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THE SUN IS out, the writs have been moved and the posters are up, so we are now officially into an early summer by-election.
November’s presidential poll gave those of us who love a good election a quick fix, but without a general or local election until likely 2029, these by-elections may be all we’ll get for a good while.
There are two of them, in case you hadn’t heard.
President Catherine Connolly won the above-mentioned contest, vacating her Galway West Dáil seat in the process and necessitating the first by-election.
The second came about after Paschal Donohoe also departed for a senior but unelected job in the World Bank, forcing him to give up Fine Gael’s seat in Dublin Central.
That the two events happened within a couple of weeks of each other mean we get a two-for-one deal on Friday 22 May.
And as it happens, they are two quite diverse by-elections. One smack bang in the heart of the capital, and another in Galway that takes in Galway City but also Connemara and some of the most remote parts of the country.
We already have a rake of candidates who have confirmed they are running (it’s in double figures in both areas) and there’s a week left to go to register, but as it stands who is in the running and how is it looking?
Galway West
As you will hear a lot over the next month, it’s usually a tall order for government parties to win by-elections.
There have only been three such occasions when a government party has won a by-election in the last 30 years, and in two of those wins it involved a relative being elected following the death of a sitting TD.
So it probably won’t be easy for Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael.
That said, Fine Gael’s Sean Kyne was an eager beaver this morning in sending out a press release declaring he was “ready to hit the ground running”.
The sitting Senator and former junior minister will likely position himself as the most experienced candidate from the government side.
Fianna Fáil’s candidate for Galway West is 25-year-old councillor Cillian Keane who, if he were elected, would become the youngest Soldier of Destiny in the Dáil, undercutting the three young guns who caused the bother for Taoiseach Micheál Martin last week.
It is, however, and older and former Fianna Fáil man who is the bookies favourite to take the seat.
Sitting councillor Noel Thomas is running for Independent Ireland narrowly missed out on the fifth and final seat in the general election. He’s back here to have another go.
President Connolly had only got her feet under the desk in the Áras when Independent Ireland’s Michael Collins TD was pushing Thomas for the seat.
Given Independent Ireland prominence as part of the recent fuel protests, it’ll worth watching how this will influence both his candidacy and the wider race.
Only this week, Thomas was pushing those buttons when he declared that Leo Varadkar’s controversial podcast comments were “a shameless attempt to sow division between rural and urban communities”.
As the constituency nationwide with the biggest concentration of Irish speaking voters, one of the questions of the campaign has been the command of the language among the candidates.
The Journal has previously reported that neither Raidió na Gaeltachta nor TG4 will be hosting a debate as gaeilge due the significant number of candidates lacking fluent Irish.
One of those who does have Irish is Míde Nic Fhionnlaoich of the Social Democrats who is from Connemara and last week was backed by longtime Fianna Fáil TD for area Eámon Ó Cuiv as having a credible chance of taking a seat.
Ó Cuiv’s thinking was that Nic Fhionnlaoich is best placed to benefit from votes that have previously gone to Connolly.
Also fishing for Connolly’s votes in particular will be Sheila Garrity, a university lecturer who was previously involved in Connolly’s campaigns in Galway and who is in the race as an independent candidate.
Sinn Féin’s Mairéad Farrell TD topped the poll in Galway West at the general election and as such the party will be hoping that her vote moves en masse to the party’s by-election candidate Mark Lohan, a former Galway City councillor who came through a tight convention process to get the nod for largest opposition party.
The other candidates declared in Galway West are:
Dublin Central
From west to east and over in Dublin Central there is a smaller (but still large) field hoping to replace Paschal Donohoe.
The constituency has been a fascinating one for politics-watchers in recent years, so the by-election here is among the most high-profile in the country.
Sinn Féin’s party leader Mary Lou McDonald has been the poll topper here in recent elections but she has never brought in a running mate to take a second seat for the party.
Given the competitive nature of the constituency, a by-election may well be Sinn Féin’s best chance of having a second seat but this is far from a guarantee.
Sinn Féin’s selection convention sprung a bit of a surprise when Councillor Janice Boylan was chosen as the candidate ahead of Gillian Sherratt, the mother of Harvey Morrison Sherratt who died last year after years of waiting for spinal surgery.
Boylan ran unsuccessfully alongside McDonald in the last general election so could be considered the expected choice again but Sherratt was seen as party HQ’s preferred candidate.
According to the bookies, the favourite for the Dublin Central by-election is another councillor, Daniel Ennis of the Social Democrats.
Ennis has worked alongside sitting TD Gary Gannon and has a strong social media presence and history of being vocal on local issues.
To move to the third party that already has a seat in the constituency, Labour are also running someone who has worked alongside the sitting TD.
Community activist Ruth O’Dea is a staff member in Marie Sherlock TD’s constituency office and has said her platform will be focused on “housing, public services and community integration”.
The Green Party had a representation in this constituency between 2020-2024 in the shape of Neasa Hourigan, and hoping to regain that seat is Janet Horner.
Horner was out of the blocks early to confirm her candidacy and The Journal went out canvassing with her back in February, just after the Greens’ sister party in the UK had its biggest ever electoral victory.
“Seeing Greens break through in places that they haven’t done before is a very exciting thing to see,” Horner said at the time.
Rounding out the five candidates who are campaigning under an informal ‘Keep Left’ banner is People Before Profit candidate Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin, a fluent Irish speaker and an award-winning musician who has his roots in sean-nós singing.
‘Keep Left’, which is also active in Galway West, is an ad hoc organisation that seeks to continue the unity the five parties showed during Catherine Connolly’s presidential campaign, despite the absence of a formal transfer pact among them.
Among the government parties, the best chance for a seat is Fine Gael’s sitting Lord Mayor of Dublin Ray McAdam.
A long-time councillor for the party in the North Inner City, McAdam was close to Donohoe and has been pressing flesh as much as possible in recent months in his duel role as Lord Mayor and candidate.
In what was clearly a coordinated message by Fine Gael HQ, McAdam used the same words as his Galway West colleague by also saying he was “ready to hit the ground running”.
Of course, one of the reasons why Dublin Central has been (literally) box office in the past two years is the presence of gangland figure and now theatre protagonist Gerry Hutch.
Hutch, who was found not guilty of murder in 2023, essentially kicked off his latest campaign in February by urging people to register to vote.
Hutch secured just over 3,000 first-preference votes in 2024 before ultimately losing out on the final seat to Labour’s Sherlock after transfers.
Hutch’s return to the campaign trail comes as legal issues continue to hang over him.
He is currently on bail in Spain in connection with an investigation into alleged money laundering offences and Justice Minister Jim O’Callaghan recently said when asked about Hutch that people seeking office must be tax compliant.
For O’Callaghan’s own party, Fianna Fáil has chosen local councillor John Stephens as their candidate to win a seat in constituency that was once the fiefdom of Bertie Ahern.
Fianna Fáil haven’t won a seat in Dubln Central since Ahern’s heydey but Stephens said he has “lived, worked and played an active role in this community throughout my life.”
Of the ten candidates in Dublin Central who are currently in the running six are sitting councillors, with Independent Malachy Steenson the sixth sitting representative.
Steenson, who was involved in anti-immigration protests in East Wall in late 2023, was recently outspoken to defend the proliferation of tricolours on lampposts in the north inner city in the past year.
Also running in Dublin Central is Ian Noel Smyth of Aontú, who spoke outside the Dáil in support of fuel protesters last week.
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