WITH TWO COUNCILS in the bag, businessman Gareth Sheridan is eyeing up specific local authorities in Leinster in his bid to get on the presidential ballot.

This week has seen Sheridan receive support from councillors in Tipperary and Kerry, but still needs another two to meet the required four councils so that he can contest next month’s election.

Councillors in Carlow on Friday evening, followed by Meath and Offaly on Monday, are now the focus of the Sheridan campaign’s plan.

Critically, he already has proposers and seconders in each council chamber and so have a better chance of forcing a contest.

However, one Fine Gael councillor in Carlow has said that it’s looking unlikely that Sheridan can count on support from the party – they have been “instructed to specifically vote against” any candidate looking to get on the ballot.

A spokesperson for Sheridan, who headed up the US-based company Nutriband prior to standing for election, said they believe that momentum is building for his bid to get on the election paper.

But they also fear that there might be a repeat of what transpired in Laois County Council on Monday, where the 36-year-old missed out after a majority of councillors voted not to endorse any candidate.

“We’re not on a day out when we turn up to a council, we have gone there because we’ve been engaging with the councillors over a months-long period,” the spokesperson told The Journal.

“In the main, we’re not presenting to a council where we don’t already have a proposer and seconder among the councillors.”

Sheridan is the sole candidate to qualify to meet Carlow County Council, having been nominated by Independent councillor Will Paton and Independent Ireland’s John Cassin.

The campaign is hoping that Carlow’s history in backing Independents will help Sheridan.

This included nominated Derek Nally in 1997, Dana Rosemary Scallon in 2011 and former Dragon’s Den judge Gavin Duffy in 2018 – the latter is a part of Sheridan’s backroom team this time around.

Will Fine Gael councillors disobey party HQ?

This week’s meeting in Tipperary County Council saw Sheridan receive backing from a Fine Gael councillor, which raised eyebrows given a ban handed down from party headquarters on support for Independent candidates.

Mary Hanna Hourigan told RTÉ today that she has “full confidence” in the party’s candidate Heather Humphreys and will be “doing everything I can to see her get elected”.

She said the diktat from her party is “undemocratic” and that she should be free to “vote the way I want”.

Reacting to the vote in Tipperary, Fine Gael’s Director of Elections Martin Heydon said that any sanctions against Hourigan is a matter for the party’s Executive Council.

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However, one Fine Gael councillor in Carlow has told The Journal that he doesn’t think there will be a repeat of Tipperary – as the party already has Humphreys as a candidate.

Brian O’Donoghue said party members have been “instructed to specifically vote against” candidates coming before a local authority.

But he added that councillors were likely to “come under pressure not to be anti-democratic” and urged to support Sheridan.

An example of this comes from 2011, when Michael D Higgins asked his own Labour party members on Dublin City Council to facilitate the nomination of senator David Norris.

Despite this, O’Donoghue said the Fine Gael party instruction to oppose any Independents would likely ensure that candidates need to look elsewhere for support.

“If someone abstains it reduces the majority needed,” he said.

This means that the threshold to get support from a council becomes lower and lower with every abstention.

“In theory, if Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael, Labour and Sinn Féin all abstain, Gareth Sheridan only needs three councillors of the remaining four – and he already has two of them,” O’Donoghue said of Friday’s meeting, as an example of how abstentions can help a candidate.