Are Fianna Fail under Brian Cowen in free fall?
Fianna Fáil support has fallen by 10 percentage points since late September, and just 26 per cent of voters say they would vote for the party in a general election. This is their lowest result and one dreaded by FF backbenchers. Meanwhile FG are seven points ahead of FF while the Labour Party have picked up 6 points to bring them up to 15% just 11% short of Fianna Fail itself.
This is a shocking result which reflects the public's disgust with a FF government which did not prepare for, or even acknowledge that there could be, an end to the boom of recent years.
Worse still, instead of tackling the issue head-on and raising direct taxes and upping the tax rates, the government has tried to balance the books by introducing a "patriotic" levy and by chipping away at the more vulnerable, less vocal elements of society in the hope of keeping the majority onside.
However this approach has backfired horribly and FF are in poll free fall since they lost the trust of the pensioners. FF forgot that pensioners vote in every election and no party can afford to mistreat them. The attempts to remove their medical cards has completely undermined their trust in FF and so the house of cards has collapsed completely.
What's more FF have badly damaged themselves with the farmers (IFA say 60,000 farm families will lose 11% of their income under this budget) and are about to annoy every parent and teacher with a return to overcrowded and understaffed schools.
It seems FF have reached their tipping point and could be facing into a John Major/Conservative type collapse at the next election. So far the big winner has been Labour with a huge jump in the polls and the one thing Labour does well is health so we are likely to see an enlarged Labour Party in Government within the next 3 to 4 years.
The only way back to FF is win back the pensioners, but with poor budgets to come this is unlikely.
Its a dark day for Brian Cowen.
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