Projecting Elections in the South

Hello!

Probably one of my longest running excel sheets is an evolving tool I've been using to project future Irish elections based on polling, regional level polling, as well as the 2020 election itself. This is not a flawless (read good) system and is as of yet untested but I can have fun.

I will probably update this little section more often than I should so assume it's relatively up to date.

I know Harry [surname] is doing the same thing over on his website which I have a slightly different method to but probably average across our guesses if you want a better one.

The Dáil Projection.

  • Sinn Féin-58 (+21)
  • Fianna Fáil-32 (-6)
  • Fine Gael-34 (-1)
  • Greens-1 (-11)
  • Labour-1 (-6)
  • SocDems-9 (+3)
  • PBP/S-1 (-4)
  • Aontú-1 (-)
  • IND/Oth-37 (+17)

Discussion

On the broad picture, we should expect to see Sinn Féin picking up a lot of new seats with a more ambitious strategy, their current high polling, and likely with a bit more name recognition for candidates after the local elections.

The next big story would be the drop in seats for the Greens who saw their polling absolutely sink to rock bottom since they entered government. It looks like they'll be back to their 2016 numbers.

Finally you'll also notice Independents are absolutely cleaning shop right now in the polls, with Independents and others polling very well recently. However, I'm not sure whether to chock this up to local and European election thinking rather than people like Shane Ross, Katherine Zappone, or Paul Gogarty actually being likely to make a breakthrough. But if it's what the machine says I am not allowed to dispute.

You'll also notice that on these numbers government formation gets really shaky where the only solution that doesn't depend on like 15 different independents would be a Sinn Féin-Fianna Fáil coalition which would hurt me emotionally even if it is the obvious answer with Sinn Féin having made clear overtures to the centre and Fianna Fáil eying up the possibilty of "training in" new Sinn Féin ministers (the collapse in Sinn Féin support would also help).