Latest poll shows the polarisation of society has been overstated
Only one in 100 voters rejected the recent family referendum mainly because of immigration “concerns”. Just one in 50 voted No mainly as an “anti-woke” statement. And fewer than seven in 100 gave either of these factors as being relevant in any way.
Polls released by the Electoral Commission last week suggest the recent referendums were not a culture war for voters but a practical question about family and carers. Voters were not deeply divided along right/left or progressive/ conservative lines in that regard.
While only 14pc said they “fully understood” what was proposed in the family and care referendums, overall two-thirds had an “averageto-good” degree of understanding of the two proposals, despite one in 10 complaining about a lack of information.
Those who voted No tended overall to be somewhat less liberal in social attitudes than those who voted Yes. But the differences in attitude are not staggering. Thus, just over one in every three No voters agreed that “all in all, family life suffers when the woman has a fulltime job”. Yet nearly one in every four Yes voters also agreed.
Just 31 out of every 100 who voted No-No to the family and carer referendums thought that gay and lesbian couples should not be let adopt or foster children. However, 19 in every 100 Yes-Yes voters thought likewise.
And despite agreeing with the main political parties on the referendums, more than six in every 10 Yes-Yes voters thought that most people who run for office are generally interested in their own importance, power and the perks of office.
The Electoral Commission polls show most people only made up their minds in the very last days of the campaign, and the reasons they gave for their votes were rational and clear. In this respect, the polls are consistent with findings of the Sunday Independent/Ireland Thinks own exit poll.
Thus, out of every 100 people who voted No to the family proposal, the Electoral Commission now reports that 32 did so mainly because the wording was vague, 17 because they disagreed with the need for such a change, 16 because of a lack of information to persuade them otherwise.
Exactly the same percentage of Yes and No voters in the care referendum (46 in 100) “would welcome a Traveller as a member of the family”. And more than nine out of 10 Yes or No voters said “men should take as much responsibility as women for home and children”.
More Yes voters than No voters thought that “immigrants are good for Ireland’s economy”, but in both cases a majority of both Yes and No voters thought so (79pc and 58pc respectively).
The limited value of viewing Irish politics through a prism of left/ right or progressive/conservative is exposed by these surveys. Indeed, when it came to those voting YesYes, the percentages of such identified as “left” and “right” were almost the same (34pc left and 30pc right).
The poll indicates that a majority of both Fine Gael and Labour voters voted Yes to the family referendum but No to the one on carers. So are Fine Gael and Labour thus deemed right wing and/or left wing? More than two of every three Sinn Féin voters say they rejected the family referendum, with four out of 10 rejecting the carers proposal. What does this make Sinn Féin?
Green Party support for the referendums owes much to Green
Party minister Roderic O’Gorman championing them. His explicit efforts to claim a “progressive” highground were needlessly offensive to those who voted No. In fact, only eight in every 100 Yes voters gave their main reason for voting Yes as “Ireland is becoming more progressive/getting away from the past/ times are changing”.
Pragmatism trumped ideology, either liberal or “right-wing”.
When the votes were counted, it turned out that more people voted No than the surveys had predicted would be the case. Pollsters explained this by saying No voters were “more likely to refuse to take part in the survey” than Yes voters.
The fact the No vote was bigger in the end than the polls anticipated may also mean that differences recorded online between Yes and No voters on “conspiracy theories” and other questions were even smaller than reported: 17 in every 100 “definite Yes voters” and 28 in every 100 “definite No voters” said “a small secret group of people is responsible for making all major decisions in world politics” — a response that surely merits unpacking in future polls.
Other “conspiracy theory” questions that gauged voters’ attitudes related to alternative medicine, “scientific” studies suppressing evidence, and drug “experiments” carried out without our knowledge.
More Yes than No voters agreed that alternative medicines were effective in the long term. But in no case did a majority of Yes or No voters support a conspiracy theory.
The conspiracy questions were flawed by excluding a “sometimes” option. And given the major car industry scam uncovered in 2015 about how the world’s biggest car firms rigged diesel emissions, and the Oxycontin drug scandal in America for example, fears of conspiracy are not entirely irrational.
The limited value of viewing Irish politics through a left/right prism has been exposed