Sinn Féin succeeds, as big two share four other seats
by Danielle Harney Updated: Friday, 4th March, 2011 12:50pm
After a mammoth 45-hour count, including one recount, Sinn Féin was the big winner in Laois Offaly claiming its first seat in the constituency since 1923, while Fine Gael retained its two seats and Fianna Fáil lost one.
It was, by any means, a campaign to remember in Laois Offaly, with Taoiseach Brian Cowen deciding not to stand again and the Enright dynasty coming to an end for now. The 11 independent candidates, three of whom were ex-party members, added to the unpredictable nature of the vote. However, although there's three new faces representing the constituency, the status quo was not really challenged with a Cowen returning to the Dáil, albeit in opposition, and a female Fine Gael politician replacing Olwyn Enright.
Fianna Fáil will consider its campaign a success, with only one casualty, John Moloney, quelling fears that running three candidates in the constituency was a risk. Its voter share took a huge knock, dropping from 56.3% in 2007 to 26.8% this time, but the party admitted that Brian Cowen's personal massive vote would never again be repeated. Laois/Offaly was one of only two constituencies where Fianna Fáil returned more than one TD, after leader Micheál Martin brought home his running-mate in Cork South Central.
A surprisingly strong performance by Labour will perhaps make HQ reflect on the how the selection process was handled - two ex-party members who ran as independents probably cost them close to 1,000 votes, which could have put the party in with a chance of beating Fianna Fáil's Sean Fleming and taking the last seat. But with a share of the vote at almost 8%, three times higher than in 2007, the party will be happy with first-timer Whelan's performance.
Sinn Féin doubled its share of the vote, but more importantly as neither candidate had a running-mate to rely on for transfers, both Labour and Sinn Féin will be extremely happy with how transfer-friendly their two candidates turned out to be.
Fine Gael will have to analyse its decision to run four candidates - was adding John Moran to the ticket with only weeks to go to polling day a mistake, or did the vote management strategy go wrong? Perhaps there just isn't enough party supporters in the constituency to get three over the line, especially if the trend towards Sinn Féin and Labour continues, especially in urban areas.
After the first count, nine candidates polled less than 700 votes. These were all independent candidates and their transfers mostly stayed within the independent vote, however their dilution of the independent vote pond also kept potentially serious contenders Cllrs John Foley and John Leahy out of the running. Independents in this election increased their voter share by a massive 18% compared to 2007, which showed how much the large field of Independents affected the party share.
The recount only increased the number of invalid votes and lowered the quota, however in the end, after 13 counts, only Fine Gael candidates Charlie Flanagan and Marcella Corcoran Kennedy reached quota. But the Fianna Fáil duo of Barry Cowen and Seán Fleming, weren't far behind. Quota or not, for Brian Stanley, after 15 years of work, it was a sweet, historic victory.
