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“It wasn’t our day”. Mary Lou McDonald says SF hasn’t had the outcome it hoped for in the local and European elections, but she will continue on as leader. Said some voters angry with the Government have gone for independents and other parties. pic.twitter.com/MiDjlHZCNC
— Eimer McAuley (@eimer_mcauley) June 9, 2024
SINN FÉIN LEADER Mary Lou McDonald has said the party “has a job to do” after it is shaping up to have a poor showing in the local elections.
Speaking to reporters at the RDS Count Centre this afternoon, McDonald said she was “disappointed” that more councillors had not been elected. Though she said the party had made “some gains” on their disastrous 2019 showing.
“Obviously we are disappointed that we didn’t manage to get more [councillors] elected,” McDonald said.
We have made some gains. They are modest but they are there. It hasn’t been our day. Clearly frustrations, anger indeed, with government policy on this occasion has translated into votes for Independents and others.
Independents have had a very strong showing this election, and Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have also remained strong, with the Greens holding steady in many areas.
As things stand, SF has just 14 councillors elected out of the 285 or so that have taken seats. There is still a lot more seats to be filled, but it’s clear the party did not have a good day at the polls.
McDonald said that now the party would “take time to reflect”.
“We’ve literally been on thousands, probably tens of thousands of doorsteps over the last number of weeks.
We’ve listened very carefully to people. We now need to go and reflect on that, we need to learn from it. We will regroup. I am sorry that we didn’t do better. I know that we can do better and I’m determined that we will.
Opinion polls over the last few months have shown a steady decline in support for the party, as it found itself unable to mount a coherent position on immigration.
The party had a low base to build on after a pretty poor showing in 2019, so while early indications point to the party gaining seats, it looks to be nowhere near the gains they have been hoping for.
After the 2020 general election, one of the key talking points surrounding Sinn Féin was that the party did not run enough candidates to fully benefit from the huge surge in popularity they experienced.
Now, however, the party has fielded too many candidates, and split the vote in a number of areas.
With reporting from Jane Matthews and Eimer McAuley at the RDS
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SF thought they were putting all their ‘Chickens ‘ into the one pot, see what ‘ Thought ‘ done. They paid the price for all their back flipping on various issues.
@Martin Finnerty: exactly
When their focus shifted on immigration it was a bad move by Mary Lou
Nobody cared about immigration. The current govt that gave us the current immigration “issue” were reelected. The anti immigrant parties were entirely rejected.
@9QRixo8H: You’re missing the fact that there was a huge move towards independents who had an emphasis on poor immigration laws and vetting of immigrants
@9QRixo8H: we do care about immigration. We don’t have the services that are needed.
@Means Of Escape: Keep thinking that. If that was the case, why did the current govt who gave us this immigration (non) issue, make gains? Independents were elected for a myriad of reasons. But of course the skin-triggered will think it’s because of their (biased) issue, despite the fact that anti-immigrants were DECIMATED.
@brian madden: *YOU* care about immigration. The vast majority don’t, as the people re-elected the current govt that gave us this apparent migration problem.
@9QRixo8H: they made gains because a)Harris stepped in and did intensive canvassing and more so B) he moved on tent city c)increased policing on the border d) will bring in better vetting procedures and finally increased t he done for airlines who carry undocumented immigrants. So had he done none of this it wouldn’t have gone so swimmingly for Fine Gael and this was seen with Sinn Fein
@9QRixo8H: the vast majority will say that we are full up with too high a demand for services. No houses, can’t get a gp visit, waiting lists through the roof. We cannot bring people in and hand them a tent and let them go whetever they want. If my passport was a day of out date I wouldn’t be allowed travel.
@9QRixo8H: The only party to be soundly rejected is SF.
They didn’t even wait to get into government before they became traitors and lost touch with their core supporters who have suffered more than most from mass immigration.
@brian madden: then why didn’t an anti immigrant party even get one seat if immigration was an issue to the majority?
@Thomas Sheridan: if mass immigration was an issue to the majority, then why didn’t an anti-immigrant party get even one seat? LOL.
It needs to be a toodleloo for old Mary Lou. SF needs it’s base back.
There was no difference on policies between SF and the government, they were all singing from the same hymn-sheet. Voters just ignored them!
Sinn Fein did not listen .
We can see the freeloaders entering Ireland and been given everything for free.
The political parties above do not stand with the electorates opinions on immigration. Irish people do not have a problem with people coming here to work …but millions on Ukrainian pets ? . It has cost SF dearly
Glad the far right loons didn’t get anything.We have a centre right gov.And that’s bad enough already.Can you imagine far right gov in there.First the attack immigrants.Then They turn on the Irish people.It has a history you know…
If she has any credibility she will fall on her sword ,she couldn’t get the words out quick enough.for Leo in referendum
Mary’s far too liberal stance has cost her the Taoiseach job ,
Big.jump for Indy’s , sickening what Terence McSweeney would make of the land he sacrificed his.life for nowadays..
@Chris: Credibility is totally lacking…..
The irony about this is that for all the bad rep Sinn Fein gets, FF/FG have literally caused all the problems we currently have in Ireland
Nior thainig a la.
Mad that SF actually increased their 1st pref vote compared to 2019 local election, with a larger increase than any other party, they seem to do badly in local elections, this didn’t seem to matter as we all know they won a lot of seats in the the general election the following year, seems they do badly when the turnout is really low and before Ulysses jumps in wanting to know who I voted for, that’s my business but it wasn’t SF.
An understatement… It was not immigration…lots of people are doing well and happy with this government.
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