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THE GALWAY WEST byelection campaign has entered its final stretch, with housing, the cost of living and emigration dominating canvasses across the constituency.
The Journal joined the two leading centre-left candidates in the race on Friday – with a week to go before polling.
Under grey skies in Shantalla, made up of former council houses built in the 1940s, Labour candidate Helen Ogbu canvassed alongside her party leader Ivana Bacik as well as TDs Ged Nash and Duncan Smith.
In the centre of the city, Social Democrats candidate Míde Nic Fhionnlaoich launched the party’s new Renters’ Charter alongside housing spokesman Rory Hearne.
Fine Gael’s Seán Kyne topped the poll at with 17% of first preference votes, followed closely by Independent Ireland’s Noel Thomas.
The poll has placed Ogbu in third with 12%, and Nic Fhionnlaoich in fourth place with 9%, leaving both candidates battling to emerge as the strongest centre-left contender in a fragmented race.
Housing remained the defining issue, Nic Fhionnlaoich said, but increasingly, worries about issue came blended into wider anxieties.
“It’s housing, it’s cost of living, health, transport,” she said.
“There’s not a moment where renters don’t worry about what’s going to happen next month. There’s not a moment where people don’t worry about going up to the till in the shop, what it’s going to cost them, or that electricity bill landing on the mat”.
She argued that there was growing frustration with governments that had failed to deliver on promises around affordable housing and public services.
Asked about the mood among younger voters, Nic Fhionnlaoich repeatedly returned to the sense of insecurity facing renters and workers.
“It all comes back to this idea that there is no future for us here, that there is no quality of life for a young person,” she said.
“Doesn’t matter how hard you work, that you will never be able to afford a home, that you will never be able to have that security that our parents had”.
Last week, the Social Democrats formally launched their Renters’ Charter, a package of proposals focused on strengthening tenant protections, limiting no-fault evictions and tackling rising rents.
“We’ve seen more and more people get eviction notices,” she said.
“And in a country that is so rich, it’s unconscionable that you have so many people just facing off into a cliff edge”.
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Labour’s canvassing in Shantalla leaned heavily into local roots.
The team gathered at St Joseph’s Community Centre, nestled in between Shantalla and Westside, before dispersing across the houses.
Canvassers were instructed to emphasise Ogbu’s Galway city roots, contrasting them with candidates based outside the city. There were reminders, too, about the constituency’s significance.
“It used to be Michael D Higgins’s seat and Catherine Connolly’s seat. That would be a very good legacy for Galway to be a part of,” Aideen Blackwood, the party’s national organiser, said.
Almost immediately after canvassing began, Ogbu encountered a healthcare worker preparing to emigrate to Australia after struggling to find work locally.
“I’m fully qualified now, and it’s really hard to get into that hospital,” she said, gesturing towards University Hospital Galway. “I’m moving to Australia in August”.
Ogbu later said stories like that were becoming increasingly common.
“I’m hearing that this is not a coincidence,” she said.
“Young people are not being listened to. They’re not even being talked to.”
The cost of living repeatedly surfaced on doorsteps throughout the afternoon.
“It used to be transport and congestion,” Ogbu said.
“But now the cost of living is just kind of, everyone is complaining about it”.
One voter described their university peers couch-surfing after being evicted from rented accommodation, while another spoke about classmates commuting long distances because Galway rents had become unaffordable.
The canvass also came across some scepticism about Labour, with one older voter arguing the party had “lost its grassroots” and questioning its record in government.
Bacik insisted Labour was rebuilding its community base “from the ground up”.
Both Ogbu and Nic Fhionnlaoich are part of the ‘vote left, transfer left’ coalition, with the Green party, Sinn Féin, People Before Profit, and independents.
The Galway West byelection takes place this May.
The Journal will be canvassing with other candidates in the days to come.
The full list of candidates who are contesting the Galway West byelection is as follows:
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