The following Constituencies are now available :

MUNSTER	Clare	Tipp Nth	Tipp Sth
	Waterford	Kerry	Cork South-West
LEINSTER	Longford-Westmeath	Meath West	Wicklow
	Kildare North	Kildare South
DUBLIN	Dublin Central	Dublin Bay North	Dublin North-West
	Dublin Bay South	Dublin South-Central	Dublin Fingal West
	Dublin Fingal East	Dublin West
CONNAUGHT-ULSTER	Galway E	Mayo	Roscommon-Gal.
	Sligo – Leitrim	Cavan-Monaghan	Donegal

CLARE

Clare returned 2 Fianna Fáil TDs (Timmy Dooley and Cathal Crowe), 1 Fine Gael TD (Joe Cooney) and 1 Sinn Féin TD (Donna McGettigan). Cooney replaced retiring Fine Gael TD Joe Carey (whose sister Caitriona Carey fell short), while McGettigan replaced Independent (ex-SF) Violet Anne Wynne.

For the purposes of this analysis I’ve split the Constituency into four parts : Shannon EA in the south-east, largely rural Killaloe in the East, Ennis in the centre of the county, and the Ennistymon and Kilrush areas jointly in the west. Despite covering a large geographic area, the west did not elect a TD – on the other hand Shannon elected two.

The Shannon is one of the more unusual in the country. At one end is Shannon itself, a new town largely built in the 1960s and 1970s which had always had distinct voting patterns and where Sinn Féin have a strong base. At the other end is Shannon Banks, containing suburbs of Limerick City on the Clare side of the river. And in between are rural areas and small villages such as Meelick and Parteen.

Below are the poll-toppers in the largest urban areas in Clare.

The election in Clare was effectively over on the first count – the only possible contest was between Cooney and Carey for the Fine Gael seat. In the event, Cooney was 2,324 votes ahead on the first count and 2,328 on the sixteenth.

CANDIDATE	ENNIS	SHANNON	KILLALOE	WEST
Dooley (FF)	23%	9%	22%	20%
Crowe (FF)	11%	29%	8%	10%
McGettigan (SF)	12%	22%	9%	9%
Cooney (FG)	7%	8%	34%	6%
Carey (FG)	15%	9%	4%	7%
FF Toral	36%	39%	31%	43%
FG Total	25%	18%	39%	21%

DOOLEY (FF) polled well and fairly evenly across the north of the Constituency. His best polling station in Ennis was Scoil Chriost Ri in the west of the town where he took roughly a quarter of the vote. Rurally, he polled best in Dromindoora (41%) and Mounshannon (47%) in the north-east of the county – but also polled about a third of the vote in the vicinity of the Burren.

CROWE (FF) by contrast saw his vote highly concentrated in the Shannon Ekectoral Area – nearly half his vote came from here. He took 44% in Shannon Banks (an extension of the Limerick suburbs), 49% in Meelick and 46% in Parteen.

McGETTIGAN (SF) took 40% in Shannon, peaking at 45% in the St Senan’s boxes. She also took a quarter of the vote in the Shannon Banks boxes. In Ennis she took 14%, peaking at roughly 20% in Scoil Chriost Ri.

COONEY (FG) took over half his vote from his home Killaloe area in the east of the County. He took over half the vote in Annaghneal, Bodyke, Kilkishen and O’Callaghan’s Mills all of which lie on or near to the Ennis-Portumna Road. His running-mate Caitriona CAREY took 15% in the Ennis area (35% in Clarecastle), but failed to get traction elsewhere.

TIPPERARY NORTH

Tipperary North returned 1 Fianna Fáil TD (Ryan O’Meara), 1 Labour TD (Alan Kelly) and 1 Independent TD (Michael Lowry)

The reconstituted Tipperary North consists of the whole of Nenagh, Newport, Roscrea and Thurles Electoeal Areas as well as parts of Cashel-Tipperary Electoral Area and Castlecomer Electoral Area in Kilkenny.

The majority of the population live in the Eastern part of the constituency but two western candidates were elected (O’Meara and Kelly) out of the three seats.

For the purposes of this analysis I’ve split the Constituency into four parts : Nenagh, Newport, Roscrea and Thurles (including the parts of Cashel-Tipperary and Castlecomer).

Below are the poll-toppers in selected polling stations in the Constituency.

Lowry took a majority of his vote from the east of the constituency while both O’Meara and Kelly took a majority of theirs from the west. O’Meara was able to stay ahead of his running-mate Smith by outpolling him in Thurles.

CANDIDATE	NENAGH	N’PORT	R’CREA	THURLES
Lowry (IND)	19%	14%	33%	39%
Kelly (LAB)	27%	33%	4%	4%
O’Meara (FF)	23%	12%	6%	9%
Smith (FF)	4%	6%	30%	7%

LOWRY (IND) polled very well across the Constituency, although he only came second in Thurles to Jim Ry an (29% to 40%). He took over half the vote in Barnane (52%), Drom (55%), Borrisoleigh (51%), Ballycahill (55%), Drumbane (52%), Gaile (65%), Inch (53%), Annacarty (52%) and Clonoulty (55%). Even in Carlow he took over 40% in Galmoy (44%), Crosspatrick (44%) and Johnstown (43%).

KELLY (LAB) has the art of finite vote management down to a fine tee – 89% of his vote was concentrated in the two Western Electoral Areas of Nenagh and Newport. He took 42% in Nenagh Town, a strong performance given the pressure from O’Meara. He also took sizeable polls in Newport (34%), Lissenhall (47%), Portroe (61%) and Silvermines (40%).

O’MEARA (FF) took healthy polls in the rural north-west in Cloughjordan (37%), Ballinree (45%) and Kilruane (33%). He also took 20% in Nenagh.

Of the other Candidates, SMITH (FF) took a very strong 47% in Roscrea, but was unable to extend his influence far beyond the town – the rest of his strong boxes were within walking distance. RYAN (IND) took a very strong poll (40%) in Thurles, but again he failed to progress much beyond the town boundaries.

TIPPERARY SOUTH

The newly reconstituted Tipperary South returned 1 Fine Gael TD (Michael Murphy) and 2 Independent TDs (Mattie McGrath, ex-FF and Seamus Healy, ex-WUAG)

Two of the three seats were effectively decided on the first count – Mattie McGrath was nestled in just under the quota while Clonmel-based Michael Murphy was comfortably ahead of Imelda Goldsboro (FF) to take the one certain Government seat.

Outgoing SF TD Martin Browne was just under half a quota, a mere 142 votes ahead of veteran socialist Seamus Healy. Just over fifteen hundred votes belong to five candidates (including Aontu, the Greens and the National Party) were distributed on the second count closing the gap to 139 votes. On the third count, just under two thousand Labour votes were distributed, closing the gap further to 75 votes. On the fourth count, just under four thousand votes belonging to Tipperary-based Independent were distributed narrowing the gap further to just 36 votes.

The only distributable votes remaining was Mattie McGrath’s surplus of 322 votes which originated from the multiple eliminations on the first count. Of these, 169 (53%) went to Healy, 54 (17%) went to Browne, 52 (16%) to Goldsboro and 47 (14%) to Murphy – leaving Healy 79 votes ahead.

Given that a fair amount of those first preferences went originally to right-leaning minor it might seem odd that they would decisively favour the most left-wing candidate in the field (particularly as they arrived via Mattie McGrath) – but perhaps it is better to look at the above transfer through an Establishment-Opposition prism. With Sinn Féin being considered by this particular strand or niche of voter as being very much part of the Establishment.

Browne’s transfers took Healy well ahead of Goldsboro for the last seat.

Below are the performances of the candidates in each of three regions (West includes the Cahir and Cashel-Tipperary areas)

CANDIDATE	WEST	CLONMEL	CARRICK-ON-SUIR
McGRATH (IND)	32%	21%	14%
MURPHY (FG)	16%	33%	14%
HEALY (IND)	4%	21%	16%
BROWNE (SF)	12%	11%	14%
GOLDSBORO (FF)	11%	7%	28%
O’HENEY (IND)	18%	1%	1%

Just under half the votes were cast in the West, just over a quarter in Clonmel Area and just under a quarter in Carrick-on-Suir area.

McGRATH (IND) polled best in the largely rural Cahir area in the south-west where he took 47%. He took 62% in Newcastle, 59% in Duhill and 52% in Goatenbridge near the Waterford border. He also polled a third of the vote in the village of Dundrum, site of a long-running protest against immigrant accommodation. However, it should be noted that he took a decent vote right across the Constituency.

MURPHY (FG) took an impressive one-third of the vote in the Clonmel Area – all the more so given that he had to go toe-to-toe with Seamus HEALY (IND) in his stronghold in the town. Even there it was 32% to 24% in Murphy’s favour. He had telegraphed his strength by taking two quotas (29%) in June’s local elections. He also took 47% in the rural Powers town Polling Station.

However what is intriguing is the wide range of his voting strength in individual boxes in the town – sometimes even between boxes in the same polling station.

I’ve given a few examples in the table below :

BOX	Murphy (FG)	Healy (IND)	Browne (SF)
Res Hall 2	40 (15%)	99 (38%)	55 (21%)
Res Hall 3	145 (48%)	55 (18%)	27 (9%)
Raheen Rd TS 1	51 (23%)	80 (36%)	29 (12%)
Raheen Rd TS 2	70 (41%)	35 (20%)	13 (8%)
Sisters of Charity 1	21 (12%)	88 (49%)	23 (13%)
Sisters of Charity 4	61 (41%)	27 (18%)	9 (6%)

Note not only does the Healy vote fall in roughly inverse proportion to the Murphy vote, but so does the Browne vote. I would be tempted to say this is likely related to underlying socio-economic factors though of course there could be more specific local factors as well.

His best polls in the town were in the Presentation Convent (43%) and St Peter and Paul’s (40% but over half in two boxes). His lowest polls were St Mary’s (24%) and St Oliver Plunketts (21%)

HEALY (IND) saw his vote heavily concentrated in the towns of Clonmel (24%) and Carrick-on-Suir (40%) – in two boxes in Carrick-on-Suir his vote reached over 60%. In fact over half his vote came from these two towns alone.

Of the other candidates, GOLDSBORO (FF) polled well in the north-east of the constituency but was likely stymied by former party colleague Mattie McGrath’s continuing grip on Fianna Fáil voters elsewhere in the constituency. BROWNE (SF) was more competitive than I expected as his vote didn’t fall in line with Sinn Féin’s vote nationally – he polled 20% in both Cashel and Carrick-on-Suir. O’HENEY (IND) was very much a Local Man for Local People – over 90% of his vote came from the Cashel-Tipperary area and the vast majority of that vote was centered around Tipperary Town (where he took 39%) and surrounding rural areas.

WATERFORD

Waterford returned two Sinn Féin TDs (David Cullinane and Conor McGuinness), one Fianna Fáil TD (Mary Butler) and one Fine Gael TD (John Cummins).

