Poll encouraging for Coveney - but Varadkar still holds all the aces

Since the avalanche in support towards Leo Varadkar in the opening days of the Fine Gael leadership campaign, his rival Simon Coveney has maintained that the parliamentary party is out of step with the councillors and the party membership that make up the rest of the electoral college.

Today’s poll does not measure Fine Gael members. But it does measure the voting public and it does measure Fine Gael voters. And among both of those cohorts Simon Coveney is the preferred choice for leader of the party by a small but not insignificant margin. It should be said that the Fine Gael measurement is based on a smaller sample and therefore is less robust than the full national sample.

• FG leadership tracker: track the contest and check who your local TD, Senator, MEP and councillor is supporting.

The results today may not affect the near-insurmountable lead Varadkar commands in the race. But they will do two other things: they undermine his claim that he is preferred by the public at large, and they will bolster Coveney’s claim that the parliamentary party does not represent the views of the members on the leadership choice. As the series of hustings gets under way, the poll is a fillip for Coveney, no doubt about it.

The Varadkar campaign needs to blow up if the outcome is to change. Today's poll changes the picture, but it isn't an explosion under the front-runner

Now, God knows, he needed it. The Irish Times tracker of leadership support puts Varadkar on 45 per cent – on the cusp of a majority, and that’s before the votes of the members are taken into consideration. It’s not just that Coveney needs something big to happen, it’s that the Varadkar campaign needs to blow up if the outcome is to change. Today’s poll changes the picture, but it isn’t an explosion under the front-runner.

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Campaign fuel

But it will fuel Coveney’s campaign and it will demonstrate to the members that maybe there’s a contest here yet. That may not change the outcome, but it will certainly animate the next week.

There is little movement in the support levels for the parties since the last poll in February, with all the adjustments falling within the margin of error. Such movement as there is will cheer Fine Gael – the party is two points up, their chief rivals in Fianna Fáil are two points down.

It leaves Fine Gael three points ahead of Fianna Fáil, 30 per cent to 27 per cent. This is the first time since the general election that Fine Gael has been ahead of Fianna Fáil. Elsewhere Labour is up a point to 5 per cent, and Sinn Féin is down a point to 20 per cent. The Independents and others are static on 17 per cent.

Under the Independents and others umbrella, the Greens are on 2 per cent, Solidarity-People before Profit on 3 per cent, the Social Democrats are on 1 per cent, other groups or candidates on 1 per cent and Independents are on 11 per cent.

The 11 per cent for the Independents in turn is made up of 1 per cent for the “Shane Ross Independent Alliance”, 2 per cent for the Independents 4 Change party, 2 per cent for “other grouping”, 2 per cent who weren’t sure or declined to answer, and 5 per cent who said their preferred candidate was not a member of any group.

The truth is that almost all these numbers are within the margin of error. Support for small groupings tends to rely on high-profile candidates in a small number of constituencies, and big national polls are not a great vehicle for measuring them.

Perhaps predictably, there is a big jump in satisfaction with outgoing Taoiseach Enda Kenny. Last month, less than a third of voters (31 per cent) were happy with Kenny's performance as Taoiseach. Today, that figure has jumped to 43 per cent. Kenny's supporters have always maintained that his term as Taoiseach will be more appreciated by people after he has left office; they did not expect the process to begin while he was actually still Taoiseach. It is the highest rating he has enjoyed since 2011.

Of more immediate relevance, perhaps, is that satisfaction with Government has also jumped since our last poll in February, rising from 28 per cent to 37 per cent. This is also the highest level of satisfaction with the Government since July 2011 – a few months after Kenny first became Taoiseach. Ironically, the increase in its satisfaction rating has come at a time when the operations of Government itself have slowed down due to the impending departure of Kenny.

There is little significant movement in the satisfaction ratings of the other party leaders.

Centrist, centre-right and centre-left parties still comfortably command in excess of two-thirds of the electorate's support

Overall the picture painted by today’s poll is of a political landscape that is relatively settled since the general election. Fianna Fáil’s average support in the Irish Times series since the general election in February of last year has been 29 per cent; it’s a bit below that today. Fine Gael’s average support is 27 per cent; it’s a bit ahead of that today. Everyone else hovers around where they are.

Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil remain the big beasts in the Irish political landscape, their uneasy relationship about to enter a new and uncertain phase when the new Fine Gale leader takes over.

Centrist politics

The formation of the next government without either – or both – looks like a remote prospect. For all the fretting about the decline of centrist politics in the West, it still looks pretty robust in Ireland. Throw in Labour and some of the Independents' support, and centrist, centre-right and centre-left parties still comfortably command in excess of two-thirds of the electorate's support. That being so, combinations composed of these parties or at least dominated by them will continue to govern Ireland for the foreseeable future.

Nonetheless, one important further note should be added to this picture of relative stability. Weak government and leader satisfaction (the fond farewell being paid to Kenny notwithstanding), the continuing tenor of political discourse, and the general impatience with politics and politicians everywhere suggest that beneath this relatively calm surface lurks the potential for significant change. The public’s political mood may be settled but that does not mean they are content. The record suggests that fewer and fewer votes are tied to unshakeable anchors.

Change remains the most powerful political trope of the age. True, change in Ireland comes slowly and cautiously, but the politicians who understand the appetite for it – its expectations and limitations – are the ones likely to prosper.