The 2020 Irish general election took place on Saturday 8 February, to elect the 33rd Dáil, the lower house of Ireland's parliament. The election was called following the dissolution of the 32nd Dáil by the president, at the request of the Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, on 14 January 2020. The members, Teachtaí Dála (TDs), were elected by single transferable vote in multi-seat constituencies. It was the first election since 1918 to be held on a weekend. Following the election, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil entered into a historic coalition government.
The election was an unprecedented three-way race, with the three largest parties each winning a share of the vote between 20% and 25%. Fianna Fáil finished with 38 seats (including one TD returned automatically as outgoing Ceann Comhairle). Sinn Féin made significant gains; it received the most first-preference votes, and won 37 seats, the party's best result since 1923. Fine Gael, the governing party led by Varadkar, came third both in seats (35) and in first-preference votes. International news outlets have described the result as a historic break from the two-party system, as it was the first time in almost a century that neither Fianna Fáil nor Fine Gael won the most votes. Furthermore, the combined vote share of the two traditional main parties fell to a historic low. The leaders of those parties had long ruled out forming a coalition government with Sinn Féin.
The 33rd Dáil first met on 20 February. The outgoing Ceann Comhairle, Seán Ó Fearghaíl of Fianna Fáil, was re-elected, reducing to 37 the number of Fianna Fáil TDs. Four candidates were proposed for the position of Taoiseach, but none were successful. Varadkar formally resigned as Taoiseach that day as he was constitutionally obliged to do, but he and the other members of the government continued to carry out their duties until the appointment of their successors. Negotiations to form a new government continued through to June, impacted by the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic in Ireland. A Programme for Government agreed by Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party was published on 15 June 2020. On 26 June, all three parties voted to enter government under the Programme for Government. On 27 June, Micheál Martin was appointed as Taoiseach and formed a new government. The parties agreed that in December 2022, Varadkar would serve again as Taoiseach.
Background Since the 2016 Irish general election, Fine Gael had led a minority government with the support of Independent TDs, including the Independent Alliance. It relied on a confidence and supply agreement with Fianna Fáil.
On 3 December 2019, a motion of no confidence in the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government Eoghan Murphy proposed by Catherine Murphy for the Social Democrats was defeated, with 53 votes in favour to 56 votes against and 35 registered abstentions. On 9 January 2020, Independent TD Michael Collins called for a motion of no confidence in the Minister for Health Simon Harris. On 14 January, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar sought a dissolution of the Dáil which was granted by the president, with the 33rd Dáil to convene on 20 February at 12 noon. The election was set for 8 February, the first time a general election was held on a Saturday since 1918.
Electoral system Members of Dáil Éireann known as TDs (Dáil deputies) were elected by single transferable vote (STV) from 39 constituencies with between three and five seats. Voters complete a paper ballot, numbering candidates 1, 2, 3, etc. in order of their preference. Ballot boxes are sent to the constituency count centre after polls close and are counted the following morning. Voters may mark as many or as few preferences as they wish. Each ballot is initially credited to its first-preference candidate but if the first preference candidate is elected or eliminated on later counts, the vote may be transferred to the next usable preference, in which case it is not used to elect the candidate marked as the first preference. (The vote is only used to elect one candidate in the end or none at all.); The whole-vote method is used for transfers of surplus votes held by elected candidates.Farrell and McAllister, Australian Electoral Systems, p. 60 As the outgoing Ceann Comhairle, Seán Ó Fearghaíl, did not announce his retirement, he was automatically returned, and the remaining 159 of the 160 seats were up for election.
Constituency boundary changes A Constituency Commission, convened in July 2016 under the provisions of the Electoral Act 1997 with High Court judge Robert Haughton as chair, made recommendations on changes to constituency boundaries after publication of initial population data from the 2016 census. The commission had some discretion but was constitutionally bound to allow no more than a ratio of 30,000 people per elected member, and was required by law to recommend constituencies of three, four or five seats, and to avoid – as far as was practicable – breaching county boundaries. The Commission report, released on 27 June 2017, recommended an increase in the number of TDs from 158 to 160 elected in 39 constituencies. These changes were implemented by the Electoral (Amendment) (Dáil Constituencies) Act 2017. The election of the 33rd Dáil was therefore held using the new boundaries, for 160 seats.
Retiring incumbents The following members of the 32nd Dáil did not seek re-election. Constituency Departing TDParty First elected Date confirmed Cavan–Monaghan Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin Sinn Féin 1997 Clare Michael Harty 2016 Cork North-Central Jonathan O'Brien Sinn Féin 2011 Cork South-West Jim Daly Fine Gael 2011 Dublin Bay North Tommy Broughan 1992 Dublin Bay North Finian McGrath 2002 Dublin Central Maureen O'Sullivan 2009 Dublin Fingal Brendan Ryan Labour Party 2011 Dún Laoghaire Maria Bailey Fine Gael 2016 22 January 2020 Dún Laoghaire Seán Barrett Fine Gael 1981 6 December 2019 Kerry Martin Ferris Sinn Féin 2002 Limerick City Michael Noonan Fine Gael 1981 Longford–Westmeath Willie Penrose Labour Party 1992 Louth Gerry Adams Sinn Féin 2011 Mayo Enda Kenny Fine Gael 1975 Sligo–Leitrim Tony McLoughlin Fine Gael 2011 Waterford John Deasy Fine Gael 2002 Waterford John Halligan 2011
Campaign
The campaign officially began after the dissolution of Dáil Éireann on 14 January 2020 and lasted until polling day on 8 February 2020. the Polling was just over a week after the United Kingdom (which includes Northern Ireland) withdrew from the European Union, making it the first major election to be held within the EU after Brexit. The election took place on a Saturday for the first time since the 1918 election. Leo Varadkar said that the change of day was to prevent school closures (many schools in Ireland are used as polling stations) and to make it easy for third-level students and those working away from home to vote.
