A man who pleaded guilty to election fraud worked for a company owned by the Healy-Rae political family in Co Kerry, a Fine Gael senator has claimed.
Senator Michael Kennelly said: “We had voter impersonation at a Kenmare polling station at the local and European elections in June 2024 caught on CCTV.”
Raising the issue in the Upper House, he referred to the case in Kenmare District Court earlier this month.
“A Cahersiveen man pleaded guilty but avoided a conviction for election fraud after he used a polling card not in his name that went missing from a vehicle.
RM Block
“It is even more extraordinary to learn, as every dog and divil in Kerry knows, that the defendant works for the Healy-Rae Plant Hire company.”
Using Seanad privilege, the Listowel Senator said the defendant was “cited in court as a farmer and a contractor, but his employer, the Healy-Rae firm, was unusually not identified, even though he has worked for it for years”.
Mr Kennelly said he had called for a “thorough investigation into the facts of the incident”, adding that “we still need clarity as to how this was quietly hushed up”.
He said the issue “has made a mockery of our democracy”.
Mr Kennelly added: “There have been no answers as to how this man got the polling card before he drove 40 miles (64km) from his home to vote in another town. “He did not acquire it himself, the court was told, so who exactly gave it to him?”
Offering further information, he said: “This guy was not even asked for identification. To say we are running proper registration on voting day is wrong. We do not know how many of these cases exist.”
The Healy-Rae Plant Hire company is owned by the family of Independent TD Danny Healy-Rae. Contacted for comment, Mr Healy-Rae said: “I have no comment.”
Mr Healy-Rae is brother of Minister of State for Agriculture, Michael Healy-Rae.
Mr Kennelly, a Senator on the Labour panel, also highlighted another case in Kerry in 2019. A decision is still pending from the Director of Public Prosecutions in relation to that case.
He said: “This case centres on allegations that, ahead of the May 2019 local elections, a Garda officer, in the Killarney electoral area, stamped hundreds of supplementary voter registration forms without the applicants being physically present, which is a legal requirement.
“An Garda Síochána launched a formal investigation led by a superintendent from outside Kerry and a file was prepared. As of April 2024, GSOC forwarded a file to the DPP, with a decision still pending. This is over six years ago. When will we see this case brought to a conclusion?”
He added that every “fraudulent vote cancels out the voice of a lawful voter”. He pointed out that he won a seat in the 2014 Listowel local elections by two votes.
Mr Kennelly called on Minister of State for Local Government, Christopher O’Sullivan, “to clean up the whole voting process, to review the cases I have mentioned and to make sure that everything possible is done to eradicate this kind of behaviour”.
Mr O’Sullivan said he could not comment on individual cases but he agreed “fraudulent behaviour in the voting process strikes at the core of democracy”.
He added that he does not think it happens widely, but stated: “Where it is blatant and obvious and someone has been caught red-handed, I agree there should be serious consequences”.
