Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
LAST UPDATE | 26 Oct 2025
“I’VE ALWAYS VOTED, all my life, and I’ve never spoiled my vote before,” Geraldine from Jobstown in west Dublin told The Journal yesterday afternoon.
Like over 200,000 people nationwide, Geraldine spoiled her ballot on Friday.
One in eight voters did so, an unprecedented protest vote that’s already as big a talking point as Catherine Connolly’s resounding success in this presidential election.
A further 7% voted for Jim Gavin, despite his withdrawal from the race. Spoiled votes were at historically high levels in constituencies nationwide, particularly in some working-class areas.
In Jobstown, to the west of Tallaght, half of votes in some boxes were spoiled.
One tallyman who was watching the votes come in yesterday morning said the manner in which they were spoiled was mixed. Many people just put an X across the paper, while others wrote a message such as “none of the above” or the name of a candidate they would have preferred.
Some people wrote racist messages, including in relation to asylum seekers in nearby Citywest.
Some of the people The Journal met in Jobstown raised immigration as an issue, but none of them had voted or spoiled their vote. A number of people we met said they had never voted.
“Nothing in Jobstown will change,” said 25-year-old Stephen, who has never voted.
For Geraldine, who had spoiled her vote after voting all her life, the problem was the limited choice in this two-horse race between Connolly and Fine Gael’s Heather Humphreys.
“Once I saw who was running, I knew I was going to. There had to be some sort of protest,” Geraldine said.
She said she’s a lifelong Fianna Fáil voter and “would have voted for Bertie [Ahern] or Jim Gavin”.
In fact, we met a number of disaffected Ahern fans in Jobstown, who had either spoiled their vote, stayed home or reluctantly voted for Humphreys knowing she was doomed to lose.
One middle-aged man, who asked not to give his name, said he spoiled his vote because there was “no choice”. He wanted to vote for conservative campaigner Maria Steen, who failed to secure a nomination from either county councils or a sufficient number of members of the Oireachtas.
Politicians who have been out on the campaign trail in this area in recent weeks say there’s no one clear political motivation shared by the people they met who signalled they planned to spoil their votes. Nor was it just one type of voter. However, a sense of alienation from and disillusion with current politics may be the most common factor.
People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy was one of the organisers of Catherine Connolly’s campaign. He won his seat in this constituency in a 2014 by-election in which voter disaffection crystallised around the issue of water charges, on which Murphy was campaigning. Now that frustration has found a different outlet.
“There is something real here. There’s a lot of people who feel very deeply alienated from the political process,” Murphy said.
He said the campaign on social media to encourage people to spoil their vote was clearly effective. This campaign was promoted by supporters of Maria Steen and by anti-immigration campaigners.
The idea pushed by this campaign that voters are being denied choice, and that there has been “carve-up by the political parties” had “resonated with some people who are alienated”, Murphy said.
“The deep roots of alienation are that people are living in an awful housing crisis. They’re experiencing cost of living crisis. They’re rightly angry with this very rich country that we live in, but their lives are very difficult.”
Canvassing for Connolly in west Tallaght, Murphy said he met many people who were considering spoiling their votes and it was possible to have a discussion with them. He said people who were planning to spoil their vote believed the available candidates were “all the same”, or would reference Maria Steen or, in a minority of cases, immigration.
“I think anti-immigration is definitely an important part of it but it’s more general than that. It’s a protest: ‘spoil the vote’. It’s about a lot of things.”
Mick Duff, an Independent councillor for Tallaght who has long been involved in local politics, said spoiled votes in this area were almost certainly voters “venting spleen” at the government rather than expressing support for an alternative candidate.
“I don’t think the very good people of Jobstown are honestly concerned that Maria Steen didn’t get on the ballot. Maria Steen’s world and the world in Dublin South-West are completely different,” Duff said.
Alan Edge, a left-wing Independent councillor on South Dublin County Council who also worked on Connolly’s campaign, agreed that many people he met on the campaign trail who planned to spoil their vote were “not necessarily fans of Maria Steen or leaning more to the right – they just weren’t enthused and felt that they weren’t spoken to”.
Edge said there was a significant sense of disenfranchisement in Jobstown, an area where there is economic deprivation and inadequate services. He noted that west Tallaght is close to the Citywest area where there were anti-immigration demonstrations and riots in recent days.
“You see people who are angry, and that anger is exploited by people pushing a far-right narrative, who are using social media to push disinformation and myths about people in international protection,” Edge said.
So what happens next? Politicians may need to do some soul-searching.
“There’s work to be done across the political spectrum to try and reach people who are feeling so disenfranchised that they would take the trouble to spoil their votes,” Edge said.
“They didn’t just stay at home. They actually took the trouble to spoil their vote. I think that says something to all politicians,” Edge said.
Paul Murphy said the next step for the political system is to “not give up on people”.
“I think it’s a big challenge to the left, but we need to open a dialogue with people, not to shame people for spoiling their vote. It is a legitimate choice to spoil your vote. I don’t agree with it, but it’s not a moral failure,” Murphy said.
Murphy believes the left now needs to “mobilise people in working-class communities” on the day-to-day issues that affect them, in particular the cost-of-living crisis and the housing crisis.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
have your say