Less than five hundred votes seperated Cllr Conor McGuinnesss (Sinn Féin) from outgoing Independent TD Matt Shanahan on the firstt counr, and given the latter’s supposed geographical advantage (being based in the city as opposed to McGuinness who was comparatively isolated in the wilds of West Waterford) he could have been forgiven if he had nurtured a cautious optimism during the long hours st the count centre.

However, the first count turned out to be the closest he ever got. By the sixth count, he was nearly fourteen hundred votes behind. However a glimmer of hope emerged when he took a very healthy skelp of the Aontu transfers to bring him back within 639 votes of McGuinness with Mary Roche’s (Social Democrats, formerly Independent/Fianna Fáil) 4,887 votes to be distributed.

He possibly still retained some hope as both he and Roche were Waterford City based – and indeed, he had replaced Roche when she stepped down (as an Independent) from the Council in 2018.However, it was not to be – Roche’s votes broke 35% to 27% for McGuinness giving him a winniing margin of just under a thousand votes.

The Map below shows the poll-toppers in selected polling stations (excluding the city).

Mary Butler topped the poll in her home town of Portlaw, but actually did best in Rural Areas of the south and West. Conor McGuinness polled well in Dungarvan and also rural areas to its south and west.

The Map below shows selected Polling Stations in Waterford City

David Cullinane dominated much of the west and south of the city, taking up to 60% of the vote. The vote was more nuanced in the east of the city, with Cummins taking a quarter of the vote in Ballygunner.

Finally, this map shows the poll-toppers in Dungarvan.

The reason I chose to have a look at Dungarvan is I noticed whilst looking through the tallies that there were clear differences between the five polling stations there – Scoil Mhuire on the east side (Abbeyside) of the river, the Fusion Centre on the south-west bank of the river, Saint Joseph’s and Saint Mary’s in the west of the town proper, and finally the village of Ballinroad about a mile to the east of the town which is now a de facto suburb thanks to the pull of the Celtic Tiger.

Mary Butler topped the poll with roughly a quarter of the vote in Ballinroad, Scoil Mhuire and the Fusion Centre while Conor McGuinness took about 40% in the west of the town.

Below is a table showing candidate performance in geographic areas of the constituency – the west includes Lismore and Dungarvan Electoral Areas (29% of the tallied vote), the centre is Portlaw-Kilmacthomas Electoral Area (17%) and Waterford City (54%)

CANDIDATE	WEST	CENTRE	CITY
Cullinane (SF)	6%	15%	34%
Cummins (FG)	20%	22%	18%
Butler (FF)	28%	25%	12%
McGuinness (SF)	26%	11%	2%
Shanahan (IND)	4%	10%	13%

I also broke down the three city areas into the Urban areas of East, South and West as well as separating Tramore and the Rural areas.

CANDIDATE	EAST	WEST	SOUTH	TRAMORE/R.
Cullinane (SF)	21%	42%	51%	24%
Cummins (FG)	22%	15%	12%	21%
Butler (FF)	13%	11%	9%	14%
McGuinness (SF)	3%	3%	3%	3%
Shanahan (IND)	19%	9%	7%	15%

CULLINANE (SF) polled well right across the Constituency, only dropping below 10% in the rural West of the constituency where his party colleague Conor McGuinness was based. In the city he took over half the vote in Ballybeg, Ballytruckle and Lisduggan.

CUMMINS (FG) was runner-up last time on a two man ticket, but in an impressive performance improved the Fine Gael vote against the national trend to gain a seat. His worst area ironically was his home area Waterford City South (13%) – though that probably has more to with demographics as WCS has the lowest proportion of middle-class households in the country. He took strong polls in the vicinity of the Comeragh Mountains – 37% in Coumaraglin, 36% in Rathgormack.

MARY BUTLER (FF) topped the poll in her hometown of Portlaw with a third of the vote but her best polls were in the rural West – 50% in Ballysaggart, 41% in Knockanore and Melleray. She didn’t have a running-mate in the city this time, so the Fianna Fáil vote in tbe city was down somewhat.

CONOR McGUINNESS (SF) took a creditable vote in Dungarvan (30%, rising to 40% in the west of the town). He also polled strongly along the coastline to the west – 43% in Ring, 31% in Ardmore. He took nearly 85% of the Sinn Féin vote in Dungarvan and about three quarters in Lismore, but less than half in Portlaw-Kilmacthomas which did leave him vulnerable to challenge.

Of the other candidates, Shanahan (IND) actually improved his vote from 2020, but as noted above geography did not come to his aid to allow him overtake McGuinness. It was somewhat ironic that the final nail in his electoral coffin were the transfers of Mary Roche (SD,ex-IND/FF) given that he replaced her on the council in 2019. He did best in the east of the city, though his strongest performance was in the village of Butlerstown (29%), a few miles west. Roche (SD) polled decently, her strongest poll being 8% each in Ballytruckle and Ballygunner in the south of the city. O’Cathasaigh (GP) was unexpectedly thrown into tbe Dáil in 2020; in 2024 he was unceremoniously thrown out. His vote didn’t top 5% anywhere in the city.

KERRY

The constituency of Kerry remained the same in the redraw, comprising the whole county of Kerry.

Kerry was an early stronghold for Fianna Fáil, with the party taking five out of seven seats in both the 1932 and 1933 elections – on the second occasion with 67% of the vote – and five out of the seven seats in the new Kerry North and South in 1937 and 1938. However from 1943 the vote fragmented somewhat, with Dan Spring’s Kerry North victory for Labour in 1943 heralding a 59 year unbroken run for Labour (though son Dick only survived by four votes in 1987), and both Clann Na Talmhan and Clann na Poblachta winning seats in Kerry North in 1954.

This time, Fianna Fáil won two seats (Norma Foley TD and Cllr Michael Cahill), the Healy-Raes two seats (Michael and Danny), and Sinn Féin one seat (Pa Daly TD). For the first since 1948 Fine Gael has no TD in Kerry.

On the first count, Michael Healy-Rae took nearly one and a half quotas (18,596 votes) – an increase on his 2020 votes. Only 47% of his 5,513 vote surplus went back to his brother Danny – clearly not all MHR voters bought into the concept of a Healy-Rae brand. The equivalent transfer rates in 2016 and 2020 were 53½% and 50% respectively.

There were effectively six candidates for the five seats – the sixth candidate Billy O’Shea (FG) started on 7,932 votes, 5,908 votes ahead of the next candidate Linda Gordon-Kelleher (FF). There were a further ten candidates under her. Altogether, the six competitive candidates took over 80% of the vote.

O’Shea started off 334 votes behind Michael Cahill (FF) – that was close as he got. The elimination of Lin da Gordon Kelleher (FF) on the tenth count stretched tbe margin to 1,083 which was reduced to 757 votes on the final count.

The following table details selected party transfers throughout the count.

PTY	CNT	FF	FG	SF	H-R	OTH	NT	VOTES
IFP	4th	10%	2%	11%	11%	59%	6%	816
PBP	5th	4%	2%	46%	3%	42%	3%	1,089
II	6th	34%	7%	12%	18%	22%	6%	1,181
LAB	11th	24%	16%		11%	33%	15%	2,438
AON	12th	22%	8%			9%	61%	2,897
GP	13th	40%	23%				37%	3,439

Note the “anti-establishmenr” transfer patterns of some of the smaller parties – over half of the Irish Freedom Party transfers went to parties other than the big three or the Healy-Raes. Later – with most smaller parties eliminated – more than half of Aontu transfers were non-transferable.

A third of Independent Ireland transfers went to Fianna Fáil – II candidate Tom McEllistrim was of course a former Fianna Fáil TD. It’s also notable that Fianna Fáil did better than Fine Gael in all the counts listed above, even those from Labour and Fine Gael.

For the purposes of this analysis I’ve split the Constituency into ftwo parts : the three northern LEAs (Listowel, Tralee and Castleisland) and the three southern LEAs (Killarney, Dingle, Kenmare).

CANDIDATE	NORTH	SOUTH
M Healy-Rae (IND)	24%	23%
D Healy-Rae (IND)	8%	15%
Daly (SF)	20%	9%
Foley (FF)	20%	5%
Cahill (FF)	3%	19%
O’Shea (FG)	10%	10%
FF Total	24%	29%
SF Total	21%	11%

MICHAEL HEALY-RAE (IND) – The fact that Michael Healy Rae (IND) took nearly a quarter of the vote in both North and South Kerry is testament to his immense appeal to Kerry voters across the county. He topped the poll (44%) in the hamlet of Tuosist deep in the Beara peninsula – he also topped in the village of Ballylongford (31%) on the banks of the Shannon estuary. According to Google Maps, Ballylongford and Ballylongford are eighty miles apart by road and expected travel time between them is two hours and one minute. One can’t help presume that there are markedly different dialects of Kerryonian spoken in the two localities which if nothing else are testament to MHR’s linguistic skills.

Despite polling nearly a quarter of the vote across the constituency, he only took over half the vote in three boxes, Knockanure (50%) in Listowel, and Lauragh (65%) and Tahilla (63%) in Kenmare.

He topped the poll across the Dingle peninsula, the west and south of the Iveragh peninsula and the kerry portion of the Beara peninsula.

In Listowel he took one third of the vote – all the more remarkable given that the Healy-Raes don’t have a Councillor in the area.

PA DALY (SF) saw his vote fall by a quarter since 2020 and had to wait until the 7th count to be elected this time – this can be partially explained by the presence of a running mate who took 1½% of the vote. He topped the poll in Tralee with 29% of the vote, reaching 40% in some parts of the town.

DANNY HEALY-RAE (IND) saw his vote tightly corralled into Killarney Electoral Area and part of Castleisland Electoral Area under the terms of the Healy-Rae Electoral strategy. He took just over two-thirds of the Healy-Rae vote in the former Area and about three-fifths in the latter. He also took about one-sixth in the Kenmare area, mainly due to the presence of Kilgarvan where Danny took 41% of the vote and Michael 31%. His biggest polls were along the Cork border at Gneevenagullia (61%), Meentogues (53%) and Rathmore (50%).

NORMA FOLEY (FF) polled strongly in Tralee (where she took 27% , just behind Pa Daly, and was ahead in teo of the five main polling stations in the town) and its hi nterland. Overall she topped the poll in Tralee Electoral Area taking a quarter of the vote and also one fifth of the vote in Listowel Electoral Area. She polled strongest in rural areas adjacent to Tralee Town – Spa, Blennerville and Listellick, all around 35%

MICHAEL CAHILL (FF) polled strongly in the greater Killorglin area and along the Northern shore of the Iveragh peninsula. He polled strongest in Glenbeigh (71%) and Cromane (54%).

The only other candidates to poll competitively was Billy O’Shea (FG). His downfall was his failure to achieve any meaningful local advantage in his local area of Kenmare – he only got 11%. Even in his hometown of Killorglin he was out-polled by Michael Cahill by 40% to 17%. He actually polled better in the Listowel area, and took over 20% in Coolard and Tarbert, but in each case behind Michael Healy-Rae.

