Where the opposition lost Part 2

We are looking at the seats that the opposition did not take that could have won them the election. We already have 2 here  what follows is the next 2 and the result

Sligo North Leitrim

This constituency returned 2 Fianna Fail and 1 Fine Gael. However the opposition had more votes then Fianna Fail. One of the problems was that Fine Gael ran three candidates. While I guess the reason was to capture 1st preferences and transfer them around the party. It is hard to direct them. When FG third candidate got eliminated the vote was split between their two candidates evenly. Where what was needed was for the sitting TD to get less of those votes and the second candidate to get more. In the end the Fine Gael candidate lost to Fianna Fail by about 1,100 votes. This could have been brought down if the third Fine Gael candidate had not stood and perhaps also the Labour candidate. It would have been very very close but they could have just swung it. Seat lost due to too many candidates and not enough vote management.

Meath East

In Meath East Dominic Hanigan lost out on a seat by about 1,500 votes. The problem here seems to have been 2 FG candidates. While the second candidate got eliminated, she got eliminated in the second last count. This meant that while Dominic got transfers from her. The first FG candidate only got elected on the last count. Which meant that Dominic never got to get the surplus transfers from him. He had a surplus of about 1,600. While if tight could have gone his way. Indeed if the first guy had got elected a lot earlier he would not have taken the opposition transfers, which would have gone to Dominic. Seat Lost due too many candidates.

So far we have 4 extra seats for the opposition bring them to 81 seats. While FF have 1 less seat. If this had happened then Enda would be in the driving seat needing only 3 independents (out of 6). But is there another few seats they could have picked up?

Personnally I am not sure from looking around I can not spot any other close races (please tell me if you know any). There is speculation that the Green Seat was lost when Niall Ó Brolcháin went on radio and defended the city council over the water contamination. The fact that a major incident like that could happen and no change in sitting TD’s would speak to an opportunity lost. Over all though the votes were simply not there for an alliance majority, but with a bit of vote management and a bit of luck they could be in the driving seat in the negotiations.