Has Ireland bucked the 2024 incumbency curse?

Hello from my kitchen table, at close to 2am. Sharing a thought I can't get out of my head on this election results day, even as the count has yet to deliver anything definitive. Do share your thoughts - either reply or I am on BlueSky - and excuse any typos - it has been a long day.

In every election in the developed world this year incumbent parties have been punished, as per John Burn-Murdock's viral graph. So why does it look like Ireland has bucked the trend? I have two theories.

One is the budget giveaways have largely shielded the Irish electorate from the squeeze on living standards that have been experienced in other countries. As Burn-Murdoch wrote:

Voters don’t like high prices, so they punished the Democrats for being in charge when inflation hit. The cost of living was also the top issue in Britain’s July general election and has been front of mind in dozens of other countries for most of the last two years.

Yet the tax cuts, electricity subsidies etc. etc. come from bumper tax receipts, as I recently wrote (and many people discussed over the last 10 days of the campaign) are at risk. What will happen next time if the feared Trump changes hit home?

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Between Trump’s appointees, mobile tech capital and changing tax rules, we are facing a possible fiscal cliff. Yet we are still hearing 2007-style auction politics. Where is the vision for a less FDI dependent economy?

The BriefingLiz Carolan

The other of course is that one party of Government looks like it has been completely decimated; the Green Party wipe out looks like it might be on a par with the post-financial crash moment, with the Party going from 12 TDs to between 0-2.

Maybe this is standard scapegoating of the minor coalition partner, personalities, or the association of the Party with things like IPAS centres and the RTE scandal. But the shellacking feels like something much more than even the sum of those.

Green policies are one area (along with housing) where people feel worse off than they did in the past. Adapting to the realities of the climate crisis is hard, and takes fundamental changes to our economy and way of life. The Green Party does not have a monopoly on climate policy, but it is the only one who has delivered some of these while in Government.

I shared this theory on RTE tonight. When I walked outside, it was suddenly December; it was 1am, and it was 13 degrees celsius.

ICYMI

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