Those of you listening to the radio, or watching television today, may notice a change from previous days-before-elections: The moratorium on broadcast coverage of the campaign has been lifted.
Now of course, this will divide opinions. It will, I suspect, draw the substantial ire of Ireland’s substantial anti-politics constituency – the people who hate election posters, put “no junk mail” on their doors and chase after canvassers who drop leaflets anyway, and declare that the whole bloody thing is a damned inconvenience. Knowing a few of those people personally, they will certainly moan about this, looking forward as they are to it all being over.
The fact is, however, that the moratorium was always outrageous on several grounds, the first being freedom of speech. It was, after all, a literal law against informing the public about important matters in the public interest. In previous elections, were it to have emerged later this afternoon that a leading candidate had just admitted on social media to being an axe-murderer, the moratorium would have classed this as election news and prevented the voters from being told about it on the airwaves.
Further, the moratorium frankly encouraged dirty tricks. Last minute leaflet drops by political parties making scurrilous accusations about a rival. Or more subtle things: At the 2007 general election for example one Fianna Fáil candidate allegedly (I understand he denied all knowledge) plastered a constituency with “the party wants you to vote number one for me in this area” leaflets, effectively screwing his running mate entirely. The party, of course, wanted no such thing – but local media were precluded from covering the story. The candidate won, and his running mate was defeated. Thus, an unfolding story of political skullduggery was hidden from most of the people who were the intended victims of said skullduggery.
More to the point, research by the experts has consistently found that a meaningful number of voters – perhaps 8 or 10% – make up their minds how to vote in the dying hours of an election campaign. Often these are voters who have much in common with the “anti-politics” crowd above. They have purposefully tuned out the campaign up to now, are looking around to make a decision, and on the very day they want to tune in to hear from their candidates, the media is confined to talking about Taylor Swift’s latest album instead.
Aside from all of that, though, tomorrow really is a momentous day. Whatever the outcome will be (and I confess I am not optimistic that it will be one I like) the country is choosing a fundamental direction for the next five years. The General Election is therefore the most important story in the country. The idea that broadcasters should be compelled to effectively pretend that it’s not happening, and be actively precluded from reporting on it, is bonkers.
The moratorium is gone, for this election, and good riddance to it. Therefore, when you hear election coverage on the 4pm drivetime news, or see it on your television tonight, don’t get all upset and accuse reporters of breaking the law. It’s finally been changed – and not a day too soon.