1 A shot in the arm for the IFA

You can’t dispute the numbers, which strongly suggest the IFA elections were a shot in the arm to the organisation. The turnout fell just 10 votes short of 30,000, an increase of over 7,000 on the 2019 election. That’s more than a 30% rise in voter turnout.

The election got people talking about the IFA, what it is or isn’t and should or shouldn’t be doing. It’s a sharp contrast to the low-key accession of Denis Drennan to the helm of the ICMSA.

The challenge for Francie Gorman now is to capitalise on the energy a well-contested election has provided, to hit the ground running in 2024.

2 Canvassing the room

Time and again we have seen outgoing characters make the biggest impact in IFA elections.

Francie Gorman is a natural extrovert, someone who will be noticed at a meeting.

Martin Stapleton, while an engaging person one-to-one, is a quieter presence. It’s just how the two men are wired.

In a similar way, Eddie Downey routinely won the “meeting after the meeting” at the hustings in 2013, working the room after the formalities between himself and Jer Bergin had been completed. Gorman had a natural advantage in being an extrovert as the IFA election roadshow wound its way from the summer season of shows and open days through the hustings.

3 Ground game worked

There was a huge push to get votes posted and in before the deadline of Monday 11 December.

I understand as many as 1,800 votes were received on that last day. The general sense was that while both candidates ran a good ground campaign, that it was Stapleton’s team that got more of those late votes and replacement ballots across the line. It wasn’t enough to secure victory, but it ensured a tight and tense finale.

4 Turnout crucial

The overall turnout, boosted by the option of the postal vote, was 42% nationally. However, there was significant variation around the country. The highest turnout was in south Leinster.

With two candidates in the race, it was only to be expected, but a 55% turnout across the counties in the southeast came as a surprise.

There were a few reasons for this.

Francie Gorman is from Laois, but his wife Kay is a Kilkenny woman, and Kilkenny chair Jim Mulhall, who is highly regarded, is a close friend of Gorman’s and proved a vital ally.

It’s a curious fact that the new IFA president and deputy president have both previously managed campaigns in the IFA elections

Alice Doyle is based in Wexford, but is originally from Carlow, and was campaign manager for Angus Woods in the last presidential election, which meant Wicklow strongly supported her this time in turn.

Doyle and Gorman between them beat the bushes across the Slaney, Nore and Barrow valleys, and each benefited from that dynamic.

5 Course and distance

It’s a curious fact that the new IFA president and deputy president have both previously managed campaigns in the IFA elections.

Just as Doyle masterminded Angus Woods’ run in 2019, Francie Gorman was campaign manager for Henry Burns four years earlier.

The lessons from those campaigns may have given a decisive edge to Doyle and Gorman.

Martin Stapleton and Pat Murphy had been involved in national campaigns, but not to that degree.

6 Social media matters

While the old tradition of carloads of farmers hitting every byway and boreen around the country in search of votes has dissipated, online communication has been a new driver in the elections.

A website and a social media profile are now essential, with Pat Murphy’s the pick of the websites, and Francie Gorman’s Instagram/Facebook/X game well-regarded.

7 Whither the branches

While the IFA will be delighted with the overall turnout, the hybrid system has seen the level of voting at branch AGMs collapse.

About two of every three votes cast were posted in, leaving only 10,000 or so votes cast at local branches, compared to just under 23,000 last time.

Of course, it’s possible that many people attended their local AGM having voted already. That said, the IFA needs to revitalise the branch structure, which is withering alarmingly in some parts of the country.

Taking away the necessity to turn up at your local branch AGM to vote is a double-edged sword.

Will the IFA go to an entirely postal vote next time, and if so, how will the organisation sustain it’s branch structure? Are 941 branches needed or even manageable?

8 Unique opportunities for Doyle

Having broken the glass ceiling to become the first woman at the very top table in IFA (there was a regional chair previously in Rosemary Smyth), Alice Doyle may have opportunity to now break the “grass ceiling” that has seen the media presence of farm leaders dwindle over recent decades.

The IFA leadership team looks distinctly different

The sheer novelty of a woman farm leader may attract the Miriam O’Callaghan/ Brendan O’Connor radio shows, perhaps even Patrick Kielty and The Late Late Show. Equally, political shows such as Prime Time and Virgin Media’s The Tonight Show try to have a gender balance on their programmes, which may see Doyle achieve a higher profile than her predecessors in the same role.

9 Fresh new team

The IFA leadership team looks distinctly different. In addition to Gorman and Doyle, there are three new regional chairs, in Brendan Golden, Conor O’Leary, and Paul O’Brien.

Golden has just completed four years as livestock chair, where he has been succeeded by Declan Hanrahan, like Gorman from Laois.

O’Brien has been replaced as environment chair by John Murphy, who like O’Leary is a Cork dairy farmer who has been outspoken on the derogation changes.

10 More to follow

In the new year, we will see the newly separated roles of national treasurer and national returning officer filled.

Louth’s John Carroll was elected national returning officer on Tuesday. John Bambrick from Kilkenny and Paddy Donnelly from Westmeath also ran for the position.

Carroll, the current Louth county chair, was elected for a four-year term and will be eligible to run for a second term.

Meanwhile, the new treasurer will have to grapple with the stark realities of the association’s finances, as revealed at this week’s national council meeting.