in govt tended to correlate with an increase in NO votes.

(And, not surprisingly, the hugest correlation was in the percent of SF and NO votes. Interestingly, the smallest of all correlations between GE vote and Lisbon vote was in the case of FG voters. If the above numbers are roughly what a more rigorous regression analysis would suggest, it appears that FG voters in the last GE voted on Lisbon in almost the exact same % as the nation as a whole -- i.e., about 54% against.)

I would be a bit sceptical about your conclusions. The inclusion of Mayo will skew your results regarding FG, for example. If you look at a map then the results follow a fairly similar pattern throughtout the country. Roscommon-Leitrim and Cavan-Monaghan had similar results even though SF is strong in one and weak in the other. If anything, there is a class effect, with the wealthier constituencies more likely to vote Yes than their poorer neighbours.

Anomalies:-
- Laois-Offaly: clearly there was a boost for the Yes in Laois-Offaly because of Cowen.
- Clare: perhaps Shannon Airport's links to Europe helped the Yes?
- Mayo: surprisingly high No vote. Not sure why. Perhaps general remoteness is the cause - I heard on RnaG that the Aran Islands voted about 70% No.