Cork North-Central

Profile

Province: Munster

Seats: 5 (+1 from redraw)

Current TDs: 1 SF, 1 FF, 1 FG, 1 PBP

Projection: 1 SF, 1 FF, 1 FG, 1 PBP, 1 II

Analysis

September 2024

Cork North-Central is the only constituency with two changes this month. This is in part attributable to model changes, as the previous iteration was being far too generous to the Social Democrats, particularly on transfers, and was I believe incorrectly inflating their chances in this constituency. Sinn Féin are running two here, and even with their current polling are not completely out of it for a second seat, but are no longer favoured.

Fine Gael returning to a projected seat here for the first time since February should hardly be a surprise. What is perhaps more interesting is the model showing Kenneth O’Flynn as being the first gain for Independent Ireland under the model. O’Flynn was very close in 2020, and in a positive polling environment for Independents and Others, ought be in a strong spot. Whether the II brand helps or hinders him, I’m not sure – but my instinct is that with his local profile, it won’t matter a huge deal either way.

The wrinkle here, as ever, is that Mick Barry (Solidarity) is such a huge outlier from his party’s general support in Munster that his position is always going to be very, very hard to assess. Comparing his 2016 and 2020 performances, it’s clear Sinn Féin ate a lot of his first preferences. If those come back to him, he should be fine. If they don’t, and he’s not able to overtake SF’s second candidate, Cllr Joe Lynch, he’s in serious trouble.

February 2024

Cork North-Central came up last month as a bit of an odd one, and it’s even more true this month, as the model favours PBP/Solidarity’s Mick Barry to hold his seat again, with Fine Gael’s Colm Burke losing out. All of this is within very fine margins, and there are essentially seven candidates that are possibly viable for five seats here, and there are plenty of possible configurations to that, with really only one Sinn Féin and one Fianna Fáil seat looking guaranteed.

I do think that the model is probably overestimating the Social Democrats a bit here – and have discussed the reasons for this before a few times now, so I won’t rehash. I will however again emphasise that, as noted previously, there is more margin for error in a redrawn constituency than otherwise. It’s also worth saying that this is one of those tight races where the model has transfers mattering a lot, and transfers should naturally be treated with more caution than first preference votes when it comes to projections. I would advise caution here.

January 2024

When Cork North-Central was redrawn, I noted that Fine Gael, People Before Profit/Solidarity (Mick Barry is in Solidarity, but is categorised here as PBP for consistency), the Social Democrats and Labour were all pretty tight for the final seats, with Independent Kenneth O’Flynn not far behind. That’s still the case, although FG have pulled clear a bit, so some shuffling here should not be too surprising, although I think an SD seat here would be a bit of a surprise.

So why is the model showing this? As discussed during the redraw, Ballincollig makes up a big chunk of the new constituency, and was an SD stronghold in 2020 when it was in Cork North-West. The nuance here is that in 2020, neither PBP or SF ran there, so there is a significant margin for error in the calculations in adding it to the constituency and trying to work out what the SF/PBP vote will be there. In addition to this, SD polling in Munster is relatively strong. As ever, it’s hard to say exactly how this will map in areas where support is highly geographically concentrated, and small polling fluctuations impact small parties disproportionately. The last seat here remains very interesting.

August 2023 (redraw)

Cork North-Central gets a fair bit bigger, taking on Mallow and Ballincollig while losing lightly populated EDs in the east and all Cork City EDs north of the Lee. This is potentially a significant change to the constituency’s, well, constituency. As a result, it gains a fifth seat which the model projects to be held by incumbent Mick Barry (Solidarity, categorised here as PBP for convenience).

This seems fairly straightforward, giving the extra seat to an under-pressure incumbent, but things are much more complicated than that, and this constituency is going to be fascinatingly unpredictable. Colm Burke (FG) is not in great shape here, and the redraw probably doesn’t help. On current numbers, Kenneth O’Flynn (IND) is unlikely to win a seat (though it would not take a huge change in polling to make him competitive), but is a strong enough candidate to play spoiler, particularly in the northern suburbs of the city.