Nomination of candidates closed on Wednesday, 22 January. A record number of women were nominated, with 162 of the 531 candidates. This was the first Irish general election in which there was a female candidate running in every constituency. If a party does not have a minimum of 30% male and 30% female candidates, it forfeits half of their state funding. At close of nominations, Fine Gael had 30.5% female candidates, Fianna Fáil had 31%, Labour had 32%, Sinn Féin had 33%, People Before Profit had 38%, the Green Party had 41%, and the Social Democrats had 57%, all passing the quota.
Parties contesting a general election for the first time included Aontú, the Irish Freedom Party, the National Party and RISE (as part of S–PBP).
Voter registration via the Supplementary Register of Voters closed on 23 January, with very high registration taking place on the last day – Dublin City Council, for example, reporting 3,500 registrations on the final day allowed, and a total of 14,000 additional registrations, reported to be twice the normal amount for a general election.
On 3 February 2020, the returning officer for Tipperary cancelled the writ of election there, as required by Section 62 of the Electoral Act 1992, after the death of candidate Marese Skehan.; ; However, the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government formed a view that the 1992 provision breached the constitutional requirement that elections take place within 30 days of a Dáil dissolution, so on 5 February he issued a Special Difficulty Order allowing the election to proceed on the same date as other constituencies. Skehan's name remained on the ballot paper.
Party manifestos and slogans + Party/groupManifesto (external link)Other slogan(s)Refs Fine Gael A future to Look Forward to "Building a Republic of Opportunity, Taking Ireland Forward Together."Fianna FáilAn Ireland for all / Éire do cháchSinn FéinGiving workers & families a break "Time for change", "Standing up for Irish unity"Labour PartyBuilding an equal society Planet Before Profit "Socialism for the 21st century"Solidarity "Real change, not spare change"RISESocial DemocratsHope for better. Vote for better. "Invest in better" Green Party Want Green? Vote Green! "The future belongs to all of us" Aontú "Think outside the political cartel"
Television debates 2020 Irish general election debates 22 Jan Virgin One Pat Kenny 27 Jan RTÉ One Claire Byrne 30 Jan Virgin One Ivan YatesMatt Cooper 4 Feb RTÉ One David McCullaghMiriam O'Callaghan 6 Feb RTÉ One David McCullaghMiriam O'Callaghan 6 Feb Virgin Media Ivan YatesMatt Cooper 6 Feb TG4 Páidí Ó Lionáird
The first leaders' debate took place on Virgin Media One on 22 January, but was restricted to Leo Varadkar and Micheál Martin.
A leaders' debate featuring seven party leaders/representatives took place on RTÉ One on Monday 27 January, from NUI Galway.
On 27 January, RTÉ published an article explaining its rationale as to whom it invited to appear in televised leadership debates. Aontú announced that it would seek a High Court injunction to prevent the broadcast of the leaders' debate scheduled for the same day but later in the day they announced that they would not proceed with the action.
A further RTÉ debate was scheduled for 4 February, again on RTÉ One, and featuring only Varadkar and Martin. Mary Lou McDonald, leader of Sinn Féin, had objected to her exclusion, and Sinn Féin threatened legal action if it was excluded from this debate. On 3 February, RTÉ announced that it had invited McDonald to participate in the final debate, in part due to Sinn Féin's standing in recent opinion polls, and Sinn Féin confirmed that it would accept the invitation.
A final debate between the leader of smaller parties took place on 6 February on RTÉ One.
Candidates
Opinion polls
Opinion polls on voting intentions were conducted regularly. Polls were published on an approximately monthly basis by The Sunday Business Post (which uses the Red C polling company) and The Sunday Times (which used the Behaviour and Attitudes polling company for all of its polls since 2016 until its final poll prior to the election, for which it used Panelbase).
Less frequent polls were published by The Irish Times, Sunday Independent, Irish Mail on Sunday, RTÉ News, and others.
The chart below depicts the results of opinion polls since the previous general election.
Results
Polls opened at 7am UTC and closed at 10pm. The total poll was down by 2.2% to 62.9% compared to the previous election, despite it being held on a Saturday. However, severe weather warnings were in place over much of the country due to Storm Ciara.
Counting of the votes commenced at 9am on 9 February and concluded at 11:59pm on 10 February, with Galway East being the first constituency to report and Cavan–Monaghan being the last constituency to report.