Bye-Elections: Early Reports say Lee will romp home

At 10.07am Newstalk were calling it for George Lee in Dublin South, David McCullough on RTÉ was saying it would be very difficult to beat his former colleague at about 9.45 on RTÉ radio. At present it looks like the Boy George will take the seat on the first count, he’s at 52% with over half the boxes opened. Olivia Mitchell said Lee was taking 55% of the boxes opened in the count centres – a frankly amazing figure. Alex White must be stunned, this was supposed to be a little more competitive. Shay Brennan has taken just 17% so far, in the 2007 general election FF took 41% – oobviously that’s not a direct comparison but – ouch.

Lee would to well to look back through the constituency record. Dublin South has a reputation for bringing candidates into it’s bosom in the bye-elections and spitting them soon after. Garland, Fitzgerald, O’Donnell…

The Dublin Central count is far closer. Fine Gael’s Paschal Donohoe, while leading early on is not streaking ahead. Given that the early drop-outs are likely to be lesser known leftist candidates, followed by Christy Burke – who will likely transfer to The Gregory Candidate, Maureen O’Sullivan – this doesn’t look too healthy for Donohoe. Maurice Ahern (polling at just 15%) will probably follow Burke, De Udder Brudder is another candidate unlikely to pass transfers to Paschal Donohoe so Maureen O’Sullivan is very strong early on. Ivana Bacik may pull out a shocker and grab more transfers from the more minor candidates and/or Sinn Féin but that looks unlikely.

Other reports say Mannix Flynn is polling strongly in the Dublin City Council local election.