Irish Election’s Three-Way Tie Creates Stalemate

A close election result will force Irish political parties to form coalitions (Wikipedia Commons)

Ireland’s Big Two political parties have become the Big Three after a general election result saw the top three parties finish within four percent of each other. 

Despite losing six seats, Fianna Fáil has become the largest party in the 160-seat Dáil Éireann (the lower house of Ireland’s parliament) with 38 deputies—37 of whom were actually elected, as the chairperson of the previous Dáil, a Fianna Fáil representative, was automatically re-elected per usual. 

Meanwhile, Fine Gael, the incumbent party, now has 35 Teachta Dálas  (TDs, members of the Dáil), down from 50 in the last Dáil. In the greatest shock of the election, Sinn Féin, a left-wing republican and nationalist party, won 37 seats in the Dáil—an increase of 14 from the last election, and its largest total in the history of the Irish state. However, given that 80 seats are needed for a Dáil majority, lengthy coalition talks or even a second election are now in the cards.

The historic election results seem to herald the end of the old Fianna Fáil/Fine Gael duopoly in Irish politics. The two parties are relatively similar in ideology, but they descend from the opposing sides of the Irish Civil War, fought almost a century ago. Traditionally, the two parties’ combined vote share has dwarfed that of all other parties, though it has declined in recent decades. Every Irish Taoiseach (prime minister) since the foundation of an independent Irish state in the early 1920s has come from either Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael, except for one—the first Irish leader, William T. Cosgrove, whose party merged with other smaller parties to form Fine Gael.

In this election, however, voters signaled their desire for change—in an exit poll conducted by The Irish Times, 79 percent of respondents expressed a desire for a change of government, of whom 31 percent thought that the country needed a radical change in direction. This was borne out by the election results. Sinn Féin obviously benefitted the most from this desire for change, but it did not stand enough candidates to fully capitalize on its surge in support, helping many other candidates on the left secure seats.

The question now facing the leaders of all three of the main parties is how to form a government—and who to form that government with. The leader of Sinn Féin, Mary Lou McDonald, made the first move shortly after the election, reaching out to other, smaller left-wing parties such as the Greens and the Social Democrats–but this grouping lacks the numbers for a Dáil majority. 

The only way a majority government can truly be formed is through two of the Big Three coming together, along with one or two smaller parties. On the campaign trail, the leaders of both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael said they would not go into government with Sinn Féin, and those promises were repeated this week, leading to speculation over the potential formation of an unprecedented “grand coalition” between the two parties. In response, McDonald attacked what she called “the old boys club” of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, calling their exclusion of Sinn Féin from government formation talks “disgraceful,” and stating that “any suggestion that Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil together represents change is farcical.”

A second election remains a distinct possibility given all of this uncertainty and volatility. Micheál Martin, the leader of Fianna Fáil, has himself conceded that government formation will be “very difficult,” and he declared that he “would not rule out another general election.” Ireland could ultimately end up heading back to the polls sooner rather than later.