HISTORY
Tipperary North has existed – apart from a brief interlude between 2016 and the present – as a stand-alone constituency since 1948. From 1948 until 2011 it consisted entirely of areas within Tipperary, with areas being exchanged intermittently with Tipperary South. From 2011 to 2016, it also consisted of the part of rural south Offaly sandwiched between the barony of Lower Ormond north of Nenagh and Roscrea and its hinterland.
Fianna Fáil were largely dominant in North Tipperary taking nearly half the seats between 1948 and 2011. Below you can see the statistics for the seat takes in both Tipperary constituencies.
| CONSTITUENCY | Fianna Fail | Fine Gael | Labour | Other | Independents |
| Tipperary North | 27 (47%) | 15 (26%) | 10 (18%) | 1 (2%) | 4 (7%) |
| Tipperary South | 34 (44%) | 23 (30%) | 12 (16%) | 2 (2%) | 6 (8%) |
Others include : Clann Na Poblachta in 1948 in both constituencies, Workers Unemployed Action Group in Tipperary South in 2007. Seamus Healy had previously run as an Independent.
Daniel Morrissey was a Trade Unionist who first won a seat for Labour in the then Tipperary Mid, North and South constituency in 1922 – Legend has it that Ernie O’Malley threatened to shoot Morrissey if he stood, but relented when Dan Breen threatened to shoot him. He broke with Labour in 1931 over his support for the Cumann na nGaedhal’s government’s plans to introduce Capital Punishment for IRA members. He soon afterwards joined Fine Gael, and remained a TD until 1957.
The two Fianna Fáil Michaels – Smith and O’Kennedy – loomed large over politics in Tipperary over four decades. The Roscrea-based Smith represented the constituency from 1969 to 1974, 1977 to 1981 and finally has a more secure tenure from 1987 until his final defeat in 2002. He held ministerial roles in Defence, Education and Environment. The Nenagh-based O’Kennedy represented the constituency from 1969 to 1981, November 1982 to 1992 and finally 1997 to 2002. He was appoint European Commissioner in 1981, but resigned and returned to domestic politics in November 1982. He held several Ministerial roles including Minister for Finance.
Special mention must be made of the November 1982 election where Michael Smith was defeated despite securing over 0.97 quotas and being only 210 votes short of the quota on the first count. I will look at this election in more detail in a separate post.
Michael Lowry was first elected for 1987 for Fine Gael – his election victories in 1989 and 1992 were relatively narrow, but he has topped the poll as an Independent ever since.
RECENT CONSTITUENCY RESULTS
| YEAR | SEATS | Fianna Fáil | Fine Gael | Labour | Sinn Féin | Greens | Others | Inds. |
| 1997 | 3 | 42.3% 2 | 11.3% | 10.3% | 6.7%** | 29.3% 1 | ||
| 2002 | 3 | 42.3% 2 | 14.9% | 13.5% | 3.5%** | 25.4% 1 | ||
| 2007 | 3 | 34.3% 1 | 15.9% 1 | 10.3% | 3.8% | 1.1% | 1.4%** | 33.3% 1 |
| 2011 | 3 | 16.5% | 23.7% 1 | 19.8% 1 | 6.3% | 0.8% | 3.0%** | 29.9% 1 |
| 2016*,**** | 3*** | 27.2% 1 | 13.5% | 13.7% 1 | 7.5% | 2.0% | 1.1%** | 35.1% 1 |
| 2020* | 3*** | 20.3% 1 | 8.8% | 17.1% 1 | 10.5% | 3.4% | 0.2%** | 39.7% 1 |
NOTES:
* Bye-Elections took place in 2000 and 2001. In 2016 and 2020 I’m using the tallies from the areas that will be in Tipperary South
** Votes for Others are as follows…. 1997 – Progressive Democrats 3.5% National Party 3.2%, 2002 – Progressive Democrats 3.5% 2002 – Christian Solidarity Party 0.3%, 2007 – Greens 1.5% Progressive Democrats 1.4%, 2011 – Greens 0.9%, 2016 – Greens 1.3%, 2020 – Greens 4.0% Irish Freedom Party 0.6%
*** In 2016 and 2020, three of the elected candidates in the five seat Tipperary constituency were from the five seat Tipperary constituency.