Cork South-West

Between 1981 and 2002, the three seat Cork South-West constituency was consistenly Fine Gael’s gilt-edged constituency, returning P.J.Sheehan and Jim O’Keeffe in every election. They repeated the feat in 2011. Yet in both 2020 and 2024 they failed to return a single seat.

Three TDs were returned – Michael Collins (Indpendent Ireland), Holly Cains (Social Democrats) and Christopher O’Sullivan (Fianna Fáil).

Fine Gael actually outpolled Fianna Fáil (11,125 to 9,115 votes) but were unable to hold that advantage as their internal transfer rate was insufficient.

Selected transfers are shown in the table below.

PTY	CNT	FF	FG	II	SD	OTH	NT	VOTES
GP	3rd	8%	17%	3%	46%	25%	1%	352
PBP	4th	3%	1%	4%	49%	39%	4%	369
LAB	5th	9%	16%	8%	48%	13%	6%	533
AON	6th	7%	12%	51%	6%	16%	8%	821
SF	8th	4%	4%	27%	44%	8%	13%	2,152

The first three transfers all came from candidates on the left of the spectrum – all three saw transfers of nearly half the votes to the Social Denocrats. Note however that the Greens and Labour were much more likely to transfer to the “Establishment” parties (25%) than People Before Profit (4%).

Also note the diifference between these vote patterns and that of Aontu’s – in the former category 48% of the vote went to the Social Democrats and only 6% to Independent Ireland, but Aontu’s transfer went 6% to 51%, a near perfect reversal. It’s also interesting to note that while 44% of Sinn Féin’s transfers went to the SDs, over a quarter went to Independent Ireland.

On the first count, Holly Cairns (SD) was 306 votes ahead of Christopher O’Sullivan (FF) who in turn was 2,993 votes ahead of Noel O’Donovan (FG). By the 10th count (when Cairns was elected) she had stretched her lead over O’Sullivan to 1,827 votes who in turn had increased his lead over O’Donovan to 3,602 votes.

On the final count, O’Donovan received 3,323 votes from his running mate Tim Lombard, a transfer rate of 56.8%. 1,824 votes went to O’Sullivan – over 30% – leaving O’Donovan some 2,103 votes adrift. The minimum transfer O’Donovan would have required to be elected (assuming no change in the numbers of non-transferable votes) therefore would have been 4,375 – just under three quarters of the vote.

To put that in context, recent transfer rates for Fine Gael in the constituency are as follows : 58.6% (2020) and 64.2% (2011). It was a high bar.

CANDIDATE	WEST	CENTRAL	EAST
Collins (II)	34%	22%	17%
Cairns (SD)	22%	19%	19%
O’Sullivan (FF)	16%	22%	17%
O’Donovan (FG)	13%	23%	5%
Lombard (FG)	4%	3%	19%

COLLINS (IND) polled strongly across the Constituency except perhaps its easternmost tip. He topped the poll in three of the four largest towns (Bandon 31%, Skibbereen 31%, Bantry 37%). He topped the poll in Goleen (39%) on the Mizen Peninsula in far west and in the commuter village of Riverstick (29%) on the outskirts of Cork City – over sixty miles apart by road. His vote was down slightly from 2020. His highest polls were in Cahermore (45%) and Schull (42%).

CAIRNS (SD) more than doubled her vote from 2020 in a very strong performance. She topped the poll in Kinsale (26%) and like Collins topped the poll from the west to the east of the constituency.

O’SULLIVAN (FF) topped the poll in the town of Clonakilty (29%). He polled strongly in the centre of the constituency, taking 32% in Courtmacsherry and 34% in Drinagh and Derryclogh.

Of the other candidates, O’Donovan (FG) went toe-to-toe with O’Sullivan in the centre of the constituency and actually outpolled him in the Clonakilty-Skibbereen area by a handful of votes but failed to run up the big totals necessary. His best poll was 39% in Rosscarbery. Lombard (FG) was similarly unable to dominate the Eastern part of the constituency with decent polls from O’Sullivan, Cairns and Collins. His best poll was in the easternmost polling station in the constituency, Minane Bridge (41%).

LONGFORD-WESTMEATH

Longford-Westmeath returned 2 Fine Gael TDs (Michael Carrigy and Peter Burke), 1 Fianna Fáil TD (Robert Troy) , 1 Sinn Féin TD (Sorca Clarke TD) and 1 Independent TD (Kevin Moran).

Longford-Westmeath became a five seater for the first time, but only returned one Longford TD as compared to four for Westmeath. By contrast in 2007, two of the four elected TDs were from Longford.

There were no surprises in Longford-Westmeath. In Westmeath the top four candidates were all more than four thousand votes ahead of their nearest challenger (Paul Hogan of Independent Ireland), while in Longford Michael Carrigy of Fine Gael led incumbent Joe Flaherty (Fianna Fáil) by nearly two thousand votes.

For the purposes of this analysis I’ve split the Constituency into five parts : the whole county of Longfo rd, and the four electoral areas of Westmeath : Athlone, Moate, Mullingar and Kinnegad. Each of the five candidates elected did best in a single one of those areas.

Below is a map of the poll-toppers in the largest Urban areas.

Much of the Kinnegad area had been in Meath West in 2020 – in other words parts of East Westmeath returned westwards from Meath West into Longford-Westmeath. Try saying that at speed after a few pints of Arthur’s finest.

CANDIDATE	L’FORD	A’LONE	MOATE	M’GAR	K’GAD
Burke (FG)	2%	5%	24%	40%	28%
Troy (FF)	2%	4%	28%	19%	22%
Moran (IND)	4%	54%	13%	1%	2%
Carrigy (FG)	34%	1%	1%	0%	1%
Clarke (SF)	7%	7%	10%	17%	20%
Flaherty (FF)	25%	1%	1%	0%	1%

BURKE (FG) took a very impressive 37% out of Mullingar town. He took 47% in the Gaelscoil in the south of the town and 44% in the Presentation Convent in the east. He took over half the vote in Ballinea, Curraghmore and Walshestown.

TROY (FF) took 60% in his home village of Ballinacarrigy. He polled well through the centre of the county, also taking over a third of the vote in Ballymore, Rathowen and Tyrrellspass.

MORAN (IND) polled over 50% in the town of Athlone, polling best in its Eastern areas and nearby communities such as Coosan (68%), rural Cornamaddy (73%) and Glasson (58%). He also polled well in neighbouring areas of the Moate Electoral Area (Moate 24%, Mount Temple 37%) and also areas along the South Longford border (Ballymahon 19%, Kenagh 10%)

CARRIGY (FG) took one third of the vote in Longford. He was narrowly outpolled by FLAHERTY (FF) in the southern Ballymahon Electoral Area (26% to 29%) and in Longford Town (28% to 28%) but compensated by beating him 49% to 17% in the northern Granard Electoral Area. He took over half the vote in Aughnacliffe and Ballinalee.

MEATH WEST

Meath West returned 1 Fianna Fáil TD (Aisling Dempsey), 1 Sinn Féin TD (Johnny Guirke) and 1 Aontu TD (Peadar Toibin).

Dempsey was just over seven hundred votes ahead of Linda Murray Nelson of Fine Gael on the final count.

The Constituency consists of the whole of the Navan and Trim Electoral Areas, the southern part of the Kells Electoral Area and a small portion of the Ratoath Electoral Area.

CANDIDATE	KELLS	NAVAN	TRIM
Guirke (SF)	35%	23%	16%
Toibin (AON)	16%	30%	13%
Dempsey (FF)	21%	13%	21%
Nelson (FG)	16%	18%	15%

The part of the Kells area in the North is largely rural and contains the small towns of of Athboy and Oldcastle. The Navan area is dominated by the town where over 80% of the voters live. The Trim area (with the bir of Ratoath) lies to the south – Trim and Navan contain roughly 40% of the votes each and Kells just under 20%.

Below is a map of the poll-toppers in the larger towns and villages in the Constituency.

GUIRKE (SF) polled very strongly in his base of Oldcastle (59%) in the far north-west of the constituency as well as surrounding rural areas Ballinlough (61%) and Ballinacree (44%). In Navan, he took a quarter of the vote rising to 32% in Scoil Mhuire in the centre of the town. His vote was lighter in the south of the constituency although he did take 30% in Castlejordan.

TOIBIN (AON) maintained and slightly improved upon his strong 2020 vote in Navan Town taking 30% there, rising to 35% in the north-west of the town.

DEMPSEY (FF) polled moderately in Navan but compensated by pulling a surprisingly decent vote from the North of the Constituency. She took 50% in Batterstown and 30% in Baconstown in the Trim area, but also 24% in Athboy in the Kells area.

NELSON (FG) outpolled Dempsey by over seven hundred votes in Navan, but this was cancelled out by her failure to match Dempsey in the Kells and Trim areas. In Navan she polled best in the Johnstown boxes (20%).

Of the remaining candidates, NOEL FRENCH (IND) took 22% in the Trim Local Electoral Area, but it wasn’t enough to put him in the frame. His vote peaked at 37% in Longwood. RONAN MOORE (SD) took 9% in the Trim Area and 6% in Navan.

WICKLOW

Wicklow dropped a seat this time to four with the southernmost part of the constituency going into the new Wicklow-Wexford constituency.

It returned two Fine Gael TDs (Simon Harris and Edward Timmons), one Sinn Fein TD (John Brady) and one Social Democrat TD (Jennifer Whitmore).

Bray East, Bray West, Greystones and Wicklow Electoral Area all lie within the boundaries of the new Wicklow constituency. In addition the majority of the land and population of the Baltinglass Electoral Area lie within the Constituency, as well a tiny bit of Arklow.

One TD was elected from the Bray Areas (Brady), two from Greystones (Harris and Whitmore) and one from Baltinglass (Timmons) – Roughly 30% of the votes were cast in Bray, 27% in Greystones, 26% in Wicklow and 17% in Baltinglass.

CANDIDATE	BRAY	G’STONES	W’LOW	B’GLASS
Harris (FG)	31%	46%	24%	15%
Brady (SF)	19%	10%	16%	13%
Whitmore (SD)	12%	20%	21%	8%
Timmons (FG)	1%	1%	3%	24%
Donnelly (FF)	5%	6%	6%	8%

Edward Timmins (FG) was the first candidate to win a seat from West of the mountains since his brother Billy in 2011. He started off 503 votes behind Stephen Donnelly, but his receipt of 46% of Simon Harris’ surplus but him 941 votes ahead. By the 12th count, he had extended the leaf to nearly fourteen hundred votes and Shay Cullen’s elimination left the difference at 1.563 v otes.

As can be seen, the large urban centres on the East Coast are largely indistinguishable. More detailed maps are available below.

DUBLIN CENTRAL

DUBLIN CENTRAL

Dublin Centra l returned 1 Fine Gael TD (Paschal Donohue), 1 Social Democrat (Gary Gannon) , 1 Labour (Marie Sherlock) and 1 Sinn Féin TD (Mary Lou McDonald).

