Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny said today the Government's poor showing in the latest opinion poll reflected widespread public angry at how the country was being run.
The latest Irish Times/TNS mrbi poll shows satisfaction with the Government has slumped to a record low of 10 per cent, with 86 per cent of voters now expressing dissatisfaction with the Coalition.
Mr Kenny said the poll reflected what he had been hearing across the country for the last twelve months that "people are really angry at the way Government has misused their money, wasted opportunities, destroyed careers and dashed hopes".
Speaking in Kilkenny, where he was canvassing with European election candidate Senator John Paul Phelan, Mr Kenny said he believed the electorate would deliver "a very strong verdict against Fianna Fáil" on June 5th but he warned against complacency within the ranks of his own party despite a surge in support for Fine Gael.
The poll indicated a six-point rise in support for Fine Gael to 38 per cent, its highest level of support for a quarter of a century, giving it a massive 17-point lead over Fianna Fáil.
The rise in support appears to have coincided with the unveiling of the former RTÉ economics editor George Lee as the party candidate in the Dublin South byelection.
The adjusted figures for party support, compared with the last Irish Timespoll in February were: Fianna Fáil 21 per cent (down 1 point); Fine Gael 38 per cent (up 6 points); Labour 20 per cent (down 4 points); Sinn Féin 9 per cent (no change); Green Party 3 per cent (down 1 point); and Independents/others, 9 per cent (no change).
Despite the rise in support for his party, Mr Kenny said there would be "no triumphalism" in Fine Gael and that he had been "through enough elections to know that complacency is always the enemy of victory".
Earlier Minister for Justice Dermot Ahern has said Fianna Fáil's poor showing was the price the Government was paying for making tough decisions.
Mr Ahern said: "If the price of getting Ireland through this very tough situation is making tough decisions that court unpopularity then so be it."
"At this time of severe crisis, polls and elections are less important to Fianna Fáil than making the right choices to lay the right foundations so that when the upturn does take place we will benefit," he told RTÉ's Morning Ireland.
Reflecting on his party's poor showing in the poll, Green Party leader John Gormley said: "There is anger out there. People are losing their jobs, they are uncertain about their future, they can't get credit at the banks if they have small businesses."
But Mr Gormley said the Greens would stay in Government as long as their programme was being implemented but were open to other alliances.
The poll was conducted over the past three days among a representative sample of 2,000 voters in face-to-face interviews at 200 sampling points in all 43 constituencies.
The satisfaction rating of the Taoiseach has dropped again since the last poll and now stands at just 18 per cent. Fianna Fáil supporters are evenly divided on his performance, but Green Party voters are decidedly unhappy with it.
The rating of Mr Gormley has continued to slide and he is down to 25 per cent.
The rating of Fine Gael leader Enda Kenny has gone up 3 points to 33 per cent since the last poll, but he now trails his party's satisfaction rating.
Labour Party leader Eamon Gilmore is easily the most popular political figure with a satisfaction rating of 51 per cent (an increase of 7 points) and he is clearly benefiting from his strong Dáil performance.
The rating of Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams at 34 per cent is up 2 points. There was no increase in support for his party.
A Labour Party spokesman said it was reasonable to conclude that Fine Gael had made some gains at the expense of Labour.
But the party's level of support was double that of its last general election result and "if translated on a pro rata basis would result in 40 seats".
He also said Mr Gilmore's approval rating of 51 per cent was almost equal to the combined total of the other two main party leaders.
Regarding the opinion poll's finding on the party leaders, Mr Kenny said he accepted that Labour leader Eamon Gilmore is "the most popular party leader in the country" while he was "happier to see the Fine Gael party rising" than his own personal ratings.
The Fine Gael vote is up significantly all across the country and the party is now at 28 per cent in Dublin, more than twice the Fianna Fáil total of 13 per cent.
It is also well ahead of Fianna Fáil in Munster and Connacht-Ulster and ahead by a narrower margin in the rest of Leinster.
The further slide in the satisfaction rating of the Government and the Taoiseach is ominous for the future prospects of the Coalition.
A massive 86 per cent of the voters are now dissatisfied with the performance of the Government and that figure rises to 89 per cent in Dublin. The better off AB voters are the most unhappy of all.
Among Green Party supporters the figures are appalling, with 93 per cent expressing dissatisfaction with the way the Government is running the country.