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Credibility is the Key
Read more about: Economy, Government, Polls 
The latest Irish Times/TNSmrbi poll indicates that people prefer the alternative government by a margin of 4%. But when asked to predict who will actually win, the current coalition has a nine point lead. The appetite for change is clear but many voters still see a problem of credibility with the rainbow alternative. A key finding in the poll is that the government may no longer rely on its stewardship of the economy as the reason why most voters will continue to back it. When asked what issue would be their priority when they came to vote, only 10% said it was to ensure Ireland’s continued economic success. Economic prosperity is now seen, mistakenly I believe, as a given, a natural condition by many voters. This is why the opposition is at pains to reiterate that it won’t put up taxes.
In yesterday’s Irish Times, Stephen Collins summarised a key finding of the poll:
What will encourage the Opposition parties is the finding that, when it comes to election issues, the public seems far more concerned with getting better public services than with keeping the economic success story going. It seems voters don’t believe that a change of government will do any damage to the economy but they do think that it might improve services.
The government parties will fiercely resist the framing of the issues in this fashion as they believe that the economy is still their trump card. It’s possible that the polls may be overstating the public’s concern with public services and quality of life issues, perhaps people questioned by pollsters want to appear more altruistic than they really are. Unlike 2002, Fianna Fáil will not be able to influence the agenda for the forthcoming election campaign with anything remotely approaching the success they had last time. With only a year to go before the next election there is more of a congruence between the public agenda, as reflected by what people think the important issues are, and the media agenda as indicated by the prevalence of the new conventional wisdom that social policy will be the key to electoral victory.
The question is whether government failure on key policy issues is sufficient in itself to drive people to support the opposition? The opposition has the advantage in that it is raising issues that voters are clearly concerned about. Setting the questions and framing the issues is the key to setting the political agenda for the next campaign. Credibility still counts and for Fine Gael, their lack of policy development and the anonymous front bench still hold the party back.
For many voters the current coalition has coalesced to such a degree that if FF and Labour did a deal after the next election that some members of the public would see that as the government being reelected (one reason for Labour not to do such a deal).
Also, people aren’t aware of the new poll findings when they are asked the various questions, so those being asked would have been working off the previous poll figures they had seen in assessing the likely outcome (the RED C had just given FF 38%) and concluded that it was more likely that they would be returned. The fact that irrespective of their own expectation that the party they would vote for might not be government they were still willing to declare their support is a indication of the strength of that commitment.