*Leonora Carey (FG). Photograph: John McDermott.
LEONORA CAREY (FG) has been unsuccessful in her bid to be elected to the Seanad.
Clarecastle woman Carey ran for the Labour Panel in Seanad Éireann and was eliminated on the twelfth count. Eleven Senators are elected from the Labour Panel where there was a field of nineteen candidates.
Carey polled 51,000 first preference votes which was 4.4 percent of the total share. By the time of her elimination, she had climbed to 64,000 votes which was not enough to put herself in contention. She had initially secured a nomination from members of the Oireachtas.
This was the second election contested by Leonora in the space of three months. Her General Election attempt was her first run for public office, here she 5,251 first preference votes.
For ten years, she was a member of the Fine Gael Executive Council, she served as Chairperson for two years. Leonora is a qualified occupational therapist (OT) by profession, with over 25 years’ clinical experience and 17 years as an OT manager.
Her father Donal (FG) was first elected to the Dáil in 1982, he retained the seat for five subsequent campaigns until he lost out in 2002. Five years later, his son and Leonora’s brother Joe (FG) was elected and was a TD for four terms until announcing his retirement from politics on medical grounds in August.
Leonora is the first of the Clare Seanad hopefuls to learn their fate. Ennistymon duo, Senator Martin Conway (FG) and Ann Marie Flanagan (IND) are both in the running on the Administrative Panel where seven Senators will be elected, Cllr Tony Mulcahy (FG) was the first candidate to receive a nomination for the Industrial and Commercial Panel which will have nine Senators elected.
