Election counts in the RDS have seen some epic arrivals over the years.
Big name politicians taking a breath before plunging into the peppering media scrum, inching their way through the front doors as supporters, reporters, camera crews and photographers push frantically forward while being bulldozed back.
These intense moments, when the victorious and the vanquished arrive to face the electoral music, are highly dramatic and often downright dangerous.
There was the pandemonium when George Lee, then of Fine Gael, entered the Simmonscourt building after a stunning byelection win in 2009. There was chaos when Michael McDowell dramatically resigned as leader of the Progressive Democrats in 2007.
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The rolling mauls of national and international media around Sinn Féin leaders when they swept in surrounded by cheering and flag-waving colleagues.
But Sunday’s scenes were unprecedented.
For two days, the big question in the count centre was whether gangland boss Gerry Hutch could pull off the most daring smash and grab in modern Irish political history and snaffle a seat in the Dáil.
For much of that time, it looked on the cards.
For much of that time, the other big question was: what the hell is going on?
And one more: would Hutch – living (a fact which adds to the mythology around him) proof that serious crime is no bar to celebrity status – show his face at the count?
Because he was back on home turf, having been released on bail by a Spanish court after his arrest last month as part of an investigation into alleged money laundering. Which was nice.
In all the years of covering general election counts in Dublin, this would be the first one where crime correspondents were in danger of outnumbering the political correspondents.
The thin red line of the Labour Party and Marie Sherlock stood between him and an infamous victory.
And the thin red line prevailed.
There had been a strong rumour that the millionaire gang leader might show up at the Dublin Central Count on Saturday night when he consolidated his impressive first preference haul (3,098 votes) with significant transfers in subsequent counts.
Oscar-nominated film-maker Jim Sheridan, who grew up on Seville Place in Hutch’s north inner city area, arrived in the afternoon, fuelling speculation that the candidate would show up. Sheridan is making a documentary about him.
Bizarrely, in this already remarkable episode, former Fianna Fáil junior minister Conor Lenihan is also involved in this production and was strolling around the RDS on Sunday looking very arty with his boho scarf and natty trilby.
While Sheridan would later admit he was relieved that Hutch didn’t actually get elected, a win would have greatly benefited their project. But there is clearly enough there for a decent film because the project continues.
Word on Saturday – and into Sunday morning – was that Hutch, also glamorised as The Monk, didn’t want to turn up as a loser. Hutch would attend the count only if victory was certain.
The arrival of Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald late on Saturday afternoon caused a frisson, particularly among the overseas media contingent which never seems to tire of her party’s particular allure. Mary Lou rolled in with Michelle O’Neill, Northern Ireland’s First Minister and Sinn Féin deputy leader, by her side.
They looked and talked like winners, as if they had just triumphed over their two establishment rivals and were on an unstoppable march to a historic victory after 100 years of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.
They joined hands and raised their arms aloft, smiling at the centre of a simmering media scrum which then followed Mary Lou (Michelle didn’t stick around too long) for hours in the count centre before her poll-topping win was confirmed.
Watching them – and listening to all their big talk about “winning a mandate for change” – one would never have thought they were trailing in third place behind their two main rivals.
A number of disgruntled far-right supporters, who learned that spouting tripe for likes on social media doesn’t win many votes, loudly heckled the Sinn Féin leader.
As the count progressed into Sunday, the Labour Party contingent slowly relaxed as the transfers heading Hutch’s way began to dry up.
They were deeply worried the night before, as were supporters and representatives of the other parties, staring into the very real prospect of a very real gangster becoming a TD.
The jokes about sending a criminal to join the rest of them in the Dáil – they were flying until the boxes were opened and tallied – dried up. Suddenly, they weren’t funny any more.
Gary Gannon of the Social Democrats was elected after McDonald. He is also from Dublin’s north inner city, born and bred. The opportunistic grandstanding of Gerry Hutch sickened him.
An emotional Gary was with his wife, Clodagh Allen, and his mother, Tina.
“I wouldn’t be here today if it wasn’t for me ma. She works in the creche in Sherriff Street and knows everything that’s going on. She’s the best in the world,” he said.
He said when he was let go as an apprentice plumber, he told her he wanted to go to college. “I might as well have said I was going to the moon. But she made it work for me,” he said.
“And now, all the work we have done for people in the inner city, your man Hutch is coming in and trying to undermine it. If he wins, it’s like the canary in the coal mine – things will just get worse and worse when they should be getting better.”
Gannon’s surplus votes were instrumental in keeping him out.
