INCUMBENTS ARE usually at an advantage in general election battles, but if you're a Fianna Fáil candidate seeking election to the Dáil this time around, it is far better to be a "fresh face", writes EMMET MALONE
While Senator Maria Corrigan has been on the scene for three general election campaigns, when canvassing she encounters a mix of sympathy for her previous defeats, respect for her determination to make it on the third attempt and some leeway for not having been a part of the last Government. It’s a combination that most of her party colleagues would settle for just now.
“You should have been elected last time,” says Ann Quinn midway through a night’s canvassing in Ballinteer’s Woodpark estate.
“Your timing now is just so bad. It’s a dilemma because I’ve admired you from afar, but who wants to give Fianna Fáil votes now in case they get enough.”
Corrigan tries to reassure her: “I don’t think Fianna Fáil will be in government this time, so it’s a question of what the Dáil will look like.”
The pair part on good terms. However, Quinn is clearly not convinced the gamble is worth it, insisting she is still undecided.
It’s not the only time over the course of the night that Corrigan finds herself conceding overall electoral defeat for Fianna Fáil in the hope that her personal appeal won’t be eclipsed.
Around the corner from the Quinns, Brendan Lawlor wants to know whether Fianna Fáil would renegotiate the Croke Park deal.
“I don’t think we’ll be in government to do that,” she says quickly.
The undecided voter persists: “But would you? It’s easy to say you won’t be able to.”
He never does get a direct answer as the conversation is moved on, but Lawlor still doesn’t come across like a lost cause.
“I’m very disappointed with Fianna Fáil,” he says. “I think it’s a disaster what’s happened. And if Enda Kenny wasn’t their leader I’d vote for Fine Gael, but he’d be a weak taoiseach. I’m pained with them too because I voted for George Lee in the byelection.”
More than once during Corrigan’s canvass the Fine Gael party leader is referred to in negative terms and some of those who supported Lee are still smarting over the fact that the RTÉ journalist opted to walk away from politics.
With varying levels of politeness, most Woodpark householders keep things as brief as possible at the door or simply stay inside. Corrigan is helped by the fact that the estate is something of a stronghold for Tom Kitt, the retiring TD who lived and taught near by and who has come out to help tonight.
The reaction to Corrigan, a clinical psychologist who has been pretty much full-time in politics since being appointed to the Seanad by Bertie Ahern in 2007, is generally better than one might expect in the current climate. Dublin South was home to two of Fianna Fáil’s big names, Kitt and Séamus Brennan, but Corrigan pushed Fine Gael’s Alan Shatter all the way to the final count in 2007.
Personable, articulate and industrious, it would be an indication of how far Fianna Fáil has fallen if she fails to make it in a five-seat constituency where three Fianna Fáil candidates polled over 40 per cent between them last time. Olivia Mitchell, Alan Shatter and Alex White are all expected to be elected fairly comfortably, which would leave Corrigan competing against the likes of Eamon Ryan, Shane Ross, Peter Mathews and Aidan Culhane for one of the remaining two seats.
While some questions from voters are simply unanswerable – like the one from the man who asks what he should do with 35,000 Bank of Ireland shares – most encounters give Corrigan a fighting chance.
As the night’s work nears its end, Liam Clarke declares he has “always been Fianna Fáil, going back a long time”, but between falling house prices, public sector pay cuts and limited employment opportunities, he and various family members have suffered in recent years.
“I’m disheartened,” he says, “and can’t see anything in the policies that you’ve put forward that is going to make things any better ... if we have a Department of Finance that has seen peaks and troughs and that is supposed to advise the Government, how come none of them saw it coming and none of them has lost their jobs? The buck has to stop somewhere.”
Corrigan acknowledges that much of what has gone wrong did so “on our watch,” and says “there cannot continue to be a situation where people achieve their positions automatically”.
Clarke persists though, criticising the fact that politicians take long-term leave of absence from public sector jobs to pursue their political careers. “It’s not equitable – you’re protecting your own backsides.”
He is not entirely lost to the Fianna Fáil fold, though - he quickly apologises, concerned that he is coming across as either unreasonable or personal, which he is not. He describes himself as a “hanging voter” because he is so “disappointed in Fianna Fáil”.
Corrigan can do no more than seek to assure him that she and the party’s other candidates this time around will at least try their best to improve things and, somewhat remarkably, Clarke declares himself “heartened” by this.
He still declines to commit his support. It could be that like some of Corrigan’s canvassers who are hovering near by, he simply feels the encounter has gone on long enough, but all things considered it ends pretty well for the candidate.
It’s hard to walk out of his driveway without feeling that reports of her party’s long-term demise might yet prove overstated.