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FINE GAEL REMAINS the most popular political party among Irish farmers, a new poll has found.
The Irish Farmers Journal has commissioned Ifac to carry out independent research among its dataset of subscribers and print readers.
37% of farmers surveyed said they would give their first-preference vote to Fine Gael in a general election. This is an unchanged figure from the last poll, taken in May of this year.
Fianna Fáil’s level of support is also unchanged, at 23%.
Sinn Féin has been steadily gaining support in recent polls, but this time its support dropped to 13%.
Just 30% of farmers polled rated Minister for Agriculture Charlie McConalogue as good or very good, while 31% see him as having performed poorly or very poorly. The other 39% of people are indifferent about his performance.
Only one in three respondents (30%) rated the performance of farm organisations, such as IFA, ICMSA, ICSA and Macra na Feirme, as good or very good.
Dissatisfaction with the performance of the farm organisations is most apparent among tillage farmers, with 42% describing their efforts as poor or very poor. Just 21% of cereal growers classed the farm bodies as good or very good.
The poll also found that one-third of farmers have reduced stock numbers this year. It found that 36% of beef farmers and 37% of sheep farmers have cut numbers. Just 24% of dairy farmers, however, have reduced their herd size.
When asked to explain the reason why they had decided to cut cattle numbers, beef farmers generally cited input costs, tight fodder suppliers or the high purchase price of cattle.
44% of respondents to the poll were beef farmers, 19% were dairy farmers, 12% were sheep farmers and 4% were tillage farmers. The remaining respondents comprised of contract rearers, pig farmers, poultry farmers and horticultural enterprises.
A sample of 1,801 people were polled for the research carried out between 7 and 14 September. There is a margin of error of 3%.
100% of multinational property investors, bankers, and Jeremy Clarkson would vote FG too!
@Mogh Roith: you’d think the farmers would love SF .. seeing as their buddies are quite familiar with digging fields and know all about slaughtering
Fine Gael the most popular party with the sheep of this country too.
@Cormac McCann: Depends which flock of sheep you are referring to. Mary-Lou’s flock of quite sizeable.
Comments will flood in about how farmers must be thick. Etc etc
But this is exactly what politics is and let’s look at this objectively for even 30 seconds:
Why would they vote for greens?
What have SF being doing to work for farmers and their living / livelihood?
Labour and Soc Dems, again nothing.
The PBP folks and similar haven’t any interest outside of cities.
they’ll vote for a party that shows most interest in their interests and this is completely understandable and exactly the result of a well functioning democracy.
@Paolo Fandango: ,
@Paolo Fandango: nail on head!
Farmers can only lose out under SF, no matter how anyone looks at it. Agriculture has never fared well anywhere under Marxism, and even the SF right-wing version of that doctrine is a threat to anyone who owns a few acres of what SF terms ‘wealth.’
The truth is, you can’t run a country on giveaways without finding a source for all that largesse. And if anyone who owns anything, or works for a living, wants to know where that will come from, they just need to look in the mirror.
@Brian Madden: she won’t be if she doesn’t have enough candidates to win more than 51% of the seats…
No other party will go into government with them.
@John Mulligan: Have a whiskey and chill out mo chars.
@Martin O’Reilly: “chara”.
@Vic’s Burd: FF will prob go in with them, as would Labour and the soc dems. Micheal Martin said under no circumstances would he going into government with FG as he heard on even doorstep that people wanted FG out and what did he do? Martin will be gone by next election. Sf will be the largest party. And Ff will go in with them. The promise of ministeries and power will change many a mind.
@John Mulligan: Do you know what Marxism is? Suggesting that we have Marxists on the Dail is so ridiculous, it is bordering on insanity.
The poor farmers only FG as an option.
Fine Gael love people with assists and money. …renting and poor we’ll go swivel
@David cotter: I love assists too, my FPL team depends on them.
@David cotter: we have one of highest wealth redistributions in world. The poorest Irish are 63% better off than the poor in UK.
Successful business creates wealth for those who are on the margin where policies redistribute.
So your point is false. Completely false.
@James Gorman: Keep believing the Thatcherism mantra. False and proven to be so.
@Gary Kearney: whats false? Thats the Financial Times analysis of Eurostat data. Sure a comparison between unemployment benefit in both jurisdictions alone privez that.
A lot of dissatisfaction among the farmers but the voting for the same party and expanding a different result that’s insanity
@Alan Wilson: what makes you think they expect a different result though?
@Alan Wilson: I doubt if farmers are dissatisfied and it’s unlikely they expect or want a different result. https://www.ifac.ie/news-insights/news/top-50-tax-tips-for-farmers-in-2021
Money follows money.
Tax-free everything.
New journal poll. 100% of FG voters surveyed would vote FG in an election. Those who said they would not vote FG were advised it doesn’t matter FG will still go into power in order to continue destroying the country, even if they don’t get enough votes.
Sure that’s easy , Greens are anti farmers, FF don’t know what they are and SF well we don’t know what they are
@trebloc01: We do know what SF are. Former terrorists pretending to be politicians.
Who ran the poll I’d suspect it was Fine Gael themselves
@Blackie Connors: Why? Because you didn’t like the answer?
FG always have been the farmers party, that that plus the higher grades in the civil service.
Some things never change.
Ah , sure that is no wonder . The Farmers Journal, the IFA & The Meat Industry ,– they are some outfit . The IFA is totally controlled by Blue shirts , that has always been the case .The are only interested in Big Farmers,– no interest in the small family outfit .
have your say