Are Irish people on average to the left of English people??

You also have to remember that the poor Brits don't have PR so it's a fairly stark choice for them between Tory scum and leftie nutbars, or else the middle of the road joys of the Lib Dems. Paddy can vote for every party in Ireland from raving fascists to Reds under the bed secure in the knowledge that every one of his votes counts.

We vote for the stick the heads in the sand, kick the can down the road and pump the national debt party.

I can't imagine we will be an independent nation in 50 years time and we'll blame it on everything except ourselves.

Everything is up for grabs in the country. And we'll sell our children out rather than fix the housing crisis etc etc

except the many, many people who will vote purely on a party basis - the 'we're a fianna fail etc, family and we've always been' types

But in all fairness who does one vote for?...bar the odd independent that will be able to achieve .....f all (in the majority of cases)

FF disasters

FG disasters

Labour disasters and not really Labour at all....

Sinn Fein....highly likely to be disasters 99.999999999999999999% likely imo ....and maybe even more disastrous than the gombeens we've had so far

Greens moronic ideologue disasters....that won't solve any climate problem again I feel 99.999999999999% certain of that given their track record and latest utterances i think they will be the cause of more CO2 production....they might succeed in increasing divisions and being useful idiot cheerleaders of policies that will diminish our agri food industry and leave us importing more food from the slash n burn merchants etc......

It's slim pickings..........maybe you can't blame the lad/lady voting for entirely selfish reasons ... even though most must know in their heart of hearts what they are voting for....

If there was a benchmark/way to measure performance.....metrics....a scientific report card for our elected managers .... then perhaps more voters would be discerning in terms of the long term

It's a case of the least worst option. I'm in my 50's. In my lifetime FF have bankrupted the country, not once but twice - first time being in the late 70's/early 80's. Took us a decade to recover, then we had the boom, then the crash of 2008, which was caused to an extent by outside forces but made far worse in Ireland by FF policy of throwing money at everyone to buy votes (exact same policy caused the 70's/80's recession). Plus they set the benchmark for corruption and shyster politics. After each FF disaster, FG have come in and had to pick up the pieces. Both times they did a fairly good job of it and set the country right again economically. I've seen FG make hard decisions over the years that cost them votes, something FF would never do - they'll always put party before country. In the late 70's and early 80's, FG were the progressive party on social issues while FF sided again and again with the child rapists in the Church. On that basis I've consistently voted FG on the basis that they can generally be trusted with the economy while FF can be trusted to wreck it just to stay in power. And I don't agree with your assessment of the Greens. I think the current situation, where they have power but limited power, is good. They've invested heavily in walking and cycling infrastructure which is good for sustainable travel and health. The dominance of the car has to be tackled. Obviously we need cars but there are far too many people who won't even think about any other option, even for short journeys. That has to change. Quite apart from the climate crisis, our major cities have been gridlocked for years. That simply can't go on and we need a political party who are prepared to face down the motor lobby and others. Not saying either FG or Greens are perfect of course, but until someone forms a decent centre right alternative they're probably the best we're going to get.

So FG + Greens

.....hmm, hmmmm.....in recent times when they took over wasn't it nearly a case of the only way is up?

Haven't they managed to completely make a total balls of housing in this country with every initiative seemingly tailor made to inflate prices.......

Now if it was solely FF we would probably have crashed and burned long ago so I suppose there is that ..so maybe I have to concede there...perhaps they are the least worst option but imo its a fine fine margin......FG seem quite capable of dubious decisions and corruption too.

As for the greens, it's Greens for the southside of Dublin afaic........just transition my hole......I can't see anything in the line of joined up thinking in their policies or actions.......overindulged zealots.....I'd be onboard with a green party if they showed signs of intelligence and fairness in their actions....I don't know how the majority view bicycle lanes in Dublin that have to live with them but I do know how ill thought out and unjust their plans for agriculture are so far......

Paddy just doesn't like paying taxes and then gives out when the state cannot provide adequate services- health, education, housing

The Left is fcuked here, splinter groups splintering who can't agree on sh1t. They only appeal to 'working' class and students and people who don't want to pay for anything.

SF (not proper Left) eating Labour's dinner.

No-one seems to know what Labour stands for now, absolutely beige leader with pre-prepared waffle.

We have a seriously fair representative voting system - the Dáil actually accurately represent us as a people, from the Healy Raes to the Lowrys to the Grealishes.

Agree 100% and I should have mentioned them. I would have voted consistently for them over the years, in fact in my younger days when I would have been more sympathetic to the Left I would have consistently given them my number 1 vote and FG no 2.

People always say that other people should vote for candidates based on national issues rather than local issues.

But the problem is there is never enough national policy to go around.

Not every TD can be at the forefront of some great legislation to tackle this that or the other.

And just supporting government policy doesn't make you stand out from anyone else that is getting whipped into the same lobby for the vote.

So TDs have to rely on local issues and individual issues to be able to help their constituents and be relevant.

Fair point. I think someone once suggested that we should have a two tier system where a certain number of TDs concentrated on national issues and the rest on the parish pump.

It’s not left or right in England they’ll just say it straight out, whatever they are thinking whereas we’re more ifs and buts and roundabouts.

I fully agree with you about mixed farming enterprise . I lay the blame for a lot of the lack of diversity at the door of agencies like teagasc and some of the big co-ops and government policy as well. ( the sugar beet fiasco was almost criminal) An awful lot of knowledge and skill has died off and is currently dying off in the generation of farmer who had more mixed enterprises 40-50 years ago. There was mild panic among the farming community at the prospect of compulsory tillage earlier on in the year. Many farmers around me would woefully badly set up ( myself included) to entertain such a notion but it’s a reality that is not gone away yet.