With three days remaining, this final Irish Times/MRBI survey, conducted on Monday of this week, shows Mary McAleese further consolidating her position ahead of the field on 46 per cent, which is 16 points in front of Mary Banotti with 30 per cent, followed by Dana on 10 per cent, Adi Roche 8 per cent and Derek Nally 5 per cent. Over the nine days since the last comparable poll three candidates - Mary Banotti, Adi Roche and Derek Nally - have lost ground, while Mary McAleese particularly and Dana have improved their positions.
Although the actual sequence is identical to last week's poll, the outcome is now clear-cut and Mary McAleese is destined to become the next President of Ireland.
One unusual characteristic of the survey, at this late stage, is that the undecided figure has increased to 20 per cent. While there is no evidence in the survey to show why this has happened, it is clear that no potential voters have deserted either Mary McAleese or Dana over the past week. However, Mary Banotti, Adi Roche and Derek Nally have each lost support from electors who have switched to undecided.
Should these first-preference figures approximately reflect the result of the election, and should Mary McAleese continue to command a majority of the transfers from the bottom three candidates as is shown in the survey, she would be comfortably elected on the second count.
A three-way elimination will materialise if the total first-preference vote for the bottom three candidates is below that of Mary Banotti in second place.
While the survey figure of 46 per cent indicates a very comfortable and indeed unassailable position for Mary McAleese, statistical survey findings should never be interpreted literally and there are factors which could indicate that her first-preference support on the day could vary somewhat from the 46 per cent of last Monday.
The first is the ever-present statistical variation which applies to all surveys of this nature, and which is referred to in the technical appendix. Two other factors which could influence her first-preference figure relate to past election history and to a specific finding from the survey itself.
Today's survey shows Fianna Fail on 51 per cent support, a level which the party has not obtained in a general election for 20 years.
In a number of recent elections the party received lower first-preference votes than had been indicated in the campaign opinion polls - this arose in 1997, 1992, 1991 (local election), 1989 and 1987.
Currently some 61 per cent of Fianna Fail supporters state that they intend to vote for Mary McAleese (this figure compares with 58 per cent on October 22nd and 50 per cent in the two earlier campaign opinion polls).
However, if history repeats itself, not all may turn out on the day to vote for the party's nominated candidate.
A second and rather more significant factor relates to the nature of the demographic support which Mary McAleese currently commands. Among those aged under 24 and also 25 to 34 her support is massive, and exceeds the combined totals of the four other candidates. The question arises: will these young people turn out?
In conclusion therefore, while there are indicators which point to Mary McAleese receiving a lower first-preference vote than is indicated in this final campaign survey, it is also unmistakably clear that she will be comfortably elected as our next President.
This survey in the Republic of Ireland was conducted exclusively on behalf of The Irish Times by MRBI Ltd among a national quota sample of 1,000 representatives of the 2.5 million electors aged 18 and upwards, covering 100 sampling points throughout all constituencies in the Republic of Ireland. Personal in-home interviewing took place on Monday, October 27th, 1997, and the accuracy level is estimated to be approximately plus or minus 3 per cent. In all respects, the survey was conducted within the guidelines laid down by The Marketing Society of Ireland, and by ESOMAR (European Society). Extracts from the report may be quoted or published on condition that due acknowledgment is given to The Irish Times and MRBI Ltd.