Aontú has won its first seat in the Seanad with the election of its candidate Sarah O’Reilly to the Upper House on the Agricultural panel, at the expense of Fianna Fáil.
The Cavan-Monaghan Dáil general election candidate’s victory in the Seanad follows a successful voting pact among Independent councillors.
It is a significant gain for the party, resulting in Fianna Fáil losing one of its four seats on the panel.
This is its second seat loss, following a loss on the Cultural and Educational panel.
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But the party has won a seat on the Labour panel, where counting is under way, with the poll-topper, outgoing Monaghan Senator Robbie Gallagher, exceeding the quota on the first count.
Independent Senator Gerard Craughwell was re-elected on the second count.
The Social Democrats have won their first Seanad seat as a party with Patricia Stephenson, their Carlow-Kilkenny candidate in the Dáil general election.
Sinn Féin’s former Dublin Bay South TD Chris Andrews was elected on the fourth count with transfers from party colleague Daithí Doolan, who had been eliminated.
His party colleague Maria McCormack from Co Laois, who ran in the Dáil election against former party TD Brian Stanley, was also set to become a senator.
In the earlier Agricultural panel count, Fine Gael gained a seat at the expense of Labour, whose candidate Cllr Angela Feeney lost to outgoing Senator Maria Byrne.
Labour has conceded that its candidate on the Labour panel, Sligo’s Cllr Nessa Cosgrove, will have a tough fight to retain the seat previously held by Marie Sherlock, who was elected to the Dáil.
On the Agricultural panel, during a dramatic 23rd count, Ms Byrne held her seat by just one tenth of a vote in the complicated Seanad counting system.
Labour was hoping Cllr Feeney would keep the seat held by outgoing senator Annie Hoey, who did not run in the election.
After Labour called for a recount, the revised tally did not change the result, and Cllr Feeney was excluded. A Labour source said the party would call for a full recount but expected to be refused.
The party will then submit preliminary papers, which has to done before the final count is declared, to give it the option of taking a legal challenge to have a full recount.
“We’re doing the same as Lorraine Clifford-Lee,” said a Labour source of the outgoing Fianna Fáil senator, who lost out by a fraction of a vote on the cultural and educational panel.
While the Independents' voting pact worked for Aontú, an arrangement between Labour, the Social Democrats and Greens has been less successful. It worked spectacularly for former Green Party minister and poll-topper Malcolm Noonan, who exceeded the quota, but not for Labour.
Labour sources suggested the party got 20 fewer votes than were agreed. The electorate of just under 1,200 comprises TDs, Senators and councillors, who each have a vote on all five vocational panels and trade votes between parties and groups for first or higher preference votes.
A veteran political observer described the Seanad election as “like the Ballinasloe fair” for horse-trading over votes. “All they’re short of doing is spitting on their hands before they shake.”
The ballot is secret, however, and there is no direct sanction for not holding to an agreement.
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For Fine Gael, Cork County Councillor Eileen Lynch, Longford’s Cllr Paraic Brady, a farmer and part-time builder, and Galway County Councillor PJ Murphy are new Senators, joining Senator Byrne from Co Limerick in the Upper House.
Earlier, Fine Gael senators Tim Lombard and Aisling Dolan lost their seats on the Agricultural panel. Mr Lombard, outgoing Cork South-West senator, was eliminated on the 17th count for the Agricultural panel.
Mr Lombard, a dairy farmer, had unsuccessfully contested both the 2020 and 2024 Dáil general elections in a constituency in which the party has no seat and has been pushing to regain a foothold in.
Ms Dolan, a Taoiseach’s nominee from Ballinasloe and a project manager, had contested the general elections in 2020 and 2024 in the Roscommon-Galway constituency.
Fianna Fáil returned with three seats, one less than in the last Seanad. Former cathaoirleach Denis O’Donovan retired and the party had a seat held by former party senator Eugene Murphy, who became an Independent but lost his seat.
The party’s first success on the panel was the return of outgoing Westmeath Senator Paul Daly. Mr Daly, a farmer and former secondary school teacher has been a Senator since 2016. He was elected on the 14th count.
Donegal Senator Niall Blaney was also returned, followed by Tallaght-based Cllr Teresa Costello, a newcomer to the Seanad.
Former minister of State Malcolm Noonan topped the poll for the Green Party, succeeding outgoing senator and former minister of State Pippa Hackett. He was elected on the first count, exceeding the 95,667 quota with 105,000 votes.
Votes in the Seanad are multiplied by 1,000 to avoid fractions in the counting system because of the small electorate of just under 1,200, including 949 councillors, outgoing senators and incoming TDs.
Sinn Féin’s Joanne Collins from Limerick, a newcomer, was also elected on the first count, with 106,000 votes. Ms Collins, a qualified special needs assistant, who narrowly lost out in the Dáil general election in Limerick County, said following her victory that she would relish working on behalf of rural Ireland “and in particular having the backs of section 39 workers in our community and voluntary workers”.
Sitting Independent Dún Laoghaire Senator Victor Boyhan starts his third term as a Senator following his election, also on the first count, with 105,000 votes.
The 11 Senators on the Agricultural panel have been elected and counting will commence shortly for the Labour panel, where there are 19 candidates for 11 seats.
Counting in the university constituencies, which have six seats, finished yesterday following a revised final count, when just 31 votes separated businessman Aubrey McCarthy and Green Party Cllr Hazel Chu. Mr McCarthy was deemed elected with a slight increase in his vote.
The Cultural and Educational Panel was the first vocational panel completed with the election of five Senators:
- Pauline Tully (Sinn Féin)
- Cathal Byrne (Fine Gael)
- Shane Curley (Fianna Fáil)
- Seán Kyne (Fine Gael)
- Joe Conway (Independent)
Agricultural Panel (11 Senators):
- Malcolm Noonan (Green Party)
- Joanna Collins (Sinn Féin)
- Victor Boyhan (Independent)
- Paul Daly (Fianna Fáil)
- Niall Blaney (Fianna Fáil)
- Teresa Costello (Fine Gael)
- Eileen Lynch (Fine Gael)
- Sarah O’Reilly (Aontú)
- Paraic Brady (Fine Gael)
- Maria Byrne (Fine Gael)
- PJ Murphy (Fine Gael)
Labour Panel (11 Senators)
- Robbie Gallagher (FF)
- Gerard Craughwell (Ind)
National University of Ireland
- Michael McDowell
- Rónán Mullen
- Alice-Mary Higgins
University of Dublin (TCD)
- Lynn Ruane
- Tom Clonan
- Aubrey McCarthy
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