**** In 2016, the barony of Lower Ormond north of Nenagh was in the Offaly Constituency.
THE 2020 ELECTION
One of the most interesting contests in the soon-to-be-abolished five seat constituency is not the jousting between the various parties and Independents, but rather the tussle over whether the last seat will go to a North Tipperary or South Tipperary candidate.
In 2016, Alan Kelly of Labour (North) bested Tom Hayes of Fine Gael (South) by just over thirteen hundred votes, while in 2021 Jackie Cahill of Fianna Fáil (North) bested Garrett Ahearn (Fine Gael) by fifteen hundred votes.
In 2020, on the first count, Northern Candidates got 50.6% of the first preference votes compared to 49.4% for their southern counterparts. On the ninth and final count, Northern Candidates had 50.4% of the votes, compared to 49.6% for the remaining southern candidates (excluding non-transferables).
However – at every count inbetween – southern candidates actually had a majority of the votes. On the second last count, Mattie McGrath’s surplus went 2 to 1 to the remaining northern candidates (Cahill – FF and Kelly – LAB) over the one remaining southern candidate (Ahearn – FG). Browne (Sinn Féin), also of the south still had a small surplus to distribute but it would have been unlikely to make any substantial difference.
I might come back and have a closer look at this phenomenon later.
Above you can see the poll-toppers for the whole of the Tipperary constituency in 2020 with a white line signifying the coming constituency boundary- notice how far south Michael Lowry’s dominance extends south of the boundary into the area around Cashel. On the other hand, Fianna Fáil candidate Imelda Goldsboro managed to top the poll in one area (the rural DED of Buolick North) of the border.
The following table contains the party performance by Local Electoral Area.
| TYPE | FIANNA FAIL | FINE GAEL | SINN FEIN | LABOUR | OTHERS | INDS. | % |
| Nenagh | 14% | 8% | 9% | 23% | 4% | 42% | 29% |
| Newport | 17% | 8% | 7% | 40% | 5% | 22% | 15% |
| Roscrea-Templemore | 21% | 9% | 14% | 8% | 4% | 43% | 22% |
| Thurles | 27% | 7% | 10% | 5% | 5% | 46% | 25% |
| Cashel-Tipperary | 18% | 15% | 10% | 4% | 5% | 47% | 9% |
The following maps shows the largest parties across the new constituency.
Independents – Michael Lowry and in Lower Ormond Joe Hannigan – dominated across much of the Tipperary area of the new constituency. Fianna Fáil were ahead in both the Limerick and Kilkenny portions of the constituency.
Here are the support maps for the three candidates elected in the North Tipperary area.
Michael Lowry dominated much of the east of the constituency, taking 63% in his own area of Holycross and also in neighbouring Gaile. He polled around 40% in Thurles town.
Alan Kelly’s base is tightly concentrated in the town of Nenagh (41%) and surrounding villages such as Ballina (47%) and Portroe (61%).
Jackie Cahill’s vote had a slightly unusual linear pattern to it. His strongest polls were in Holyford and Upperchurch at 31%.
DEMOGRAPHIC
By my calculations – looking at the 2022 census figures and the tallies – just over half of those who voted in 2020 lived in Rural areas (i.e. Small Village and Rural Polling Stations), just over a sixth in smaller Urban areas (i.e. larger villages and small towns), and the remaining one third lived in larger Urban areas (in the case of North Tipperary – Roscrea, Nenagh and Thurles). Please note I’m not including the areas in Limerick City East and Carlow-Kilkenny in this analysis.
The party Support in each of these blocs was as follows :
| TYPE | FIANNA FAIL | FINE GAEL | SINN FEIN | LABOUR | OTHERS | INDEPENDENTS |
| Larger Urban | 22% | 6% | 14% | 20% | 5% | 33% |
| Smaller Urban | 15% | 8% | 9% | 17% | 7% | 44% |
| Rural | 20% | 8% | 8% | 13% | 4% | 47% |
In contrast to the South, Fianna Fáil did better in Urban areas -as indeed did Labour and Sinn Féin. By contrast, Independents did notably better in rural areas.
THE CONSTITUENCY REDRAW
The Constituency Commission recommended that the new Tipperary North consist of the entirety of the Nenagh, Newport, Templemore-Roscrea and Thurles electoral areas, as well as parts of Cashel-Tipperary and Carrick-On-Suir Electoral Areas in Tipperary as part of north-west Kilkenny.
