Eoghan Dalton reports from Kilkenny

WHEN THE ELECTORAL Commission announced which constituencies were going to see their boundaries redrawn for this election, one choice raised a few eyebrows for those living in a west corner of Co Kilkenny.

Areas including Tullaroan, Freshford and Urlingford have been moved into a new Tipperary North constituency.

Many of those who spoke to The Journal during a visit this week said they feel “fed up” about the change, with some even considering spoiling their vote tomorrow by just writing ‘Kilkenny’ on their Tipp North ballot — or not voting at all.

It’s resulted in one of the more unique election promises put forward by Tipperary candidates: if elected they will try and reverse the boundary to ensure these Kilkenny people will never have to vote for them again.

Local Kilkenny politicians are trying to encourage people to vote – also telling constituents they will try and revise the boundary again – but they have been met with apathy by many would-be voters.

A number of potential voters reckoned that Tipperary candidates won’t be able to “canvass the area as well” as Kilkenny politicians, who may be more familiar with local issues.

‘Sleepless nights’

This apathy was exactly what the Electoral Commission was concerned about when it announced the change last year.

Commission chair Art O’Leary told The Journal at the time that the decision to shift 13 electoral districts – amounting to approximately 6,400 people – caused him “sleepless nights”, but he said it “just wasn’t possible” to safeguard the county boundary.

This, O’Leary said at the time, was because the constitution requires 30,000 people per TD and that it can’t create six-seater constituencies, necessitating some redrawn boundaries. The next boundary revision is due after the 2027 Census.

Tullaroan dairy farmer Robbie Dillon was among those uncertain whether he will vote. “I don’t know any of the candidates, I probably won’t be voting right now,” the 35-year-old said.

If Dillon does vote, he’ll “probably spoil it because I don’t really see the point of voting for anybody — like I don’t see them doing anything around this location.”

Pointing to the village, Dillon said he simply doesn’t believe the candidates — who are very likely to be Tipperary based — are “going to be here” once elected.

Elsewhere in the village, one man said he “got a shock” when he saw the first Michael Lowry poster appear outside Tullaroan — but he noted the Independent’s “good track record of getting things done for people” and said he considered giving him a vote if he doesn’t spoil his ballot.

There does not appear to be a concerted campaign to get people to spoil their ballots, with politicians actively trying to encourage people to still cast a vote for one of their candidates.

Michael Delaney, Fianna Fáil councillor and owner of Seanie’s Bar in Tullaroan, said he’s trying to get people to reconsider spoiling their ballots.

“A lot of this parish say they aren’t going to vote,” Delaney said, “but we’re still ran out of here by Kilkenny County Council. So whether he does anything for us or he doesn’t, I think we should be voting and get one of these boys elected and see what he might do for us.”

"A lot of this parish say they aren't going to vote," Fianna Fáil councillor Michael Delaney told us in his pub Seanie's Bar in Tullaroan. EOGHAN DALTON / THE JOURNAL EOGHAN DALTON / THE JOURNAL / THE JOURNAL

Delaney said he has been canvassing for long-time Kilkenny TD John McGuinness, adding that the outgoing deputy will seek to still represent the “lost areas” – partly as politicians expect the 13 electoral areas will be returned eventually.

One man in his 40s, who works with beef cattle and horses, got into a back-and-forth with Delaney over the situation outside Seanie’s. While noting he’s from a “Fianna Fáil family”, he was deeply unhappy over not being able to vote in the Carlow-Kilkenny constituency as normal.

“It doesn’t make sense. What was wrong with the border the way it was?” he said.

“There’s an awful lot of people in Tullaroan and various areas that won’t vote because thy don’t know who they’re voting for. It’s not their fault, I’m not having a go at the politicians necessarily,” this man said.

What “rubbed salt into the wound” was a letter from Fianna Fáil reminding the man to vote for city-based TD McGuinness. “But sure I can’t vote for him,” he told Delaney.

The councillor agreed it was a frustrating situation, before saying the letter would likely have come from the party’s Dublin headquarters rather than McGuinness’s Kilkenny office.

In a bid to entice voters, Fianna Fáil has stood two candidates for Tipperary North: councillors Michael Smith and Ryan O’Meara. While both are based in Tipperary, O’Meara lays claim to strong family connections to this part of Kilkenny through his mother’s side.

Before he was selected to stand for the party last month, Delaney and several other local Fianna Fáil Kilkenny county councillors endorsed him.

The Journal heard that a 20-strong canvass team had passed through Tullaroan in recent days seeking to catch any votes for O’Meara.

Another party has taken a different tack. Sinn Féin has stood a Kilkenny city-based candidate so that the 13 electoral areas will “feel represented” by someone local.

Evan Barry, who stood unsuccessfully for the council in June, said he has heard plenty of apathy on the doors.

Related Reads

At a glance: The candidates have been making their last-ditch attempts to earn your vote

Who's running in your constituency? Find out with The Journal's candidate database

Irish emigrants: 'There's not a single thing a government could do to lure me back home'

The 33-year-old’s main issues are local concerns about the completion of a ring road around the northern side of the city, while national issues that have come up have been housing, childcare and the Mercosur agriculture trade deal.

Evan Barry is standing for Sinn Féin as a standard bearer for the black and amber of Kilkenny in the area. EOGHAN DALTON / THE JOURNAL EOGHAN DALTON / THE JOURNAL / THE JOURNAL

Barry, who works in Leinster House for Sinn Féin, was a late addition to the ballot here, after suggesting to the party that they stand a candidate given the local frustration that party canvass teams were hearing.

“If I were to get in, I would be looking to reverse the boundary here. But really I’m telling people that if they want to protest against this, then why not do that by voting for a Kilkenny candidate,” Barry said.

Barry said his own feelings on politics have been based on the difficulty in accessing things that may have been more possible for his parents. He currently stays with family in Kilkenny while saving for a mortgage.

“Pulling yourself up the bootstraps at the moment is just not working — a lot of us have done exactly what we were supposed to do,” he said, pointing to “ridiculous” house prices and “out of control” cost-of-living charges.

“I just think it’s not fair — we all went to college, we got good jobs, but we can’t get a house,” he added.

He’s on his third visit to Seanie’s as part of the campaign, even if it can appear to be enemy territory.

Noreen, a younger sister of Michael Delaney, the Fianna Fáil councillor, agreed that the area had tended to vote for one party.

However, with Sinn Féin’s Barry standing before her in the pub – she noted: “It’s nice to have a candidate in the area that’s familiar with the area when a lot of the other candidates might not know the area.”

Overall, she believes “people make up their minds now and people don’t follow generations” anymore.

“Things do change,” she said — and many here are hoping that will eventually be the case as regards the boundary.