Over 20% of people undecided on vote for presidential election
Ottoline Spearman
The latest opinion poll shows that 21 per cent of people are undecided on who to vote for in the presidential election on Friday.
The Business Post poll, conducted by Red C, shows that Catherine Connolly has a lead of 44 per cent, with Heather Humphreys on 25 per cent. Jim Gavin, who withdrew from the race, is polling at 10 per cent.
The poll was conducted between October 16th and 21st with Red C interviewing a random sample of 1,012 adults online. The poll was released at 8pm on Wednesday.
According to the Irish Times, last week's poll conducted by the Irish Times/Ipsos B&A had Ms Connolly on 38 per cent, almost double the support of Heather Humphreys, on 20 per cent.
Mr Gavin was on 5 per cent.
Undecideds stood at 18 per cent; 12 per cent of respondents said they would not vote; and 6 per cent said they would spoil their vote.
There have been speculations that the turnout for the presidential election could end up being the lowest in history, with Boyle Sports projecting odds of 4/11 that Friday would see the lowest turnout ever.
Speaking on Newstalk, Business Post editor Daniel McConnell agreed: "People aren't engaged. It's the Friday of a bank holiday weekend. Voters have pretty much every reason not to go out and vote this time around, if you look at it from that perspective. So I do think we are looking at a low turnout."
A turnout of just 43.9 per cent saw Michael D. Higgins elected to a second term in Áras an Uachtaráin in 2018 in what was the lowest turnout ever recorded.
Mr McConnell said: "I think it will dip below 40% this time around or will be very close to that. "
Speaking on Newstalk, Chief Executive Art O’Leary, said he hopes younger voters will turn out: "Since the general election in November, 60,000 young people turned 18.
"And I was delighted when the figures were released last week to discover that we have 61,000 new voters who'll be voting for the first time. I'm hoping that many of those were the young people who turned 18."
