Fianna Fáil remains most popular party, poll suggests | Breaking News & Latest Ireland Updates

Fianna Fáil remains most popular party, poll suggests — A new opinion poll has suggested Fianna Fáil remains narrowly the most popular party in the country, leading Sinn Féin by 1 percentage point, despite ...

A new opinion poll has suggested Fianna Fáil remains narrowly the most popular party in the country, leading Sinn Féin by 1 percentage point, despite the poll suggesting Micheál Martin's party's support has fallen 2 percentage points since the previous poll.

The suggested trends are included in the latest Sunday Independent / Ireland Thinks opinion poll.

According to the poll, Fianna Fail's support has fallen 2 points to 23%; while Fine Gael's support has fallen by 1 point to 20%.

The same poll also suggests Sinn Fein's support is up 1 point to 22%, Independents/Others unchanged on 9%, Social Democrats unchanged on 8%, Independent Ireland up 1 point to 5%, Aontú and Labour both unchanged on 4%, Solidarity-People Before Profit unchanged on 3% and the Green Party unchanged on 2%.

The poll has also suggested Taoiseach and Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin's support has fallen 3 points to 46%; and that Tánaiste and Fine Gael leader Simon Harris's has fallen 3 points to 40%.

Among other leaders, it suggests Social Democrats leader Holly Cairns support remains unchanged on 40%, Labour leader Ivana Bacik's support has risen 2 points to 37% and that Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald's support has risen 2 points to 36%.

For the first time the poll also asked participants for their confidence in Minister for Housing James Browne, and suggested he has the support of 30% of respondents.

In a separate question on who they would like to see lead Fine Gael, 27% of respondents indicated they would favour Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe, 25% suggested current leader Simon Harris, 7% Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill, 5% Minister for Education Helen McEntee, while 8% said they didn't know and 29% said they had no interest in who is the party's leader.

The text-based poll was conducted on 1 May and 2 May this week, with the previous Sunday Independent / Ireland Thinks poll taking place in April.

This week's poll size was 1,649 people, while the margin of error was plus or minus 2.5%.