Vote Labour for balance, says Gilmore as support flags

Labour leader Eamon Gilmore has urged voters not to give Fine Gael a “monopoly of power” on Friday as support for Labour flags.

With three back-to-back opinion polls putting Fine Gael firmly on track to lead the next government, Mr Gilmore pleaded with people to back Labour if they wanted a stable, balanced coalition.

“Everybody will be going into their polling stations on Friday with their eyes wide open,” the Labour leader said.

“They know what the choice of government is going to be. It’s either going to be a single party Fine Gael government, a monopoly of power to one party, or it’s going to be a coalition of Fine Gael and Labour.

“And if people want a coalition of Fine Gael and Labour and the balance that that brings to government, and the fairness that that brings to government, then what they need to do is to switch to the Labour Party.”

The political parties have begun their final push to secure votes with just three full days left to polling day, with Enda Kenny now the public’s favourite to be Taoiseach.

The latest Irish Times/Ipsos Mrbi poll put the satisfaction rating for the party leader at 37% – his highest rating in three years – while the party is up four to 37%.

By comparison support for Labour has dropped five to 19%, with Mr Gilmore on 40%, a drop of four.

Polls for The Sunday Independent and Sunday Business Post painted a similar picture.

The Labour leader said polls were a snapshot in time and the public mood may have changed before Friday.

Buoyed by his growing popularity Mr Kenny, launching the party’s plans to create high-tech jobs in government, gave a cautious but light-hearted response to the poll ratings.

“I’m told that in the global games industry, the come-back shooter game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, grossed almost 500 million in its first five days of sale,” Mr Kenny said. “We’ve only four days left in the real shooter game and we hope to gross appropriately on Friday.”

Meanwhile, on the campaign trail Fine Gael outlined plans to provide more high-tech jobs, including giving companies with R&D spending under 100,000 euro tax credits and accelerating capital allowances on software purchases against income tax and corporation tax profits.

Mr Kenny also said the party would provide 10 million euro from the Innovation Fund Ireland to support new start-up digital gaming companies.

The Fine Gael leader also addressed the Irish Farmers’ Association executive along with Fianna Fail’s Micheal Martin and Labour chief Eamon Gilmore.

IFA President John Bryan said he welcomed the commitment given by the party heads to defend Ireland’s CAP budget and the Single Farm Payment.

“Micheal Martin, Enda Kenny and Eamon Gilmore were left in no doubt that the new government must ensure that Ireland retains 100% of our Single Farm Payment for active farmers,” Mr Bryan said.