Dublin Mid-West expands to a five-seater with the addition of the Fettercairn area of Tallaght.
The constituency has existed since 2002, when Fianna Fáil, the Progressive Democrats (Mary Harney) and the Greens won a seat each. It has become markedly more left-wing since 2007 with 3 of the 4 seats now held by left-wing candidates.
THE BIGGEST PARTIES PER DED IN 2020
Cork North-Central expands to a five-seater with significant changes to its boundaries – areas south of the river go into Cork South-Central, while the large towns of Ballincollig (now technically within the city boundaries although realistically not physically yet a part of the city proper) and Mallow come in.
THE BIGGEST PARTIES PER DED IN 2020
Tipperary North is a new (or revived) constituency encompassing the most of the north of Tipperary as well the north-west of Kilkenny (including Urlingford, Tullaroan and Freshford)
THE BIGGEST PARTIES PER DED IN 2020
Dublin Fingal West is a new constituency encompassing the north and west of the previous Dublin Fingal constituency as well as parts of Ballymun and Santry situated between the Airport and the city-county boundary.
It takes in the Balbriggan Electoral Area as well as most of the Lusk-Rush area, a small part of the Swords area as well as parts of Dublin
THE BIGGEST PARTIES PER DED IN 2020
Wexford-Wicklow is a new constituency encompassing much of South Wicklow and North Wexford. It takes in much of the Arklow Electoral Area in Wicklow as well as the southern part of the Baltinglass Electoral Area, and in Wexford it takes in the whole of Gorey EA and parts of Enniscorthy and Kilmuckridge.
THE BIGGEST PARTIES PER DED IN 2020
Below there will be a short description and analysis of each of the constituencies recommended by the Electoral
CONSTITUENCY : Wexford-Wicklow
SEATS : 3
CHANGES : Wexford-Wicklow is a new constituency encompassing much of South Wicklow and North Wexford.
Approximately 60% of the votes were cast in the Wexford constituency and 40% were cast in the Wicklow constituency. The three largest settlements (Arklow, Gorey and Courtown) are situated along the east coast. None of the ten TDs elected in the Wicklow and Wexford constituencies in 2020 are resident in the constituency. The 2020 figures cited below are for Wexford from where the majority of the new constituency comes from.
PARTY SUPPORT
| YEAR | SEATS | SF | FF | FG | LAB | OTH | IND |
| 2020 | 5 | 24.9% 1 | 26.5% 1 | 17.0% 1 | 12.3% 1 | 7.4% | 11.9% 1 |
| 2023 | 3 | 28.3% | 26.9% | 25.4% | 3.8% | 8.1% | 7.5% |
The three big parties had just over two-thirds of the votes in Wexford, but over four-fifths of the vote in the new Wexford-Wicklow and would take a seat apiece on the 2020 tallies.
Continue reading Initial Analysis of the Constituency Review 2023
This post looks at ten District Electoral Areas where Sinn Féin may have under-nominated candidates in the recent Northern Ireland Local Elections. Sinn Féin are no strangers to under-nomination as they missed out on up to ten seats in the southern Irish General Election of 2020.
Six of the ten areas are in just two Councils, Causeway Coast and Glens and Mid-Ulster. Did Sinn Féin underestimate the swing to them in those council areas in particular? This is something I intend to look at later.
Please note : unless the A Graph Title specifically names a District Electoral Area, all pie charts are based on NI-wide data.
In this post I will be posting election maps related to the Northern Irish Local Elections which took place on the 18th May.
Each of the maps are based on results at District Electoral Area (DEA)
The first tranche of maps relate to the overall vote-share of the parties – I will be adding more maps later and also more analysis.
Below are the vote performances by percentage for the five main Northern Irish parties – Sinn Féin, the DUP, Alliance, the UUP and the SDLP.
I plan to add the smaller parties later.
Not surprisingly, Sinn Féin polled best in their traditional heartlands – South Armagh, West Belfast, Tyrone and Fermanagh – but what was also notable was the strength of their vote in other areas.
The DUP as you might expect polled best in majority Protestant in rural and working-class areas of Belfast, Antrim, Armagh and Down.
Alliance are sometimes pejoratively described as a Leafy-Suburbs-By-The-Sea party and to be honest this map doesn’t exactly challenge that narrative.
They have had some success west of the Bann in recent years, and indeed won a seat in Enniskillen for the first time ever two weeks ago, but at the same time they lost both their seats on Derry and Strabane Council
The UUP lost a further21 seats in the elections, but remainly strong in geographically disjointed areas – Banbridge, Larne, North Fermanagh etc. Interestingly they didn’t run a candidate in Court DEA in Belfast (which contains the Shankill Road) nor in neighbouring Oldpark.
By contrast, they still were able to outpoll the DUP in Fermanagh.
Somewhat similar to the UUP, the SDLP retains a certain strength in geographically disjointed areas – Derry City, Downpatrick, Armagh City, South Belfast.
But even on the west bank of the Foyle in Derry, Sinn Féin took 6 seats to their 5 (in the old Derry City Council the corresponding results thirty years ago in 1993 was 12 for the SDLP and 3 for Sinn Féin) and in Downpatrick where they once took 65% and 6 of the 7 seats (again in 1993), this time they took 32% of the vote to Sinn Féin’s 43% (up from 4% in 1993).
They were also blessed that Sinn Féin under-nominated candidates in at least seven areas which led to the SDLP keeping seats in areas which otherwise would have gone to an extra Sinn Féin candidate.
In this post, I will be gradually working through the possible permutations of constituencies that the recently formed Electoral Commission might consider.
Unfortunately I’m slightly shooting blind, as the Terms of Reference merely state that “the total number of members of the Dáil, subject to Article 16.2.2° of the Constitution, shall be not less than 171 and not more than 181”. Apparently, the precise number of members the Dáil will not be set until after the Central Statistics Office releases the final population figures (sometime in the summer months) and will not be revealed until the Constituency Review report is released probably in the Autumn.
However, there seems to be a general concensus amongst people wiser than myself that the final number is likely to be somewhere between 176 and 181 in order to “future-proof” whatever scheme of constituencies is arrived at.
Continue reading What the Electoral Commission might do – South-East Leinster
In this post, I will be gradually working through the possible permutations of constituencies that the recently formed Electoral Commission might consider.
Unfortunately I’m slightly shooting blind, as the Terms of Reference merely state that “the total number of members of the Dáil, subject to Article 16.2.2° of the Constitution, shall be not less than 171 and not more than 181”. Apparently, the precise number of members the Dáil will not be set until after the Central Statistics Office releases the final population figures (sometime in the summer months) and will not be revealed until the Constituency Review report is released probably in the Autumn.
However, there seems to be a general concensus amongst people wiser than myself that the final number is likely to be somewhere between 176 and 181 in order to “future-proof” whatever scheme of constituencies is arrived at.
Continue reading What the Electoral Commission might do – South Connaught
