*Timmy Dooley TD (FF) and Joe Cooney TD (FG). Photograph: Joe Buckley
CLARE’s chances of having a Minister at Cabinet level in the next Government have been greatly strengthened by the General Election showing of Timmy Dooley TD (FF).
Nationally Fianna Fáil won 48 of the 174 TD seats followed by Sinn Féin (39), Fine Gael (38), Independents (16), Labour (11), Social Democrats (11), Independent Ireland (4), People Before Profit Solidarity (3), Aontú (2), Green Party (1) and 100% Redress Party (1).
88 seats are needed to form a Government with coalition talks beginning this week.
Tulla based Timmy Dooley (FF) recorded the second highest vote of all Fianna Fáil TDs nationally. Only party leader Micheál Martin (FF) with 14,526 managed to get a higher first preference than Timmy’s 11,313.
This coupled with Fianna Fáil returning two TDs in Clare puts forward a very strong argument for the county to be awarded with a Minister for the first time since 2011 when former TD, Tony Killeen was Minister for Defence, that was also the last time Fianna Fáil had two TDs from Clare in the Dáil.
Speaking to The Clare Echo, Dooley said, “The cause is stronger, the calls will be made by others, Cathal and I have experience, we would be capable of that, but that’s not going to be easy but look at the voters have put forward, and the teams here have put forward, the best case so let’s see what happens, but nothing’s guaranteed in that”.
On the prospect of the county earning a senior and junior Minister all in the one go, Timmy stated, “That’s very hard. We have a cabinet, so Ministers don’t get dropped generally. We won’t be shy about asking. If we’re lucky, we get a result, if we’re not, we still have to continue to fight for the issues here, and we will. We have a strong team now, and we will we will try to deliver for the county. Having access to the top table or the top layer helps to deliver a bit easier, if we’re fortunate, that’s great, if we’re not, we’ll just continue to do what we do best, and try to deliver on the big projects here”.