Marie Sherlock narrowly beat Gerry Hutch for the final seat.

The Constituency consists of two Electoral Areas – Cabra-Glasnevin and North Inner City. Roughly 60% of the votes were cast in the Cabra-Glasnevin area.

CANDIDATE	CABRA-GLAS.	N.I. CITY
McDonald (SF)	20%	19%
Donohue (FG)	20%	12%
Gannon (SD)	13%	13%
Sherlock (LAB)	9%	5%
Hutch (IND)	5%	16%

The North Inner City is predominantly working-class, while Cabra-Glasnevin area is more mixed with a sizeable middle-class population in the north and east of the area (Glasnevin, Drumcondra, Phibsboro) and more heavily working-class areas in the west around Cabra.

Below are the poll-toppers in selected polling stations across the Constituency.

McDONALD (SF) polled fairly evenly across the North Inner City (15%-25); her running mate Janice Boylan polled around 6%. She polled best in West Cabra (45%), but only about 10% in Dumcondra, Glasnevin and Phibsboro.

DONOHUE (FG) polled better in the Cabra-Glasnevin area than he did in the North Inner City, though he did poll around 15% along the North Circular Road and in Stonybatter. In Cabra-Glasnevin, he polled 30% in Glasnevin, 25% in Drumcondra, and about 20% in Phibsboro. He polled 10% in West Cabra and only 5% in Sean McDermott Street.

GANNON (SD) polled more evenly across the Constituency, though like Donohue he polled best in Drumcondra (18%) and worst in Cabra West and Sean McDermot Street (5% and 6%).

SHERLOCK (LAB) polled a steady 10% across Glasnevin, Drumcondra and Stoneybatter peaking at 17% in Phibsboro. She only took 1% in Sean McDermott Street.

HUTCH (IND) took over two-thirds of his vote of his vote from the North Inner City, peaking at 44% in Sean McDermot Street and 36% on the North Wall. He also took over one fifth of the vote in Marlborough Street and Gardiner Street. By contrast he was received rather more coolly in Drumcondra and Phibsboro (2%) and Glasnevin (1%). His highest poll outside the Inner City was in Cabra West (10%).

Of the other candidates, outgoing TD Neasa Hourigan (GP) peaked at 11% in Phibsboro, Mary FitzPatrick (FF) polled 10-15% in Glasnevin and Drumcondra but only about 4% in the Inner City and Malachy Steenson polled over 10% in the North and East Walls, the North Strand and Sean McDermott Street but was clearly stymied by the pulling power of Gerry Hutch in that area.

DUBLIN BAY NORTH

Dublin Bay North returned 1 Fianna Fáil TD (Tom Brabazon), 1 Fine Gael TD (Naoise O’Muiri), 1 Sinn Fein TD (Denise Mitchell), 1 Social Democrat (Cian O’Callaghan) and 1 Independent (Barry Heneghan).

For the purposes of this analysis I’ve split the Constituency into four parts : the electoral areas of Clontarf, Howth-Malahide, Donaghmede and Artane-Whitehall.

Clontarf and the part of Howth-Malahide in DBN lie along the coast and have a predominantly middle-class population. Donagmede and particularly the part of Artane-Whitehall within DBN are more working-class.

Below are the Poll-Toppers in selected Polling Stations in Dublin Bay North.

Barry Heneghan started off in 8th place on 3,602 votes (less than one third of a quota) and in the firseight counts only picked up about eight hundred votes – although he did overtake Micheal O’Donnacha of Sinn Féin on the 8th count. However, with the election of Cian O’Callaghan, he quickly became the favoured recipient of left-leaning/Independent transfers.

• * 9th count – 785 (29%) of Michael Burke’s votes.
• * 10th count – 904 (25%) of Aontu votes.
• * 11th count – 909 (23%) of Labour votes.
• * 12th count – 1,728 (32%) of Sinn Féin votes.

The Aontu votes took him into 5th place ahead of Tormey (FG) and Heney (FF) and he maintained that lead.

CANDIDATE	A-W’HALL	C’TARF	D’MEDE	H-M’HIDE
O”Callaghan (SD)	8%	14%	11%	29%
Mitchell (SF)	32%	9%	15%	6%
Brabazon (FF)	8%	5%	20%	9%
O’Muiri (FG)	4%	16%	5%	6%
Heneghan (IND)	3%	10%	3%	3%
Heney (FF)	4%	15%	4%	6%
FF Toral	13%	20%	24%	15%
FG Total	7%	23%	11%	26%
SF Total	36%	11%	27%	11%

O’CALLAGHAN (SD) polled very impressively in the Fingal part of the constituency taking big polls in Howth (34%), Baldoyle (30%), Sutton (28%) and Bayside (23%). He polled decently throughout the Constituency, only dipping below 10% in the Artane-Whitehall area. Notably he took over 20% in the Fairview/Marino area.

MITCHELL (SF) saw her strongest vote in the Artane-Whitehall area where it reached over 40% in Darndale and Priorswood – in 2020 she polled over 70% in those boxes. She got a decent vote as far south as Donnycarney and east to Raheny.

BRABAZON (FF) took a big personal vote out of the Donagmede area which saw Fianna Fáil double its vote there. He took over one fifth of the vote in Ayrfield, Edenmore and Grange. He also polled decently in parts of Coolock.

O’MUIRI (FG) inherited Bruton’s vote in the south of the constituency and topped the poll in the Clontarf area. He took 25% in Belgrove.

HENEGHAN (IND) was elected more due to his transfers than his first preferences and only took over 10% of the vote in three polling stations – two in Clontarf, one in Killester.

HENEY (FF) polled well in the Clontarf Area (17% in Killester, 18% in East Drumcondra) but it wasn’t enough to put her in contention.

Of the other candidates, MacDonnacha of Sinn Féin polled best in the Donaghmede area. Folan (LAB) failed to hold onto O’Riordain’s Labour seat – he polled 9% in Raheny and 7% in Killester. Four candidates (Burke, FitzSimons, Garrigan, Coyle) ran on varying types of anti-immigration platforms – they took 6% between but support climbed above 10% in Priorswood, Darndale and Coolock.

DUBLIN NORTH-WEST

Dublin North-West lost parts of the west and north of the Constituency to Dublin Fingal West and Dublin North- West – in return parts of Beaumont came in from Dublin Bay North in the east.

The Constituency returned three TDs : Dessie Ellis TD (Sinn Féin), Paul McAuliffe TD (FF) and Rory Hearne (SD). Cathleen Carney-Boud came fourth.

Roughly two-thirds of the vote came from the Ballymun-Finglas Electoral Area in the west – this includes heavily working-class Ballymun and Finglas as well as the more socially mixed Ballygalll and parts of Glasnevin. In the east one-third of the vote was cast in the parts of Artane-Whitehall and Clontarf electoral areas going in the constituency – again this area tended to be more socially mixed, the main areas being Whitehall and Beaumont.

Sinn Féin polled well in Finglas and Ballymun, though their vote was down from last time. Hearne topped the poll in a competitive Ballygall, though Rock did manage to get ahead in Glasnevin. McAuliffe topped the poll in north-east Finglas and also in Beaumont in the Eastern edge of the constituency (which was in Dublin Bay North last time).

CANDIDATE	B’MUN-FINGLAS	ARTANE – W’HALL
Hearne (SD)	11%	20%
McAuliffe (FF)	12%	16%
Ellis (SF)	23%	6%
C-Boud (SF)	13%	14%
Rock (FG)	7%	20%

HEARNE (SD) polled best in Whitehall taking roughly a quarter of the vote. He also took over 20% of the vote in Ballymun Library, North Glasnevin and in parts of Beaumont. His vote fell to 5% in the more working-class parts of Ballymun and Finglas.

McAULIFFE (FF) took a quarter of the vote in north-east Finglas. He polled at least 10% in all Finglas polling stations bar Rivermount (7%). He also took over 20% in much of Beaumont. He only took about 4% in Ballymun proper.

ELLIS (SF) took over 30% in three polling stations, the highest being 43% in Rivermount. He was under 10% in much of Beaumont. His running mate Carney-Boud (SF)

DUBLIN SOUTH-CENTRAL

Dublin South-Central returned four TDs – Catherine Ardagh (Fianna Fáil), Aengus O’Snodaigh (Sinn Féin), Maire Devine (Sinn Féin) and Jen Cummins (Social Democrats).

Dublin South-Central was arguably the most left-wing in the country in 2020, returning three left-wing parties (Sinn Féin, Solidarity-People Before Profit, Independents 4 Change) and one Centre-Left one (the Greens).

This time, the Constituency was on paper even more working-class, with the transfer of of mainly middle-class areas in Templeogue and Terenure in the south of the Constituency going into Dublin South-West. Indeed, the combined FF/FG vote fell to under a quota from 22.7% to 18.9% (mainly due to a slide in the Fine Gael vote) – but the transfer between the two parties was greatly increased from 30% (Fianna Fáil to Fine Gael) in 2020 to 51% (Fine Gael to Fianna Fáil) in 2024. A 51% transfer in 2020 would have seen Fine Gael take the final seat at the expense of Independents For Change.

Dublin South-Central this time was incredibly competitive – the top candidate (Aenghus O’Snodaigh) only got 60% of a quota on the first count, and no less than nine other candidates got over half his vote (ie over 30% of a quota). That said, at the end of the day the top four candidates on the first count were the candidates eventually elected on the 14th and 15th counts.

The fascinating battle in this constituency was between Jen Cummins (Social Democrats) and Hazel De Nortuin (Solidarity-People Before Profit) who was hoping to succeed Brid Smith. Cummins started just 16 votes ahead of De Nortuin, but fell behind her on the 3rd count and didn’t regain the advantage until the tenth count (Green transfers) but went behind again by 434 votes on the 13th count (Right 2 Change transfers), only to be thrown well ahead on the 14th count (Labour transfers).

A summation of the main transfers can be seen below

COUNT	PARTY	VOTES	SF	FF	SD	PBP	R2C	FG	LAB
8	IFP	1,326	11%	1%	2%	7%	9%	1%	2%
9	AON	2,178	21%	8%	5%	8%	10%	4%	3%
10	GP	2,372	4%	10%	31%	6%	4%	11%	33%
11	FG	3,451	5%	51%	6%	3%	5%		14%
13	R2C	3,960	26%	12%	12%	25%			9%
15	LAB	4,333	12%	20%	44%	13%

A few interesting things to note here….

Firstly more than a quarter of the Irish Freedom Party (IFP) vote went to left-wing candidates (SF/PBP/R2C) – only about 6% went to centre-left candidates (LAB/GP/SD) and a mere 2% went to Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. A further one-third went to Aontu. Clearly the transfer pattern was a pro/anti-establisment one rather than a classic left-right one.

A similar-ish pattern can be seen on the next count where nearly 40% of the Aontu transfers went to left-wing candidates.

