Gazing into the smallest Irish presidential election field in a generation?

I’ve resisted writing about the Irish presidential election throughout the silly season. Now with just two and a half weeks left until nominations close we are finally getting down to the pointy end of the competition. Only Sinn Féin has yet to reveal its hand.

The withdrawal of Fine Gael’s Mairead McGuinness for health reasons both screwed up the party’s careful preparations (in contrast with Fianna Fail’s seeming lack of the same) and my own betting strategy (I got a very nice price on her months ago).

What the job is not…

A few weeks back  in the Sunday Business Post Shane Coleman produced a penetrating analysis of the nature of the office of President in which he noted…

…if authoritarian figures such as Trump, Putin and Netanyahu have shown us anything in recent times, it is this: respect for constitutions, however esoteric or highfalutin a notion some may find that, really does matter.

Then a  list of what he doesn’t want from a President:

TDs represent the people. Opposing the government of the day is the role and responsibility of the opposition and, if the people don’t like or want the government, they can vote them out at the next election. That’s democracy folks.

Housing is a massive issue in Irish life, but it’s none of the president’s business. If you want to influence housing, or any other policy, stand for the Dáil. By extension, I don’t want a president who doesn’t get the limits of the office – if you don’t understand the job spec, you really aren’t qualified to be a candidate.

If you do read the constitution (most Irish people don’t) there’s not much wrong with that prescription: it’s a sound and non partisan set of principles to help decide who not to vote for. So who else is likely to run (as opposed to wanting to run)?

Runners and riders…

Galway West independent TD Catherine Connolly has enough support in the Dáil to become a candidate of the broad left. Although, the decision of Labour leader Ivan Bacik to support her has not been universally popular.

Connolly left Labour in 2007 in a dispute over candidate selection and subsequently failed to get elected in 2007 and 2011 but then handily collected her seat when the tide went out for Labour in 2016. She’s hardly been a friend of the party ever since.

For the first time since 1997 both Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are taking this presidential election seriously, and as a result we are unlikely to see a thousand independent flowers bloom this year. Both parties are due to choose their candidates this week.

Fine Gael will replace McGuinness.  MEP Sean Kelly and former minister Heather Humphreys fought it out last  for the nomination of the parliamentary party and Humphreys won. [Text changed]

Kelly locked himself into a spot by saying it’s not where you can get things done.  The role of president was created in 1937 to displace the British monarch. So whilst important it’s a ceremonial rather than an activist role.

Humphreys is personable, well liked within the party, a competent minister and the Monaghan woman was the only Presbyterian voice in the Oireachtas until she stepped down ahead of the last election with few weak points for rivals to attack.

Her cross border appeal however, in spite of her religious background, is likely to be a limited factor, not least because of how northern unionists associate her with the premiership of Leo Varadkar who burnt several bridges with that group over Brexit.

Sinn Féin had been subject to much speculation, but today (in the wake of a Sunday Independent poll that show opposition transfers are unlikely to overtake either government ticket) Mary Lou returned to her original position by ruling herself out.

No one else in Sinn Féin has the appeal of McDonald. Alternatives like Rose Conway Walsh or Michelle O’Neill, both low risk pawns who’d mitigate against testing an Oireachtas front bench yet to fulfil its huge promise, came ten points behind her on 7%.

That said, Mary Lou looks tired these days. She’s had serious medical issues to handle whilst managing two disappointing election results. A spell in the Aras might have been a rest from the pressure of leading a party that feels like it has lost its way.

But strategically, putting your most popular public asset into the Aras is like sacrificing a Queen for a King in Chess. You only do it if your opponent forces you to make a sacrifice in order to fight another day. So Mary Lou will stay Queen and fight on.

Backing Connolly as a single opposition candidate could inflict damage, particularly if the government candidates fall out publicly, or something emerges that causes their campaigns to backfire. Yet as a candidate she lacks colour or wide recognition.

Similarly to the chess point made above, I was always sceptical that the party leader would be Fianna Fáil‘s choice. Seán Kelly only said what everyone in politics knows: ie, that the Presidency is not the place to change things, Government Buildings is.

Firstly Mary Hanafin (who has been off stage years) threw her hat in, and was then overshadowed by the emergence of Bertie Ahern, or the Bertiesaurus as Miriam Lord named him when he returned to the party fold for the 25th anniversary of the GFA.

But Ahern won’t run for the party he led to three election wins in the 90s and naughties. Despite his unrivalled experience, that theoretically would make him best qualified, there is little party appetite for re-opening the books on his previous departure.

Going into tomorrow’s parliamentary meeting two candidates are still standing. The leader’s choice, former manager of Dublin GAA Football team and military pilot, 54 year old Jim Gavin and one of the party’s two MEPs for Ireland South, Billy Kelleher.

In the Sunday Independent’s poll of the public the two are virtually tied on 24% and 23% respectively. But on Gavan Reilly’s tally of public declarations of support the politically untested Gavin has 45%, while seasoned pro Kelleher has just under 9%.

Return of party power?

That Colum Eastwood and Deirdre Heenan did not made it into Fianna Fáil’s final choice is not through lack of valuable experience, but that neither brings what the leader wants: an appeal to voters outside the party base (namely, in Gavin’s case, Dublin).

Gareth Sheridan, Sharon Keogan, Conor McGregor were all talked about, but they will find it tough to get support via councils since most are controlled by FF and FG whose members have been asked to keep the field free for their party’s own candidates.

With Connolly hoovering up a lot of the independent vote in the Oireachtas, and Heather Humphreys expected to attract others, we should probably expect to see the smallest presidential field of candidates since 1990, when there were just three.

This was the norm in the years before the boom and the crash that followed it. A smaller field should allow for more scrutiny of each candidate. It also re-emphasises the role political parties can play (if well maintained) within a national democracy.

Lately Independents have crowded a domain that was once owned solely by party organisations. The atomisation of party loyalties has impaired their capacity to build the kind of consensus that has transformed Irish society over the last sixty years.

With two and a half weeks left before nominations close, there is still time for a single new entrant, or the opportunity for Sinn Féin to decide to go it alone. But without Mary Lou they can’t count on adding much more than the 6.4% Ní Riada took in 2018.

No predictions here… 

What’s still unknown is what patterns of play will emerge. Irish elections (even before the current age of uncertainty) have been littered with lucky/unlucky accidents that changed the course of even the most meticulously planned campaigns and the final outcome.

So predictions of who is likely to win will be thin on the ground from me and any losses I may incur along the way will remain confidential between me and the betting exchange. For now on Betfair, Gavin is around 5/4, Humphrey 5/2, and Connolly 6/1.

But there’s no guarantee it will stay that way…