Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
The Pat Kenny Show. With timber living log cabins. Saturday and Sunday from 10am on Newstalk. Conversation that counts.
Now we're awaiting the count in two. Closely watched by elections this morning in Dublin Central and Galway West. Turnout appears to have fallen short of expectations. Early indications suggest participation hovering around 40% of the capital and maybe just over 44% in Galway. We'll get clarification later. of those numbers very, very shortly. But first we'll go to Dublin Central.
Chapter 2: What are the latest updates on the Dublin Central by-election?
Barry White is covering the count there. Barry, good morning. Hi, Pat. Good morning. Now, how many boxes have been opened? How few, I suppose I should ask?
Chapter 3: What are the early turnout figures for Dublin Central and Galway West?
And what are the early tallies indicating?
Good morning, Pat. Yeah, look, it's still early here at the Crown Centre in the RDS in Simmons Court, but the tallies are already beginning to give us a clear picture of how this Dublin Central by-election is shaping up. And it's worth saying, Pat, there's a very strong tally operation in place here this morning with party teams working together across the Crown floor.
So these figures are expected to be quite accurate. That's normally the case when all the parties work together.
So, with almost three quarters of the boxes now opened and tallied, the early tallies show Janice Boylan of Sinn Féin on 19.8%, Daniel Ennis of the Sock Dems on 18.3%, independent candidate Gerry Hutch, 13.5%, Maliki Steenson on 10.8%, Janet Horner of the Green Party on 10.6%, Phineas Ray McAdam on 9.2%, Mona Canavan of People for Profit on 7.1%,
Labour's Ruth O'Dea on 5%, Fianna Fáil's John Stevens on 3.1% and Ian Noel Smith of Aintoo on 1.9%. So Pat, there are a few clear trends here emerging already. Daniel Ennis is performing particularly strongly in the north inner city and at this stage looks to have the momentum behind him. Another notable development is the stronger than expected showing from both the Green Party's Janet Horner.
and People Before Profits own a Canavon, their votes would be expected to transfer predominantly to other left-leaning candidates, so particularly Daniel Ennis and Janice Boylan.
So while there's still a long way to go in this count, it is increasingly looking like a two-candidate race between the Social Democrats and Sinn Féin, with Daniel Ennis at this point appearing to have the edge, because I think the transfers of the Green Party and People Before Profits will likely favour him more.
And finally, Barry, you're surrounded by wise old heads at the count in Simmons Court in the RDS. When are they predicting we'll have a result? Because is this likely to be late tonight or even tomorrow?
It depends who you speak to, Pat. But I know that the Dublin Bay South by-election a few years ago had a valid poll of around 29,000. And that went on to 9pm at night. The valid poll here is expected to be around 23,000. So I'm hoping that maybe by 7, 8 o'clock this will be done. And I know you mentioned turnout there, Pat, earlier.
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Chapter 4: Who are the leading candidates in the Dublin Central by-election?
Eamon O'Keefe, former Fianna Fáil TD and Minister. Eamon, good morning. Good morning, Kiel. What do you make of this showing? I mean, it's always the adage that governments lose by elections, but it looks like Sean Kynan is in with a shout of winning this one, but Cillian Keane really not performing.
Well, you have to understand, Cillian Cain lives in the rural area to the east of the city, and they're going to be the last boxes to be tallied. Now, it won't make a huge difference, but it will boost his percentage a bit. So we wouldn't have expected him to get very, very strong votes in the city or to the west of the city because it doesn't come from that area.
And one of the challenges here as compared to a general election is you can only put one candidate up. In a general election, you place your candidates in a different way. But he certainly won for the future.
And what is your reading of the overall shape of the voting with independent Ireland doing well? The Labour Party, whose seat it was, I suppose, but in a general election, you can get the last seat and still it's the same as the first seat. It's equally valuable. But in a by-election, there's only one to fight for. So the incumbent party doesn't necessarily get that seat.
Well, yeah, it was an independency, but independent Labour. And there is this tunnel of clay, and I was looking at transfers between the city candidates in elections from the left, and they tend to go 66% to each other. So there is quite a swill around of votes in the city. Now, we've only got the city boxes, so we haven't got the...
the connemara boxes but it looks as if kind is in a strong position but if you add all the left parties they're still in in the race the problem that no thomas has faced previously and according to your report there is facing again i checked of all the transfers in the general election he got 12 percent all right so he's not transfer friendly Well, that's what the way it was in the general.
Your commentator there said that that appeared to be the same way this time. If that turns out, he'll get a very high first preference, but he might fade towards the end.
Eamon, thank you very much for joining us and sharing your wisdom and your knowledge of that constituency. Sean Defoe, who's actually going to keep a weather eye on the elections right throughout the day and even tomorrow. Sean, what are you making of all of this? Yeah, really interesting.
So as we thought, Dublin Central, two horse race, Janice Boylan versus the Social Democrats, and you'd think advantage Daniel Ennis given the Social Democrats tend to be more transfer friendly, but we don't have a whole pile of transfer data on Sinn Féin because of how they nearly topped the poll in most constituencies at the last election. So that's a real test for Mary Lou.
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Chapter 5: What trends are emerging from the Dublin Central vote tallies?
Longevity. He's been around a long time. He's a former minister. He's a former government chief whip. He's been a TD for the area. He's obviously a senator for the area. And he is the most well-known face among them. As one Fianna Fáil minister put it to me rather devastatingly for Sean Cain, people might not like him, but they know him, which makes... Makes a bit of a help in an election.
Absolutely. And he does seem to be, at least from what Fine Gael are saying this morning, that he is picking up transfers in and around the city that may well get him there. Very hard for a government candidate, but it's still not clear. Like if you do add up all those left-wing votes that are there at the minute. You're still coming in around 36, 38 percent by elections.
Obviously, you're different. You have to get to 50. You have to get there somehow. So I think the votes of someone like Mike Cupboard, who's kind of a middle of the road independent, he's on about 9 percent at the minute, broke quite well for Sinn Féin in the general election. He could be someone that could swing it either way for, say, a Sean Cain or maybe even a Helen Ogbush.
You can stay in the race.
I'm just looking at the field. I mean, how many candidates are there? One, two, three, four... 17 in Galway, 14 in Dublin. 17 in Galway. My goodness. How do you push your way to the top of that hill?
Huge field. And like there's remarkable statistics that I think up until really the last 20 years, you sort of averaged five or six candidates in a by-election. Then it became 10. Now in the last while, it's closer to 15 candidates in all of these constituencies. Tended to be throughout the last...
hundred years of by-elections that if you got somewhere near, the average winner got about 30% of the vote on the first count. No one's coming near that in either of these by-elections.
So it makes it a really broken field and your likeability, I think, comes into it a lot more because you have to appeal to someone who might not like your party, but is willing to give you a number two or three that will be crucial.
Okay, it is extraordinary. And you expect, I know, the count to go on into the dead of the night or perhaps into tomorrow morning.
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