Nearly two-thirds of the Green vote went to fellow centre-left parties the Greens and the Social Democrats.

Half the Right 2 Change vote went to Sinn Féin and People Before Profit, but what caught the eye here was that 12% went to Fianna Fáil – a very high transfer rate for that combination.

Finally, nearly half the Labour vote went to the Social Democrats, ensuring that they would take the last seat ahead of People Before Profit.

Below is a map showing the Poll-Toppers in selected polling stations.

O’Snodaigh and Doolan shared the big Sinn Fèin vote in Ballyfermot, while Devine topped the poll in the Coombe area of the city. Cummins topped the poll between there and the South Circular Road. Collins and Ardagh both topped the poll in stations in Crumlin and the latter also topped the poll in Walkinstown. Seery-Kearney topped the poll in Chapelizod.

Below is a table showing the results by LEA. Just under half the votes cast were from Ballyfermot-Drimnagh, and just over a quarter each from South-West Inner City and Kimmage-Rathmines.

For the Right-Wing figure, I’m including “Far Right” candidates Independent Dolores Webster, and the the Irish People and Irish Freedom Party candidates as well right-leaning candidates Independent Phillip Sutcliffe and Aontu.

CANDIDATE	B’FERMOT-DRIMNAGH	SWIC	KIMMAGE-R’MINES
Ardagh (FF)	10%	10%	12%
Cummins (SD)	5%	14%	10%
O’Snodaigh (SF)	15%	7%	12%
Devine (SF)	7%	14%	12%
De Nortuin (PBP)	12%	8%	6%
SF Total	37%	24%	28%
FF/FG Total	18%	19%	20%
SD/GP/LAB Total	13%	36%	17%
PBP/R2C Total	19%	11%	19%
Right-Wing Total	12%	7%	10%

Whats interesting here is that the difference between the “Left” (SF/PBP/R2C) and the “Establishment” parties (FF/FG) is actually less than that between the Left and the Centre-Left (LAB/SD/GP). Take for instance Ballyfermot-Drimnagh where the combined vote for the Left was 56%, more than four times the vote for the Centre-Left – however to the east in the South West Inner City, both blocs took just over a third of the vote.

ARDAGH (FF) polled best in parts of Crumlin, Drimnagh and Walkinstown, peaking at 19% in Crumlin Scout Hall. Her lowest poll was 3% in Cherry Orchard.

O’SNODAIGH (SF) polled best at just over 15% in Ballyfermot, performing best in the Family Resource Centre at 20%. He also polled decently in Drimnagh and Crumlin.

CUMMINS (SD) polled best in the South-West Inner City, peaking at nearly a quarter of the vote in Donore Avenue just north of the canal. She also polled decently in adjacent parts of Crumlin, but took a negligible vote in Ballyfermot.

DEVINE (SF) polled best in the parts of the Inner City closer to the Liffey, peaking at 17%. She also polled decently in parts of Crumlin.

Of the other candidates, Doolan (SF) polled very well in Ballyfermot proper – taking over a quarter of the vote there – but failed to attract many votes elsewhere. De Nortuin (PBP) took a very healthy 17% in Ballyfermot but otherwise she polled a fairly constant 6 to 8% across the Constituency rising to 10% in parts of the Inner City. Seery-Kearney (FG) topped the poll in the middle-class enclave of Chapelizod (21%), but was unable to gain traction in much of the rest of the constituency.

The Joint Tally for right-wing candidates showed highest support in Central Drimnagh and South Ballyfermot at 15%. It was lowest in the Basin Street area of the Inner City at 6%.

DUBLIN BAY SOUTH

There was a very minor adjustment here with Harold’s Cross going into Dublin South-Central.

Dublin Bay South is predominantly middle-class but still has a significant working-class presence in the Inner City and Ringsrnd. It also has a very high proportion of renters.

It returned four TDs – Cllr James Geoghegan (FG), Ivana Bacik TD (LAB), Jim O’Callaghan (FF) and Cllr Eoin Hayes (SD). Chris Andrews of Sinn Féin was the runner-up.

Dublin Bay South – or more appropriately its predecessors Dublin South-East and Dublin Townships – were always strongholds for Fine Gael up until the turn of the century.

In 1938 – when Fianna Fáil took 52% of the national vote – Fine Gael took two out of three seats in Dublin Townships. In Dublin South-East, they took two out of three in both 1954 and 1973. The Constituency revision of 1980 saw the Constituency assume the boundaries pretty much as it today.

The real battle for the last seat was between Sinn Féin’s outgoing TD Chris Andrews (4,872 votes, 12.2%) and Social Democrat Eoin Hayes (3,615 votes, 9.1%). Crucially for Hayes he started off 365 votes ahead of Cllr Hazel Chu of the Green Party. Given the narrowness of the margin, one would wonder if the result had been different if Eamon Ryan had stood again.

The following tables shows the important transfers during the count.

COUNT	PARTY	VOTES	FG	FF	LAB	SD	SF	GP
5	PBP	1,413	<1%	1%	10%	45%	25%	8%
8	GP	3,680	23%	4%	43%	22%	4%
10	FG	2,693		88%		11%	1%
11	FF	1,794				44%	5%
12	LAB	585				45%	6%

The first major transfer was that of People Before Profit’s Brigid Purcell (1,413 votes) on the fifth count. Only 1% went to the three Fianna Fáil/Fine Gael candidates combined. A quarter of the transfer went to Sinn Féin, but nearly half went to the Social Democrats – by contrast only 18% went to the two other Centre-Left parties. One would suspect that the Social Democrats’ purity not being tainted by a recent spell in Government is a factor. The gap between Andrews (5,518) and Hayes (4,361) after this count was 1,157.

The next two counts consisted of the Independents O’Connell and Delahanty. Roughly one-third of O’Connell’s votes went back to her erstwhile Fine Gael colleagues. O’Connell’s votes slightly favoured Hayes, while Delahanty’s slightly favoured Andrews. At the end Andrews’ lead was slightly extended to 1,236 votes. Incidentally, Delahanty’s votes also put Hayes marginally ahead of Emma Blain (FG)

The eighth count saw the transfer of the Green Party’s Cllr Hazel Chu’s 3,680 votes. Two-thirds went to the other centre-left parties with Labour (43%) being favoured over the Social Democrats (22%) by nearly two to one. Of the other parties, Fine Gael received 22% and Fianna Fáil and Sinn Féin only 4% each. The difference in the transfers to Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil – despite the FFG jibes, Green voters at least seem to discern a sizeable difference between the Civil War. Overall the transfer patterns seem to suggest that current Green voters are on the centrist side of the Centre-Left voting bloc. Andrews’ lead was reduced by exactly seven hundred votes to 536.

The next count saw the transfer of Cllr Emma Blain’s votes 5,517. Nearly 70% went to her running mate Cllr James Geoghegan who was elected as was Ivana Bacik (LAB). Andrews’ lead was further reduced to just 466 votes.

On the tenth count, Geoghegan’s surplus of 2,693 votes was distributed. Well over two thousand (88%) went to Jim Callaghan (FF) electing him, 11% to Hayes (SD) and a mere 1% to Andrews whose lead was now only 191 votes.

On the eleventh count, Callaghan’s (FF) 1,794 surplus (via FG) was distributed. Only half the papers were transferable but of those that were went nearly 9 to 1 to Hayes over Andrews, leaving the latter 496 votes behind.

The last throw of the dice for Andrews was Bacik’s 585 vote surplus, but given that the votes had come via two Fine Gael candidates, the auspices were not favourable. And so it was with a very similar transfer to the previous count – Andrews only got 36 votes compared to 263 for Hayes whose final margin of victory was 723 votes.

The transfer pattern reminds me of an old sitcom : “Everybody Hates Chris”

CANDIDATE	P’BROKE	K-R’MINES	SEIC
Geoghegan (FG)	22%	13%	7%
O’Callaghan (FF)	16%	15%	9%
Bacik (LAB)	14%	14%	15%
Hayes (SD)	8%	7%	12%
Andrews (SF)	30%	6%	7%
FG Total	34%	25%	13%

JAMES GEOGHEGAN (FG) topped the poll in much of his Pembroke bailiwick, being strongest in the Sandymount, Ballsbridge and Donnybrook areas – his best polling station was in Sandymount at 29%.

JIM O’CALLAGHAN (FF) topped the poll in just one polling station (Haddington Road, 15%), though he actually polled above that level in seven other polling stations. He polled best in Donnybrook (20%) and Ballsbridge (18%).

IVANA BACIK (LAB) put in a solid performance, demonstrating that her bye-election was not in a flash in the pan. She topped the poll across the Western border of the constituency from North of the canal down to Rathgar and Terenure. She polled best in the Portobello area just north of the Canal taking roughly a quarter of the vote.

HAYES (SD) had a vote pattern quite similar to Ivana Bacik. He narrowly bested her in one polling station in Harold’s Cross.

Andrews (SF) polled strongly in the part of the inner city east of Trinity College and in Ringsend, taking just over 40% of the vote. However it wasn’t enough to offset his low vote take South of the canal and the “Everybody Hates Chris” nature of the transfer patterns took their toll.

Incidentally, Fine Gael’s best Polling Stations were Gilford Road (Sandymount) at 42% and Ballsbridge (41%).

DUBLIN FINGAL WEST

The new Fingal West is a bit of a Frankenstein of a constituency – four sizeable towns on or near the coast in the north-west, a large rural area across the west interspersed with farms and villages relatively untouched by the urban sprawl and in the far south the suburbs of Meakstown and Santry on the northern edges of the city.

Three TDs were returned – Louise O’Reilly TD (Sinn Féin), Cllr Robert O’Donoghue (Labour) and Grace Boland (Fine Gael). Balbriggan-based Independent Cllr Tony Murphy was runner-up.

Of the three TDs, two were from the Balbriggan Electoral Area (O’Reilly and Boland) and one from Rush-Lusk. All three were from the north-east coastal area.

COUNT	PARTY	VOTES	FF	FG	SF	LAB	IND
2	Mixed	1,101	3%	2%	11%	5%	27%
3	Aontu	1,486	9%	5%	19%	7%	35%
6	FF	4,882		55%		25%	11%

On the first count, Louise O’Reilly (Sinn Féin) was comfortably ahead with 6,965 votes – less than six hundred votes below the quota. Labour’s ‘Robert O’Donoghue (5,044 votes), Fine Gael’s Grace Boland (4,583 votes), Fianna Fáil’s Lorraine Clifford-Lee (4,417 votes) and Independent Tony Murray were all in competition for the other two seats.

The second count consisted of the elimination of the candidates of three far-right/anti-immigration parties – Irish People / Irish Freedom / Liberty Republic as well as a left-leaning Independent. Most of the transfers (86%) came from the right-wing candidates, and the majority of the transfers went to Aontu (29%) and Tony Murphy (27%). This narrowed the gap between Clifford-Lee and Murphy to 566 votes.

