*Tony Killeen (FF) is among those to express the view that it will 2-2 for FF and FG. Photograph: Tom Micks
FIANNA FÁIL and Fine Gael are being tipped to elect two TDs each in Co Clare according to political pundits.
On November 29th, the people of Clare will head to the polls to vote to determine who will be the county’s four TDs in the 34th Dáil.
So far, the campaign has yet to spring to life in Co Clare, the additions of Cllr Joe Cooney (FG) and Dr Tom Nolan (FG) seemed to reinvigorate candidates but gaining momentum is proving tricky for all nineteen candidates in the field.
Former Clare TD, Tony Killeen (FF) and Mike Taylor (FG) ex parliamentary assistant to Clare TD, Violet-Anne Wynne (IND) have both predicted that the county will return two Fianna Fáil and two Fine Gael TDs.
An optimistic view of the two and two return for two of the coalition parties has also been voiced by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael councillors in Clare. Such an outcome would resemble the 1989 election when Donal Carey (FG) topped the poll and he was joined in the Dáil by Madeline Taylor Quinn (FG), Brendan Daly (FF) and Síle de Valera (FF).
Speaking on The Electoral Chair, Killeen stated, “If you were asking me four years ago I would definitely have felt that Fianna Fáil were winning two seats, I was really confident and a bit of me is the same now but because of what happened then and in loads of local elections when I think back I’m a bit less confident, if I was to call it I’d say Fianna Fáil two and Fine Gael probably two, a slight doubt on the second one, I think Fianna Fáil will have more first preference votes, mind you in 2016 we had 3,000 more first preferences than Fine Gael but Fine Gael got two seats and we got one”.
At this moment, the former Minister for Defence said he was unable to predict exactly the personnel but maintained the seats would be won by four from Senator Timmy Dooley (FF), Cllr Rita McInerney (FF), outgoing TD Cathal Crowe (FF), Nolan, Cooney and Leonora Carey (FG). “There doesn’t seem to be much between the three Fianna Fáil ones and there isn’t a lot between two of the Fine Gael candidates, it matters so much and who will be getting if two of the Fine Gael candidates are close together who will be getting a chunk of the 2,500 from candidates eliminated early but 5,000 or 6,000 more coming in after that, I suppose Leonora is in the best position really because Tom is a bit over unless he is ahead of Rita in which case he becomes a beneficiary. Roisin Garvey’s vote if I’m right and it’s approximately what it was the last time, that will have a big impact, the Government parties will hope it goes to them having been together for five years but it is not that kind of a vote”.
Kilkee based Taylor felt Dr Nolan could be ahead of Carey in the rankings but felt she had a distinct advantage over most candidates in that she is not surrounded at her Clarecastle base by opponents. “Every other Government candidate apart from Leonora is marked by another Government candidate so she has a lot to capitalise on in the population centre of the county. Donna McGettigan has a big population centre too but I don’t think it is going to break through, I’d be of a similar opinion to Tony on the two Fianna Fáil two Fine Gael question mark.
“I really have a question mark there because we were surprised in 2020 and we could be surprised again, one in five votes are going to go to Independents and others, if that momentum can be properly captured and one can rise above all the rest in that way, it could be a different make-up, I’d be hard pressed to put names on two of the four but certainly I think Joe Cooney and Timmy Dooley will be comfortably returned. Beyond that you’re really getting into who is getting elected when and who is being eliminated when and how the transfers all play into each other, it comes down to the population,” he added.
Managing Director of Spa Transport, Eugene Drennan who orchestrated the Dáil elections of James Breen (IND) in 2002, Dr Michael Harty (IND) in 2016 and Wexford TD Verona Murphy (IND) in 2020 ruled out the potential of success for the trio of Violet-Anne Wynne TD (IND), Senator Roisin Garvey (GP) and Cllr Donna McGettigan (SF).
Drennan said Wynne would do well to get ten percent of her 8,987 first preference votes in 2020 when she ran as a Sinn Féin candidate. “I’d say she be doing well if she got ten percent of it, I don’t know the lady, I only saw her the time of the election, I pass her office regularly on Parnell Street and I never see her coming or going, I’ve been in the Dáil quite a lot in the last four years, in and out lobbying and I’ve never laid an eye on her, I’m sure she’s there but I haven’t picked up on it and I know a considerable amount of TDs from around the country. I don’t know what she has been active in or around, I’m not saying she hasn’t been active but I’m not aware of it because people are not talking to me about issues she is bringing up, they’re not saying ‘did you hear this, she’s doing well here or she is a mighty girl on this’, you have to have that to get to the momentum, running as an Independent you really need momentum, you need every first preference vote because you don’t have a straight line of transfers coming from anywhere, I’d say very slim”.
Transfers from Garvey and McGettigan will be crucial to electing somebody else, he said. “Their vote will be very important as the transfers but as regards getting over the line, the last 400 votes or 100 votes they are very hard to get, very hard to get and I don’t see enough of transfers coming to them at the time when they will need them. The most amazing set of transfers ever seen was the last time in the Inagh box, it was unbelieveable, I never saw anything like it, nobody but nobody could predict that one so it will tell you the tricks when the boxes are opened and the great transfer system, long may we have it”.
