Irish election could be called within hours as final Dail hurdle cleared

A general election campaign will be called by the end of the week with government formation talks to take place over Christmas, Taoiseach Simon Harris has said.

The final pre-election hurdle was cleared on Tuesday as the Finance Bill was debated in the Dáil to give effect to Budget 2025 measures.

Despite opposition disquiet, the debate was “guillotined”, which limits the amount of time legislation can be discussed for. The Bill will now be discussed by the Seanad on Wednesday.

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It still remains unclear when Mr Harris will travel to Áras an Uachtaráin to ask President Michael D Higgins to dissolve the Dáil.

The Taoiseach travels to Budapest on Thursday afternoon and will return on Friday afternoon.

He could travel to the Áras on Thursday morning but must go before lunchtime as President Higgins is hosting the 2024 Kofi Annan Eminent Speakers’ Lecture from 2pm.

It had been assumed that if Mr Harris did not ask for the dissolution on Thursday, he would travel to the Áras on Friday afternoon when he returned from Hungary.

However, there is now speculation that he could meet President Higgins tonight [weds] following the final set of Dáil votes, which are scheduled to take place from 9pm to 9:30pm. It is understood that it could be possible to facilitate this if necessary.

On his way into Cabinet on Tuesday, the Taoiseach said the general election campaign will be underway by the end of the week.

He said: “That will provide a period of time in which we can have an election campaign and invite the people of Ireland to give their verdict on the next number of years and then hopefully give time over the Christmas period and the time ahead for, whatever verdict those people give, for those parties to engage in how to form government.”

A spokesman for Mr Harris appeared to confirm on Tuesday that the election will be held on November 29.

He said: “We have an election on November 29… I said that’s the ambition. That’s what it looks like. The Taoiseach said that earlier.”

A spokesman for Tánaiste Micheál Martin, meanwhile, said that he “presumed” a new Government would be formed by the end of the year.

The Taoiseach’s spokesman and a spokesman for Green Party leader Roderic O’Gorman both declined to say if they assumed formation talks would be completed before 2024 is out.

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