The elimination of Aontu’s Robbie O’Loughlin on the tthird count saw that margin drop to just 192 votes. At the same time, Clifford-Lee closed the gap with Boland to just 105 votes.

The fourth count saw the joint transfer of the Green and Solidarity votes. Boland (14%) got nearly twice as many as Clifford-Lee (7%), which can be partially attributed to the Greens’ Joe O’Brien and Fine Gael’s Grace Boland sharing a base in Skerries. Furthermore, Tony Murphy closed the gap to 67 votes.

The fifth count saw the distribution of the Sinn Féin surplus of 731 (via Greens/Solidarity). Just over half went to Labour, but one fifth went to Tony Murphy – enough to put him of Lorraine Clifford-Lee by 38 votes.

The sixth and final count was the distribution of Clifford-Lee’s vote over half of which went to Boland and a further quarter to O’Donoghue – enough to put them both well over two thousand votes ahead of Murphy for the final two seats.

CANDIDATE	B’BRIGGAN	RUSH-LUSK	SOUTH
O’Reilly (SF)	24%	20%	31%
O’Donoghue (LAB)	8%	29%	8%
Boland (FG)	18%	12%	15%
Murphy (IND)	19%	5%	2%
Clifford (FF)	11%	19%	16%

O’REILLY (SF) took votes across the Constituency. She took a third of the vote in the largest town (Balbriggan) in the far north of the Constituency, but also took 36% in Meakstown on the northern edges of the city, and nearly half the vote in Rivermeade/Toberburr, a housing estate about half a mile to the west of Swords.

O’DONOGHUE (LAB) built on the promise of his excellent election performance in the local elections (Labour took 40% and two of the five seats in Rush-Lusk) to easily take the second seat. He took 43% in Lusk and 34% in Rush and together the two towns account for nearly two-thirds of his vote. Elsewhere he took 12% in Santry and Skerries.

BOLAND (FG) owes her seat to a strong performance in Skerries (30%). She also polled well in rural areas, topping the poll in Oldtown (25%) and Loughshinny (22%).

Of the other candidates, Tony Murphy took 30% of the vote in Balbriggan, but was outpolled by O’Reilly. He did top the poll in nearby Balrothery (33%), but given that his campaign was very much focused on Balbriggan and adjacent areas his vote take fell short. Clifford-Lee (FF) polled strongly in the rural parts of the constituency – St Margaret’s 35%, Ballyboughal 31% – as well taking a decent vote out of Rush (20%), but was narrowly bested by Boland in the battle for the one government seat. She was unfortunate that her home area of Donabate/Portrane was not included in the constituency, but at the same time if Murphy had been excluded his votes may have favoured Boland somewhat on the basis of geography. O’Brien (GP) saw his vote cut in half by the redtaw, and the ebbing of the Green tide as well as the challenge from Boland in Skerries (where he took 15%) saw his fate sealed on the first count. Edwards (PBP) polled best in the Dublin city boxes taking 8%. Laughlin (AON) didn’t make an impact generally, but took a respectable 15% in the Meakstown boxes

DUBLIN FINGAL EAST

Dublin Fingal East is – unlike its sister constituency Fingal West – almost entirely Urban. The main settlements are Swords, Malahide and Portmarnock. It is one of the more middle-class constituencies in the Dublin Area, but there is a significant working-class population particularly in Swords.

The Constituency returned three TDs – Darragh O”Brien TD (FF), Cllr Louise Graves (SF) and Duncan Smith TD (LAB). Alan Farrell TD (Fine Gael) was the runner-up.

The Constituency was somewhat remarkable for the failure of Fine Gael to retain a seat in a mainly middle-class constituency and key to this was Alan Farrell’s failure to outpoll Darragh O’Brien (FF) in strongly middle-class Malahide and Portmarnock – in the 2020 General Election Fine Gael generally out-polled Fianna Fáil by about 2 to 1 (or more) in areas with similar demographic profiles.

COUNT	PARTY	VOTES	FF	SF	LAB	FG	OTH
4	IFP	675	4%	8%	3%	2%	75%
5	PBP	791	4%	21%	13%	1%	60%
8	GP	1,483		3%	34%	22%	36%
9	AON	2,140		16%	11%	11%	36%
10	I4C	3,428		23%	24%	9%	21%
11	SD	5,774		22%	51%	13%

The second count saw the elimination of Ben Gilroy of Liberty Republic (formerly Direct Democracy Ireland) with 318 votes – nearly half went to the Irish Freedom Party, another quarter to Aontu. When the IFP was eliminated two counts later nearly 40% went to Aontu.

On the 5th count, the Social Democrats were surprisingly the largest recipients (29%) of the People Before Profit vote, ahead of both Sinn Féin and Independents For Change who both took about a fifth of the votes.

The GP transfers on the 8th count went predominantly to the Centre-Left, but 22% went to Fine Gael – and only 3% to Sinn Féin. In fact Graves was only 10 votes ahead of Farrell after this count.

The largest recipient of Aontu transfers on the 9th count was Dean Mulligan (I4C) who took 548 votes (26%) which is arguably evidence of an establishment/anti-establishment transfer trend in play. Interestingly, 45% of the I4C transfers on the 10th count went to the centre-left parties (LAB and SD) and only 23% to Sinn Féin.

Finally, the Social Democrat vote transferred decisively to Labour leaving Duncan Smith more than three thousand votes ahead of Alan Farrell – Ann Graves had over eleven hundred votes to spare.

Below are the figures for the main area – just over 10% of voters voted in Donabate (and Portrane), while about 45% did so in both Swords and Malahide-Portmarnock (which also includes the Kinsealy area).

CANDIDATE	SWORDS	MAL-PORT	D’BATE
O”Brien (FF)	14%	34%	9%
Smith (LAB)	17%	9%	27%
Graves (SF)	21%	9%	13%
Farrell (FG)	11%	18%	13%
Hopkins (SD)	8%	13%	12%
FF Total	16%	37%	11%

O’BRIEN (FF) swept the boards in Malahide (39%) and also topped the poll in Portmarnock (29%). He also topped the poll in the Kinsealy area.

SMITH (LAB) topped the poll in Donabate and Portrane (part of the Rush-Lusk area where Labour polled 40% in June 2024) with 26%. He also polled very creditably in Swords (17%), topping the poll in the North-West of the town with 26% of the vote.

GRAVES (SF) topped the poll in Swords (21%) and also in five of the six polling stations in the town.

Of the other candidates, Farrell (FG) polled best in Portmarnock (20%) but even there he was outpolled by Darragh O’Brien. Hopkins (SD) polled creditably to come fifth, particularly in the east of the constituency.

DUBLIN WEST

Dublin West upgraded from a four seater to a five-seater this time without any significant change in its boundaries. The constituency consists of middle-class areas in the south of the constituency (Castleknock, Navan Road) and more working-class areas to the North (Mulhuddart, Tyrrellstown).

Five TDs were elected – Jack Chambers TD (Fianna Fáil), Paul Donnelly TD (SF), Cllr Emer Currie (FG), Ruth C oppinger (Solidarity) and Roderic O’Gorman TD (Greens). Ellen Troy (Aontu) was the runner-up.

COUNT	PARTY	VOTES	FF	SF	SOL	GP	AON	OTH
5	FG	206	40%	2%	3%	25%	6%	24%
8	FF	1,247		4%	8%	21%	11%	32%
9	NP	1,658		11%	6%	1%	41%	17%
11	SF	2,573			28%	5%	14%	22%
12	SD	3,094			36%	18%	6%	24%
13	LAB	4,039			20%	43%	11%

*The fifth count Fi ne Gael transfers were a surplus consisting of Fianna Fáil votes

GALWAY EAST

Galway East returned 4 TDS – Sean Canney (Independent Ireland), Albert Dolan (Fianna Fáil), Pete Roche (Fine Gael) and Louis O’Hara (Sinn Fein). Declan Geraghty (Independent Ireland) was runner-up.

Galway East is unusual in that all four elected TDs come from the North-Western LEAs – Roche and Canney from Tuam, Dolan and O’Hara from Athenry-Oranmore. There are no TDs from Gort-Kinvara and Loughrea in the South or Ballinasloe in the East. Declan Geraghty of Independent Ireland was the eventual runner up – He is based in the Ballinasloe Area.

Below is a map of the Poll-toppers in selected polling stations.

Canney, Roche and Geraghty were all in competition in the north of the Constituency – and Roche was less than four hundred votes ahead of Geraghty on the first count and later fell behind him on the distribution of the Aontu votes. However, Clodagh Higgins’ transfers went over 60% to Roche to bring him to safety, leaving Geraghty finishing twenty four hundred votes behind O’Hara of Sinn Fein.

CANDIDATE	TUAM	ATHENRY	SOUTH	B’SLOE
Dolan (FF)	10%	37%	20%	18%
Canney (IND)	39%	27%	11%	9%
O’Hara (SF)	11%	16%	16%	11%
Roche (FG)	17%	11%	2%	13%
Geraghty (II)	8%	3%	6%	27%
FF Total	13%	43%	31%	25%
FG Total	20%	20%	22%	20%

DOLAN (FF) managed to take a good vote across the constituency and topped the poll in two of the three biggest towns in the constituency. His top poll was in Monivea (63%) followed by nearby Gurteen.

CANNEY (IND) by contrast saw his vote largely – though not exclusively – concentrated in the Tuam area. He took up to two-thirds of the vote in communities to the west of Tuam Town such as Sylaun (71%) and Belclare (69%). He also took a decent vote out of the Loughrea area.

ROCHE (FG) was caught in a battle with Canney to his West and GERAGHTY (II) to his East. He polled best in an area roughly extending from Tuam to Mountbellew.

O’HARA (SF) saw his vote spread out across the Constituency, but he did narrowly top the poll in Gort (24%). He also did somewhat better in towns than he did in rural areas.

Of the other candidates, GERAGHTY (II) took a big vote out of the North-East of the constituency, but ran out of road (quite literally. Neither RABBITTE (FF) nor MADDEN (FG) were able to drive up the big local totals in the Portumna area to keep a seat in the South-East.

MAYO

Mayo teturned five TDs – Alan Dillon and Keira Keogh (Fine Gael), Dara Calleary (Fianna Fáil), Rose Conway- Walsh (Sinn Féin) and Paul Lawless (Aontu).

There are six electoral areas in Mayo, and five of them elected a TD – the exception was Swinford in the north-east. The main candidate in the area was Sinn Féin veteran Gerry Murray who polled very well locally but was unable to extend his base.

Each of the three main parties had ambitions of an extra seat but Paul Lawless (Aontu) came from 8th place and less than half a quota on the first count to take the final seat.

Lawless took nearly 40% of Independent Stephen Kerr’s vote on the sixth count to overtake Fianna Fáil’s Lisa Chambers and leave him less than one hundred votes behind Mark Duffy (FG) and Patsy O’Brien (IND, ex-FG). He overtook Duffy and O’Brien on the next count with a quarter of the transfers from Gerry Murray (SF).