The Fine Gael Minister for Public Expenditure Paschal Donohoe waited his turn to reach the quota and reclaim his Dáil seat. Now the transfers were all heading Sherlock’s way. A hugely significant win, after hours of agony, was assured. That was that, so – no chance of The Monk appearing now.
The word came, out of the blue, of a change of plan. He would be coming to the RDS after all, documentary team in tow.
Hutch barrelled up the long road to the Simmonscourt building while an increasingly agitated group of photographers and reporters waited outside the main door.
The Labour crowd waited inside to hear the final result as the massed ranks of the media bolted outside.
“Hutch is on the way!”
“I don’t feckin’ care – we won,” laughed one of them.
“Sherlock is on the case,” was their candidate’s slogan.
“Sherlock won the case,” is what they are saying now.
The international media jostled with the local contingent as The Monk walked briskly towards the entrance. The holding line of photographers surged forward, taking everyone else with them.
“Get back! Get back! No pushing! No pushing!”
Hutch, smiling serenely. Throwing a few monosyllabic answers to breathless questions from breathless reporters. He was in charge and he knew it.
A number of security guards joined his own small contingent. They made for the walkway to the main entrance, but the media group was growing in size and in the way. So they ducked around to the side, accumulating an increasingly frantic entourage of photographers and reporters as they went.
Sinn Féin’s Denise Mitchell, who was re-elected later, took her five foster children and daughter, ranging in age from five upwards, to visit Santa in Elf Town in another part of the RDS. As they returned, the throng descended.
“They’re all in their Christmas jumpers and hats when suddenly the reporters started running towards us. It was madness – I thought we were all going to get caught in a stampede. I just pulled the little lads out of the way in time. It was frightening,” she said.
The rolling maul gathered speed. Hutch shouted abuse at RTÉ’s crime correspondent Paul Reynolds, who was asking about the Special Criminal Court. The candidate didn’t appreciate this.
The scrum stalled in the lobby before bursting into the main arena. The Hutch contingent turned left; their count was in the other direction.
In the ensuing pandemonium, bodies and elbows were flying, cameras crashing and in the pandemonium the chaos landed against the barriers in front of the Dublin Bay North count.
“There’s never a guard around when you need one,” quipped Hutch, revelling in the attention. He leant against the barrier.
Count staff moved a safe distance away, watching in fascination as he relaxed against it, answering the myriad of questions shouted at him with a smiling silence or a few non-committal words.
This was celebrity gone wrong. Celebrity gone mad.
Minor fights broke out among people jostling to get a look or steal a photo or record a few words. Older members of political parties, their candidate stickers curling at the edges, jostled with journalists for a better view.
Two young boys stood up on the barrier and gazed across at this older man with the piercing eyes and slightly dishevelled hair, fascinated.
More security arrived. Finally, after about 20 minutes of madness – the camera crews and photographers seemed possessed – the scrum moved off again towards the Dublin Central count.
“Did anybody see a pair of glasses,” roared a cameraman as two untethered buttons rolled past us on the ground.
As the pack clattered back towards the soon-to-be-elected Sherlock, Hutch rolled past Fianna Fáil’s Jim O’Callaghan in mid-interview, the television lights on him. Jim could be the next minister for justice. Oh, the irony.
They didn’t seem to know where they were going. More irony. You would have thought that The Monk, of all people, had his entrances and exits mapped out before he turned up.
The large contingent of gardaí on the premises looked on with expressions of mild disgust on their faces.
It was dangerous near Dublin Central. Labour MEP Aodhán Ó Ríordáin gathered up Sherlock’s young daughter just as the tsunami landed.
An elderly man stood right in its patch. We tried to move him to the barrier.
“No, no, I’m going nowhere,” he insisted. “I will not move. That’s me daughter there, that’s me daughter,” cried Michael Sherlock, eventually moving to the side. “It’s terrific,” he told us. “I’m thrilled, over the moon.”
Marie’s mother, Eileen, was “thrilled to pieces”. “Thank God she got elected. Otherwise, where would we be?”
Hutch wished Marie the best of luck. He was very gracious in defeat.
“You’re new in there and don’t be contaminated – do your best,” he told her.
He left just before the new TD was deemed elected and Labour’s wild celebrations began.
“Democracy is great, but sometimes we can overdo it,” remarked Labour veteran and Hutch acquaintance, Joe Costello.
The scrum went with him, struggling to keep up as he increased his pace, eventually breaking into a jog and running all the way down and across Simmonscourt Road, ducking into the luxury embrace of the Intercontinental Hotel.
He had a rolled up piece of paper in his pocket. A speech?
He never got to deliver it.
No loss.
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