The image below shows the poll-toppers in 2020 in the Tipperary part of the new Tipperary North in the next election. Michael Lowry tops the poll in much of the east; his fellow independent Joe Hannigan does similar in Lower Ormond. In Nenagh town and the rural area to the south (the Newport Electoral area) Alan Kelly was dominant.
Taking the party figures at face value – the tally for the new constituency would look like this.
| CONSTITUENCY | Fianna Fáil | Fine Gael | Sinn Féin | Labour | Others | Independents | % |
| Tipperary | 19.7% | 8.2% | 9.9% | 17.1% | 4.1% | 40.9% | 88 |
| Carlow-Kilkenny | 46.9% | 22.6% | 20.2% | 1.6% | 4.8% | 3.8% | 8 |
| Limerick City East | 31.9% | 21.0% | 21.9% | 13.0% | 9.5% | 2.7% | 4 |
| TOTAL | 22.3% | 9.9% | 11.2% | 15.7% | 4.4% | 36.5% |
However – that table does not take into account that obviously the same candidates that ran in 2020 in Carlow-Kilkenny will run in 2024 in Tipperary. The Personal Vote is a big factor, so I had a look at how the 2020 Tipperary candidates did in the areas immediately adjoining the areas coming into the constituency.
In the case of Carlow-Kilkenny, there are four DEDs neighbouring the area of Kilkenny moving into the constituency. The party totals there were : Fianna Fáil 33.7%, Fine Gael 9.9%, Sinn Féin 9.9%, Labour 4.3%, others 3.6%, Independents 38.6%. In the case of Limerick City East, there were again four DEDs neighbouring Newport and surrounding areas. The party totals there were : Fianna Fáil 14.4%, Fine Gael 9.3%, Sinn Féin 7.8%, Labour 42.3%, others 9.0%, Independents 16.9%.
If we were to assume that the the same numbers of people were to vote in both areas using the surrounding levels of support, the vote would look like this.
| CONSTITUENCY | Fianna Fáil | Fine Gael | Sinn Féin | Labour | Others | Independents | % |
| Tipperary | 19.7% | 8.2% | 9.9% | 17.1% | 4.1% | 40.9% | 88 |
| Carlow-Kilkenny | 33.7% | 9.9% | 9.9% | 4.3% | 3.6% | 38.6% | 8 |
| Limerick City East | 14.4% | 9.3% | 7.8% | 42.3% | 9.0% | 16.9% | 4 |
| TOTAL | 20.6% | 8.4% | 9.9% | 17.0% | 4.3% | 39.8% |
Clearly – using this type of analysis – both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael see a reduction in their vote while Labour and Independents gain. There still has to be another caveat that there will be a change in candidates this time which might mean that this geographic-based analysis is no longer so relevant.
The table below shows the effects of the redraw on the votes of the main candidates based in the noth of the county.
Mattie McGrath clearly benefits most, as he would have topped the poll on the above numbers. Martin Browne on the other hand would have seen his vote split between north and south, but still would have finished second. Seamus Healy would have seen the sizeable majority of his vote remain within the borders of the new constituency.
Both of the Fine Gael candidates see nearly half of their 2020 vote stay within the borders of the new Tipperary North and can only muster two thirds of a quota between them. Imelda Goldsboro of Fianna Fáil – who is based near the new constituency border – sees over a third of her 2020 vote go North. It should be noted however that Jackie Cahill TD took in excess of two thousand votes in the South.
| Candidate | Party | 2020GE | Quotas | NEW TOTAL | Quotas |
| Lowry | Independent | 14,802 (18.1%) | 1.09 | 9,467 (27.1%) | 1.08 |
| Cahill | Fianna Fáil | 7,940 (9.7%) | 0.58 | 4,546 (13.0%) | 0.52 |
| Kelly | Labour | 7,857 (9.6%) | 0.57 | 4,896 (16.8%) | 0.68 |
| Hannigan | Independent | 4,715 (5.8%) | 0.35 | 4,013 (11.3%) | 0.45 |
| O’Donnell | Green Party | 3,170 (3.9%) | 0.24 | 1,162 (3.3%) | 0.13 |
| Newman | Fine Gael | 4,926 (6.0%) | 0.36 | 1,942 (5.9%) | 0.24 |
| Farrell | Fianna Fáil | 2,233 (2.7%) | 0.16 | 1,703 (4.8%) | 0.19 |
The net result of the change would (on the 2020 figures) see Michael Lowry safely elected, with Jackie Cahill (if he was running) and Alan Kelly likely to join him.