CANDIDATE	C’BAR	BALLINA	W’PORT	B’MULLET	C’MORRIS
Walsh (SF)	13%	12%	13%	41%	7%
Dillon (FG)	38%	6%	6%	5%	8%
Calleary (FF)	3%	25%	3%	15%	6%
Keogh (FG)	3%	1%	38%	16%	1%
Lawless (AON)	5%	5%	3%	3%	13%
O’Brien (IND)	4%	1%	1%	1%	30%
FF Total	18%	28%	11%	24%	14%
FG Total	44%	32%	46%	23%	28%
SF Total	15%	24%	14%	42%	10%

(The Ballina area also includes Swinford for this analysis)

CONWAY-WALSH (SF) polled well across across most of the Constituency, but particularly well in her base in rural north-west Mayo. She took over half the vote in Ballycroy (57%), Aghleam (54%), Binghamstown (57%), Shraigh (55%) and Pullathomas (59%). Fianna Fáil took 43% of the vote in this area (Belmullet) and two of the three seats in the local elections in June indicating that a large numbers of voters voted locally for FF, but nationally for SF (or at least the SF candidate).

DILLON (FG) increased his vote from last time, and this dominated the Castlebar area whereas last time he had competition from both Michael Ring and Lisa Chambers. His vote was extremely consistent across the Castlebar town boxes ranging from 35% to 45%. His vote peaked in Breaffy at 51%. Just under two-thirds of his vote came from the Castlebar Electoral Area.

CALLEARY (FF) polled well across the North of the constituency – one third of the vote in Ballina, 15% in Belmullet and Swinford. He was in close contest with DUFFY (FG) in Ballina and Swinford (32% and 11% respectively), but was prevented by Fine Gael strategists from seeking votes in Belmullet which cost him dearly in the end. Calleary did best in rural areas to tne South of Ballina Town.

KEOGH (FG) took two-thirds of her vote from the Westport area where she was enthusiastically pushed by Michael Ring. According to the tallies, she took exactly half the vote in Westport Town (55% in the Quay polling station). In the rural and mountainous areas to the west and south, she was in strong competition with MAXWELL (II) who took half the vote in Louisburgh and surrounding areas. She started some two hundred votes behind DUFFY (FG) but overtook him on the 4th court and maintained a lead from then on.

PAUL LAWLESS (AON) as mentioned above started off in eighth place, but benefited from transfers. He took 13% in the Claremorris area and 8% from Swinford, which indicates his vote was strongest in the north-east of the constituency and also explains the strong transfer he received from MURRAY (SF). He topped the poll in Knock (43%) and surrounding areas.

ROSCOMMON-GALWAY

Roscommon-Galway remained a three-seater in 2024, but with changes – it ceded a significant amount of territory on its south-western flank into Galway West, while North Roscommon was returned to the Constituency from Sligo-Leitrim. The changes would have adversely affected Michael FitzMaurice who lost over four thousand votes in the redraw.

Three candidates were elected : Michael Fitzmaurice (II), Claire Kerrane (SF) and Martin Daly (FF). Aisling Dolan of Fine Gael was runner-up.

Below is a map of the poll-toppers in selected polling stations.

As you can see, the image is rather cluttered – so instead I will do maps of the west and the east of the constituency below.

The result was virtually pre-ordained from the first count with FitzMaurice elected, Kerrane comfortably ahead and Daly having more first preferences than the combined totals of the two Fine Gael candidates. Dolan’s only chance was Independent (ex-FF) Eugene Murphy’s transfers breaking heavily for her but the opposite happened and she was 2,641 adrift at the death.

CANDIDATE	ATHLONE	BOYLE	ROSCOMMON	B’SLOE
FitzMaurice (II)	32%	22%	35%	27%
Kerrane (SF)	14%	27%	18%	18%
Daly (FF)	23%	25%	18%	21%
Dolan (FG)	18%	3%	7%	26%
FG Total	20%	16%	10%	27%

FITZMAURICE (II) again put in a powerful performance, topping the poll in three of the four electoral areas and not falling below one-fifth of the vote in any of them. In geography-conscious rural Ireland that is some achievement. His top polls were along the border of Galway-Roscommon – Glinsk (80%), Cloonfad (74%), Williamstown (72%) – his best polls all lie along the R360/2 Claremorris-Athleague Road.

KERRANE (SF) put in a strong performance, particularly in the north of the Constituency. She polled very well in Ballaghdereen (52%) and surrounding areas (French park 44%, Brusna 43% etc.) suggesting she has a strong local bae. She also polled decently across the Constituency.

DALY (FF) polled strongest across the south of the constituency, polling 36% in Kiltoom and 50% in Ballyforan in South Roscommon near Athlone. Across the border in Galway, he took 65% in Ballygar and 51% in Castleffrench. He also took a very creditable 29% in Roscommon Town.

Of the other candidates, Dolan (FG) took a very creditable 43% in Ballinasloe, but her vote was suppressed in the rest of the Galway area due to the presence of Fitzmaurice. She also took decent polls in several rural Roscommon boxes. Murphy (IND, ex-FF) put in a respectable performance centered on his base in Strokestown (39%), but was stymied by FitzMaurice’s strength in mid-Roscommon.

CAVAN-MONAGHAN

Cavan-Monaghan remained a 5-seater in 2024, despite the loss of the small part of North-West Meath that had voted in tbe constituency in 2020.

Five candidates were elected – Matt Carthy and Cathy Bennett (Sinn Féin), Brendan Smith and Niamh Smyrh (Fianna Fáil) and David Maxwell (Fine Gael).

Three Candidates were from Monaghan (Carthy, Bennett and Maxwell) and two from (Smith and Smyth).

This led to an anomalous situation whereby the smaller county (population-wise) actually returned a majority of the Candidates.

Furthermore, Monaghan returned two Sinn Féin TDs and one Fine Gael TD, while Cavan returned two Fianna Fáil TDs. Robbie Gallagher (Fianna Fáil) and outgoing TD Pauline Tully (Sinn Féin) started in fifth and fourth position respectively but were overtaken by party colleagues.

This like Dublin South-Central was a very competitive constituency, and on the first count it was clear that there were several contests at play.

Could Cllr Sarah O’Reilly (Aontu) challenge for a seat at the expense of Fianna Fáil? Fine Gael only had the votes for one TD, would it be Cllr David Maxwell of Monaghan or would it be of their Cavan candidates? Sinn Féin had enough votes for two seats but who would accompany Matt Carthy back to the Dáil? If Fianna Fáil were to return two seats, would it be the two outgoing Cavan TDs or could veteran Senator Robbie Gallagher make a breakthrough.And how many seats would each county return?

The first thing to look at is the votes cast for candidates hailing from each county. According to the tallies, on the first count, 39,262 (just under 57%) of the votes had been cast for Cavan candidates, and 29,883 for Monaghan candidates – a lead of 9,379 votes. By the fourth count after the Elimination of six minor candidates, the lead had stretched to nearly eleven thousand votes.

However, the next four counts all involved the elimination of Cavan candidates, and the Cavan was down to under four thousand votes. Also importantly – the eighth count involved the transfer of Cootehill-based Fine Gael Councillor Carmel Brady. Virginia-based Councillor T.P.O’Reilly had closed the gap from between himself and Monaghan-based Councillor David Maxwell from 1,871 to 1,407 but it was to naught as over a thousand Brady votes crossed the border into Monaghan and O’Reilly was eliminated on the next count.

One observation I would make is that O’Reilly (T.P.) had three problems, the first obviously is the perennial Not Enough Votes problem (Cavan men are known to be notoriously frugal with their number ones); the second is a geography problem (Brady was based in Cootehill on the border with Monaghan), and therefore her voters might have been inclined to give the number 2 to Maxwell; but the third was Arguably alphabetical.

What I mean by this is that O’Reilly was possibly at a disadvantage due to the position of his name on the ballot paper. In other words, someone voting Brady #1 and looking to mark #2 and #3 for her Fine Gael colleagues will chance upon Maxwell’s name before they espy O’Reilly’s. Unless they have a particular preference (and a good few will) that is the likely order they will mark their paper. Now, in truth, it is unlikely that it played a pivotal role in his defeat – the margin was just too large – but it likely was a factor in tne size of that margin.

Speaking of O’Reillys, Bailieborough-based Cllr Sarah O’Reilly (Aontu, formerly Fianna Fáil) was hoping for two coins to flip heads – that Niamh Smyth TD would fail to overtake her Monaghan colleague Senator Robbie Gallagher, and that she (O’Reilly) would take a large chunk of Cllr Shane O’Reiily’s (Independent Ireland, also formerly Fianna Fáil) vote on his elimination. Unfortunately for her, neither was true – Niamh Smyth started 584 votes behind Gallagher, but the spate of Cavan eliminations led to her being comfortably ahead on the 9th count when he was eliminated. Meanwhile Shane P O’Reilly was eliminated on the seventh count, and just over a quarter of the transfers went to his Aontu namesake, putting her over seven hundred votes ahead of Smyth. However T.P.O’Reilly’s elimination on the 9th count saw them virtually level, and Gallagher’s elimination on t4he succeeding count put Smyth some sixteen hundred votes ahead. The Sinn Féin transfers did help close the gap somewhat, but on the final count O’Reilly was 819 votes behind Brendan Smith, who in turn was 172 votes behind Niamh Smyth. Excellent vote-balancing by Fianna Fáil – by accident or design – saved their seat.

A final note on both Sinn Féin Monaghan candidates taking seats at the expense of sitting Cavan colleague Pauline Tully. Tully started off 449 votes behind Monaghan Town-based colleague Cathy Bennett.. With the slew of Cavan eliminations , Tully had moved 275 votes ahead by the 9th count, but the elimination of Fianna Fáil’s Robbie Gallagher saw over five hundred votes stay local with Bennett and Tully was eliminated on the 12th count.

According to the Tally, Bennett got over one thousand votes in Cavan, and Carthy got nearly two thousand – by contrast Tully got less than two hundred in Monaghan. This suggests Sinn Féin may have been trying to optimise their vote split to try and take three seats, but instead cost a sitting TD her seat. Did they factor in that Sinn Féin are historically far stronger in Monaghan than Cavan? We are most unlikely to find out.

CANDIDATE	MON Nth	MON SC	CAVAN E	CAVAN W
Maxwell (FG)	17%	18%	1%	2%
Carthy (SF)	8%	33%	5%	6%
Bennett (SF)	37%	8%	3%	3%
Smyth (FF)	2%	6%	13%	7%
Smith (FF)	0%	1%	12%	30%
O”Reilly (AON)	5%	5%	11%	6%
Tully (SF)	0%	1%	16%	19%
Gallagher (FF)	24%	15%	1%	2%
FF Total	26%	22%	26%	39%
FG Total	18%	22%	24%	17%
SF Total	45%	42%	24%	28%

First thing I would note is that in both East and West Cavan the Sinn Féin Monaghan candidates took approximately one third of the vote. I was a bit surprised by this as I expected that the Monaghan candidates would poll better in the east of Cavan which is surrounded by Monaghan to the North and East.