Then there’s a substantial Labour vote arriving with Mallow – a bigger one than Labour are losing from the city-centre EDs – and possibly incumbent TD Séan Sherlock coming along with it. As neither SF nor PBP contested Ballincollig in 2020, how it will fit into the constituency is an unknown, and my projection figures are by necessity speculative. Also, it will likely bring with it a Ciarán McCarthy (SD) who did very strongly in Cork North-West in 2020. Overall, this means that while there’s an easier seat for PBP to hold, their FPV % will likely decline, as will FG’s. Relative to PBP, the SDs and Labour are not far behind, with FG’s not far ahead either. The model thinks with five seats that Barry and Burke will hold, but both look very vulnerable.

I have to emphasise again that Ballincollig is a massive ED – containing over 14% of the population of the new Cork North-Central, while the EDs around Mallow are a touch over 10%. How both vote will almost certainly be critical in deciding the fifth seat. Indeed, under quite a few specific scenarios, these new areas may also dictate the fate of the fourth seat.

April 2022

I’m not at all surprised to see this flip back to Fine Gael this month – I had a feeling the model favouring Barry was somewhat illusory and based on a temporary confluence rather than anything substantial. Still, it’s fairly close, and FG are seriously struggling in Munster, and there’ll be a good number of scattered left-wing transfers up for grabs from lower down the ballot.

So while holding the seat here is going to be a challenge for Barry with Sinn Féin basically guaranteed on current polling to add a second, it remains within the realm of possibility, but a lot of things – particularly when it comes to transfers will need to break his way. Alternatively, if Fine Gael’s worrying trajectory in Munster continues over the next few years, that could also work for him, but I wouldn’t rely on this.

March 2022

This is an odd one, and part of the reason I think how the model currently handles transfers needs to be revisited. This would be a huge result for the left – two Sinn Féin, and Mick Barry holding the Solidarity seat in the constituency. There’s an awful lot of contingencies here, mostly around how an SF vote split would pan out in reality, but also on transfers and of course whether or not ex-Fianna Fáil Independent Cllr. Ken O’Flynn runs again (the model currently assumes he will).

The key factor driving this is an increasingly problematic situation for Fine Gael in Munster. They are down over 3% (a 14.7% swing) on their 2020 result, and are way behind FF – moreso than they were in 2020. There’s also the volatility of PBP/Solidarity polling in Munster, which is very low and thus highly susceptible to wild swings based on relatively small polling movements.

What I’m ultimately getting at here is that this may well be illusory; there’s a lot of factors going into how the model is reaching this conclusion and a shift in any of them will probably flip this seat back. However, even if that is the case, Barry is right now in a more competitive position than he’s been since I started this project.

(And yes I know Mick Barry is technically Solidarity, not PBP. I’ll change the notation if the relationship between the two changes and they do not run as a joint party.)

January 2021

The left in general, but especially PBP, have a major problem facing them going into the next election. SF ate most of the left’s FPV in 2020, leaving many left-wing TDs almost entirely reliant on SF surplus transfers to keep their seats. The problem here is, what happens when SF run two candidates instead of one, and that surplus transfer disappears?

This is especially relevant in an environment where PBP are polling poorly, although high profile TDs like Mick Barry may ultimately prove more resilient than the polling indicates. However, right now a second SF candidate – a no brainer move from SF – leaves him short of where he needs to be.

FG are, in theory, approaching the numbers needed to push a second candidate ahead of FF incumbent Pádraig O’Sullivan, however they haven’t managed to successfully pull off a two-candidate strategy in Cork North-Central since 1997, even in very positive polling environments. While there is a small chance of an FG gain and an FF loss, it doesn’t look particularly likely right now.