With just two weeks to go before polling stations open across Galway West, candidates and their supporters have been stepping up efforts to get their different messages across to voters.
A run of mild and dry May weather has made that task a little more pleasant.
Throughout the week, many of the 17 contenders have been making the most of the sunny conditions, beginning their canvassing early in the afternoon and running until dusk.
They have a huge area to cover, taking in several islands, the country's largest Gaeltacht and a mix of urban and rural considerations. As well as Galway city, Oranmore, Clifden, Oughterard and Maigh Cuilinn, the constituency has thousands of voters scattered across a vast hinterland, complicating the task of meeting them face to face and imparting different messages.
But there’s an enduring sense here that meeting voters matters deeply. It’s likely those with the best 'ground game’ will see the fruits emerge as the count progresses.
Over the last week or so, all candidates report a generally polite and engaging reaction with the people they meet, regardless of individual political leanings, and in sharp contrast to the experience of faceless, online interactions.
And there's broad agreement among those putting themselves forward for election about the primary issue that’s being raised with most of them is the cost of living.
Those three words seem to encapsulate a range of frustrations, experiences, and struggles.
In discussions on the doorsteps, several instances of older people being reluctant to turn on their heating are mentioned; many are worried about the increasing price of a weekly shop; some raise the hike they’ve seen in electricity bills and for others, eye-watering jumps in the cost of their annual insurance premiums is to the fore.
The different ways in which those problems might be addressed, and the short and long-term impacts those actions might have, seem secondary to the challenges themselves.
Whatever form the concerns take, voters say they’re feeling the pinch in their pockets. And how their frustrations manifest themselves on ballot papers on 22 May will likely have a major impact on the eventual outcome.
Cost of living pressures take in a wider problem in relation to housing too.
Galway West is in a part of the country that’s a mecca for tourists. But the economic spin-off from that has wreaked havoc on the availability of accommodation for locals.
A glut of short-term rentals had led to a sharp decline in the number of properties for students, workers, adult children and families to live in.
The problem is compounded by the number of landlords deciding to leave the market and sell up, after the introduction of new regulations earlier this year.
Several candidates report knocking on doors and hearing heart-breaking stories of individuals and families facing homelessness, either due to a lack of alternative rental accommodation, ballooning costs or the limited supply of social or affordable housing.
Galway West constituency profile
Last month’s fuel protests are not to the fore in the minds of the electorate, at least in the feedback provided by candidates this week.
Instead, there’s a more general sense of unease at cost increases and evidence too of some discontent among PAYE workers at a lack of supports provided to that sector in recent months.
Transport is also being raised, albeit with slightly less emphasis than might have been thought. This could be due to the recent approval for a planned ring road in Galway city, aimed at easing traffic congestion.
But the daily gridlock is still a major bone of contention, and a substandard public transport network still raises hackles.
Given the long list of long-awaited infrastructural improvements in the constituency, there’s a degree of frustration too about the glacial pace of such projects.
This takes in public transport plans, like Bus Connects and improvements on the rail line from Oranmore to Galway city. It extends to housing developments being overseen by the Land Development Agency, improvements to the main public hospital, as well as associated healthcare enhancements.
All feature on the doorstep discourse.
Childcare, mental health services and the general state of the health service are also being raised, but with perhaps less frequency than might have been expected.
The race is well under way. Voters have just under a fortnight to hear more from the 17 candidates in the running, before they select the constituency’s fifth Dáil Deputy.