Looking at Cavan towns and villages close to the Monaghan border, the Monaghan Sinn Féin candidates took 58% of the Sinn Féin vote in Kingscourt, 63% of the vote in Shercock and 45% in Cootehill. But even further from the border they took 34% of the SF vote in Belturbet, 22% in Cavan Town, 35% in Killeshandra. Significant amounts.

Niamh Smyth took just over one-quarter of her vote in Monaghan (mainly south Monaghan). Apparently many years ago, Rory O’Hanlon had a similar base in South Monaghan extending over into East Cavan.

MAXWELL (FG) – Maxwell was a Councillor for the Monaghan Area, but actually polled slightly better in the Ballybay-Clones area. He polled best in Drum (the only Protestant-majority village remaining in Ireland) with 44% of the vote – his late father Cllr Noel Maxwell was a Grandmaster of the Monaghan Orange Lodge. He also polled well in Mullyash (43%), Latlorcan (31%) and Ardaghy (31%). Interestingly, a quick look at the Cavan tallies suggests that he didn’t benefit from the votes of Protestant Communities in Cavan to the same extent that previous Monaghan-based FG TDs Heather Humphreys or Seymour Crawford did.

CARTHY (SF) – Matt Carthy dominated much of the south of the county, taking almost exactly half the vote in Carrickmacross.He took almost exactly half the vote in Carrickmacross, and 57% in neghbouring Donaghmoyne. He also took 46% in Inishkeen and roughly a third of the vote in Castleblayney.

BENNETT (SF) – Cathy Bennett took well over half her vote in North Monaghan. She took one third of the vote in Monaghan Town, narrowly besting Fianna Fáil’s Robbie Gallagher, and was completely in the traditionally Republican rural areas of the town, taking over half the vote in Scotstown (51%), Tydavnet (52%), Carrickroe (54%), Killybrone (54%) and Knockatallon (72%). Interestingly she secured over 80% of the party vote in this area.

SMYTH (FF) – Niamh Smyrh pulled off something a houdini act for the third General Election in a row, yet again confounding the pundits by finishing in fourth place despite being seventh on the first count. That seventh was more impressive than it seems as East Cavan was a veritable bear pit this time, with five or six potential candidates in the hunt for votes. Such was the competition in Smyth’s base of Bailieborough, she only topped the poll in a handful of polling stations. Over a quarter of her vote came from South Monaghan.

SMITH (FF) – Brendan Smith topped the poll in Cavan Town (24%), and much of sparsely-populated West Cavan but he didn’t run up the totals high enough to make victory certain on the first count. His somewhat isolated geographical position also made somewhat less transfer-friendly – Niamh Smyth attracted 5,879 transfers during the count compared to 4,233 for Brendan. His highest polls included 57% in Bawnboy, 53% in Corran and 44% in Corlough.

O’REILLY (AON) – Sarah O’Reilly improved on her decent showing in 2020, but fell just short this time. She took 29% in Bailieborough and roughly the same in surrounding areas.

Of the other candidates, Pauline Tully seems to have lost her seat due to the large amount of votes the Monaghan Sinn Féin candidates took from Cavan. That said, she polled very respectably in her own bailiwick (BallyJamesduff 32%, Drumavaddy 36%, Crosserlough 31%). Robbie Gallagher improved his vote and put in a strong showing in Monaghan Town (only just being touched off by Cathy Bennett), but the transfers went against him.

Finally a bit of Trivia – Brendan Smith topped the poll both in Blacklion and sixty miles away in Kingscourt (where presumably they mumble in a different dialect of Cavanese, or indeed speak Monagholian…..). According to the Internet, travel time by motorised vehicle is just short of an hour and a half. It must be surely some kind of record.

Oh go on then…. another bit of trivia…. three Candidates by the name of O’Reilly topped the poll in polling stations mere miles from one another – Shane P O’Reilly (Independent Ireland) took 50% in Mullagh, T.P.O’Reilly (Fine Gael) took 32% in Virginia and Sarah O’Reilly (Aontu) took 29% in Bailieborough.

Between them they took 12,554 votes – well over a quota – so naturally it was assumed that an O’Reilly (for centuries the Taoisigh of East Breffni) would be restored to their rightful place of representation for the county.

Alas, the voters – either ignorant or uncaring of their duty – did not comply. That said, when Shane P. O’Reilly was eliminated, a very satisfactory 42% of his votes went to his kinspeoplle. However when T.P. exited, a pitiful 9% of his votes went to the last remaining O’Reilly candidate who fell just short.

They were clearly guided by more material and worldly motivations. Shameful.

DONEGAL

Donegal remained a five-seater in 2024, with Ballyshannon and Bundoran remaining in Sligo-Leitrim.

Donegal – like the other Ulster counties Cavan and Monaghan – has a sizeable Protestant Population and returned Protestant Independents (with a minor blip) from 1923 to 1961.

Five candidates were elected this time – Pearse Doherty and Padraig MacLochlainn (Sinn Féin), Charlie McConalogue and Pat The Cope Gallagher (Fianna Fáil), and Charles Ward (100% Redress).

This represents a gain for Fianna Fáil and 100% Redress at the expense of Fine Gael and Independent Thomas Pringle.

For the first time ever, Fine Gael failed to win a seat in Donegal. Incidentally – and I could be wrong here – Charles Ward is the first TD elected from the Finn Valley since 1957.

According to the Electorate figures, 53% of the Registered Voters were in (roughly) the old Donegal North-East area and 47% in the old Donegal Sth-West. Using the same boundaries, 51% of the votes were cast in the old Donegal North-East and 49% in South-West. (It should be remembered that seven DEDs in South Donegal are in Sligo-Leitrim).

However, on the first count – according to my calculations- nearly two-thirds of the vote went to candidates from the old North-East area. Much of the disparity was due to Pearse Doherty and Charles Ward – both based in the old South-West – collectively taking well over twelve thousand votes in the North-East.

According to the tallies, South-West candidates took 44% of the vote in tbe North-East, but North-Eastern candidates took only 13% of the South-West vote.

The distribution of Pearse Doherty’s surplus- most of which went to Padraig McLochlainn – narrowed the vote gap to 60-40%, but it never got any closer. On the last count South-West candidates had 66% of the vote, north-east candidates 34%. On the last count with an extra south-west candidate the margin was 63% to 37%.

The main contest was between Charles Ward (100% Redress) and Left-Wing Independent Thomas Pringle for the final seat. On the first count, Ward led Pringle by 1,573 votes. The elimination of Mary T Sweeney (Aontu) on the 12th count saw two-fifths of her vote go to Ward and put him 2,989 votes ahead. The margin was narrowed on the 14tb count by the elimination of Noel Jordan (SF) as two-fifths of his vote went to Pringle bringing the gap to 1,258 votes. However, that’s as good as it, and he was beaten by Charlie McConalogue (FF) by 1,288 votes on the final count (Ward was a further 31 votes ahead).

CANDIDATE	DNE	DSW
Doherty (SF)	20%	30%
MacLochlainn (SF)	23%	2%
Gallagher (FF)	5%	23%
Ward (100R)	12%	5%
McConalogue (FF)	17%	3%
Pringle (IND)	3%	11%
FF Total	23%	26%
FG Total	8%	10%
SF Total	44%	40%

Looking at the Vote Profiles of the five elected TDs Gallagher, MacLochlainn and McConalogue took the vast majority of their vote from their respective areas (North-East and South-West) – by contrast, Doherty took two-fifths of his vote from the old North-East area, and in fact Ward took more than two-thirds of his vote from the North-East despite being from the Finn Valley. Looking at the local election results, it is clear that 100% Redress’s greatest support was in the North-East.

ELECTION	North-East	South-West
LE24	5,630 (15%)	1,769 (5%)
GE24	4,779 (12%)	2,049 (5%)

100% Redress won 3 seats in the North-East in the Local Elections, and 1 in the South-West. Charles Ward himself didn’t win in Lifford-Stranorlar. As can be seen, their support base was roughly the same in both elections.

DOHERTY (SF) once again pulled off a spectacular performance, taking a quota and a half and at least 10% of the vote in all seven Electoral areas. His best Electoral Area was Lifford-Stranorlar (39%) – in his home area of Glenties, he polled 35% but was narrowly outpolled by Pat The Cope Gallagher. Indeed he polled 51% in Lifford and 49% in Castlefin. In his base of Glenties he polled best in the northern half of the area, taking 52% in Min an Chladaigh and Magheragroarty.

Below are maps of selected Polling Stations in Lifford-Stranorlar and Glenties Electoral Area.

PADRAIG MacLOCHLAINN (SF) polled best In Inishowen – Carndonagh (37%) and Buncrana (28%) -but even there his running mate Pearse Doherty took a large proportion of the Sinn Féin vote – 28% in Buncrana, 38% in Carndonagh. Further West, Doherty actually went ahead of MacLochlainn – 61% in Letterkenny and 57% in Milford. MacLochlainn’s highest polls were in Buncrana (44%), Burnfoot (also 44%) and Muff (42%).

GALLAGHER (FF) returned to the Dáil for his fourth stint in the house at the age of 76 – his previous sessions were 1981-1997, 2002-2009 and 2016-2020. Over half his vote came from his Glenties base where he outpolled Pearse Doherty by 36% to 35%.. He drove up very high totals from his heartland in the centre of the area – two thirds of the vote in Dungloe, 63% in Meenacross and 56% in Burtonport.

SELECTED POLLING STATIONS IN THE GLENTIES ELECTORAL AREA

WARD (100R) lives in the Finn Valley, but he pulled over two-thirds of his vote from the old North-East area. He took a third of his vote in his home village of Drumquin and a quarter in nearby Glenmaquin. Despite being an East Donegal man now, he was born on Aranmore and topped the poll there with 35%.

SELECTED POLLING STATIONS IN THE LIFFORD-STRANORLAR ELECTORAL AREA

McCONALOGUE (FF) held the same vote as in 2020, which was satisfactory given the additional pressure from 100% Redress this time. He polled well across north Inishowen, taking a third of the vote in Craigtown and Gleneely, and 30% in Carrowmore and Illies.

SELECTED POLLING STATIONS IN THE INISHOWEN PENINSULA

PRINGLE (IND) saw his vote fall for the third election in a row and this time it proved fatal. He polled very well in his base – Killybegs 55%, Commons 57% – but having McNulty immediately to his West and Jordan to his East would not have helped his cause.

Below is a map of selected polling stations in the Donegal Electoral Area.

Of the other candidates, Fine Gael’s Nikki Btadley simply failed to land a blow in the greater Letterkenny area. Her party colleague John McNulty received strong support in his area (Kilcar 59%, Meenaneary 43%, Cashel 31%), but the lack of grá for Fine Gael beyond the parish sunk him. Jordan (SF) took a quarter of the vote in Donegal Town, 40% in Mountcharles and 46% in Keelogues but was always in Doherty’s shadow.