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

Results: Quota 86, Doherty (SF) 103 and Kelly (LAB) 96 elected on first count.
Update 24/07:
Doherty (SF) 1st count
Ryan (Lab) 1st count
Moylan (FF) 14th count
Walsh (FF) 16th count
O’Brien (FF) 16th count
6 seats remaining
Seanad results at seanadrcount.ie and the Labour blog.

Rumours trickling out of the very long Seanad Count (due to end Friday) suggest that Alex White is currently topping his respective poll in the Cultural and Education panel. Apparently he is under 10 votes off the quota (around 175) which should see him elected relatively early on. With Labour having 130 odd votes one [...]

According to tomorrow’s Sunday Business Post, Environment Minister John Gormley will soon present a memo to Cabinet with a view to reforming the election process for Senators.
The article doesn’t give too much detail on his plans, but the crux of his proposal is the suggestion to make the majority of Senators directly elected by the [...]

I am sure this is probably illegal but someone has put their vote for seanad on Ebay . Interestingly enough it seems someone emailed Dan (the resident Irishelection.com candidate ) about it, so I can only guess that someone has emailed all the candidates about this. Surely no one will put a bid [...]

Ciaran Cuffe is surprised to learn that ballots for the Seanad election, for the TD/Senator/Cllr pool anyway, are not all that random.
Councillor Tom Kivlehan pointed out to me a curious aspect of the Senate Election. Each ballot is marked with a unique number on the back. Before I told him my number, he was able [...]

Votes for sale, blatant bribery for votes. Its is all there this year (and every year by the sounds of it). So what should we do about the Seanad? Has it any use at all? Should we abolish the upper house? Or for what purpose can it be reformed?
New poll on the right, any thoughts [...]

I’m not sure how idiosyncratic the issues raised in this post are, so if the title catches your attention, read on.

The Irish Times are reporting that Labour and Sinn Fein are in talks on a voting pact which will allow them to return an extra candidate each in the Seanad election. The pact would see support for Alex White (Lab) from Sinn Fein Councillors and for Pearse Doherty (SF) from Labour Councillors. The really interesting [...]

Elections are moments of truth- when we get as close as we can to really hearing what other people are thinking, albeit as a collective.
And one of the more interesting things I’ve heard from this election was the general feeling (except from some Green party members) that having the Green Party in government could only [...]

The lists for those panels where people can vote; (The poll will close on Tuesday 24 July at 11.00 a.m.)

Time for us all to think about our individual winners and losers of the campaign – feel free to do your own lists in the comments – I’m picking a few who come to mind and one for who the jury is still out for as far as I’m concerned. (Note I’m mentioning [...]

So lets move it back on, do we need two extra bank holidays per year?

Progressive Democrat Senator Kate Walsh passed away on April 24th.  This evening An Taoiseach announced the immediate appointment of Colm O’Gorman, PD candidate in Wexford to Seanad Eireann. Senator Walsh was a Taoiseach’s appointment so it is perfectly proper that another nomination be made and logical in the terms of a coalition that [...]

We should have noted this before* since it’s been brewing for a while but Fianna Fail are in the midst of an increasingly high-profile selection row in Dublin North-East.   In a move dictated by HQ, they are going with just two candidates, Michael Woods and Martin Brady, leaving longtime local player Senator Liam Fitzgerald out [...]

Labour party senator and Seanad Spokesperson on Health, Foreign Affairs, Arts, Sport, Tourism, Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Brendan Ryan, has been outed by Limerick City Council as a litter lout. The Cork senator is listed amongst over a hundred other people who were convicted in 2005 for breaches of antilitter legislation. The publication of [...]

On Friday I spoke with Senator Tom Morrissey of the Progressive Democrats at the end of the party’s ‘A New Heart for Dublin’ conference, which detailed their idea of redeveloping Dublin Port into a residential area. Senator Morrissey is the man spear-heading the idea, and the conference was launched by Michael McDowell, where he spoke [...]