Irish Election - Coverage of Irish Politics, News and Current Affairs

In a sequence that will revive memories of Dick Roche’s desk-clearing approval of the M3 motorway near Tara in 2007, acting Minister for Communications, Energy, and Natural Resources Pat Carey has approved the Corrib gas pipeline project.   As with Tara, the next minister might view this either as a hot potato glad to be off his to-do list or as a [...]

“When I am on holiday, I am not foreign minister.”  It’s not just Ireland where ministers have blind spots about their connections.

In the run up to the election much of the talk was whether or not Fine Gael could get an overall majority. As the dust settles it is clear that they are just short. So where did they fall? One place they will look back at is Kildare South.

A couple of semi-formed thoughts of issues that perhaps deserved a little more attention in all the relentless punditry.

We often hear in UK elections of a decapitation strategy by one of the 3 parties to take out high profile figures in opposing parties in marginal seats. Rarely do we have such open strategies here, though we often have such moments. The manner in which it has happened to Fianna Fail this election is [...]

61 TDs elected so far. Fine Gael 27, Labour 17, SF 5, FF 4, Socialist 2, Independents 6. Huge losses for FF. Some high-profile and slightly gasp-provoking casualties, in no particular order: Mary Coughlan, John Gormley, Trevor Sargent, Mary O’Rourke, Sean Haughey, Conor Lenihan, Barry Andrews, Dick Roche, Pat Carey, Martin Mansergh. Still over one [...]

Reuters: Historic Shift in Ireland Reuters early report on #GE11

One of the things that both Kenny, Hogan and the team of handlers that ran the FG campaign are going to be receiving credit for in the coming days is the scale of the discipline present in some of the FG votes. Granted, there are 5 seaters and 4 seaters where they might have done [...]

It’s a total nail-biter in Dún Laoghaire as Ivana Bacik and Richard Boyd-Barrett battle it out for the last seat with less than 200 votes between them. Bacik is currently on 6,953 and RBB is on 7132. Incredibly close.  Barry Andrews has been eliminated and his votes are being distributed  so now it’s interesting to [...]

One of the most staggering things about the FF collapse – and there’s been so much to choose from – has been just how many of their senior party figures have been affected.  This isn’t just a cull of the backbenchers – the entire FF front bench is being decimated. Vincent Browne just said he [...]

Shane Ross just got elected on the first count in Dublin South with over 17,000 votes – quota was 12,108. That’s Willie O’Dea levels of vote-getting right there. Interesting to see where the surplus goes – FG will likely be the biggest beneficiaries but which of their three candidates?

Not hugely surprising considering it looks like FG are going to be quite a few seats away from an overall majority, but speaking on RTE Radio One just now, Leo Varadkar essentially ruled out the idea of FG going in to government with independent TDs. “The new government has to be a strong government, has [...]

Joan Burton has become the first TD to be elected to 31st Dáil after topping the poll in Dublin West. Burton was elected on the first count with 9,627 votes, giving her a surplus of 1,132 votes which will now be distributed. Turnout in Dublin West was extraordinarily high at 82.3%, an increase of over [...]

Fine Gael look like they’re going to achieve something fairly remarkable in Dublin South: Their just over 36% of the vote has split almost exactly between their three  candidates and right now, it looks like all three are probably going to get elected. Latest tallies have Olivia Mitchell at 14%, Alan Matthews at 12% and [...]

For a sign of just how bad things are for Fianna Fáil in Dublin, look at Dublin North-West. Fianna Fáil got their biggest Dublin vote in the 2007 general election there with almost 50% of the vote. This time around, the FF vote has fallen to less than 12%, with outgoing TD Pat Carey on 11.79% [...]

Fine Gael have done extremely well outside of Dublin, they will be saddened that the wilder expectations this week weren’t met but realistic in knowing they have had an incredible election. The performance in Dublin (outside of Dub Sth, Dub SE and DL) will probably cause them to pore over their strategy. They will lead [...]