TODAY’S ELECTION SAW Catherine Connolly win after receiving the largest number of first-preference votes ever, but it wasn’t the only historic record broken - the election also saw the highest ever number of spoiled votes.

There were 213,738 invalid or ‘spoiled’ votes – accounting for 12.9% of the overall vote.

The figure is over ten times the number of the last presidential election where 18,438 votes were spoilt.

Images were shared online of invalid ballots, showing people spoiled their votes for a variety of reasons – from anger at the government to frustration that candidates such as Maria Steen didn’t make the ballot.

Some contained messages such as “Doesn’t represent me” and “Spoiled vote”, whilst others mentioned an alleged sexual assault which occurred near the Citywest complex in Co Dublin last week.

The highest proportion of spoiled votes was in Dublin Mid-West (20.2%), while the highest number was in Louth (7,782) followed by Dublin South-West (7,537).

Dublin South-West includes the area where the rioting at the Citywest complex took place earlier in the week.

In contrast, Dublin Rathdown was the constituency with the lowest proportion of spoiled votes (6.8%).

How many people in your constituency spoiled their vote?

Carlow-Kilkenny

6,493 (12.5%)

Cavan-Monaghan

6,423 (10.8%)

Clare

4,766 (10.6%)

Cork East

4,672 (13.1%)

Cork North-Central

6,215 (14.2%)

Cork North-West

3,977 (12.6%)

Cork South-Central

 4,935 (10.3%)

Cork South-West

3,562 (10.4%)

Donegal

6,434 (12.7%)

Dublin Bay North

7,100 (13.9%)

Dublin Bay South

2,590 (8.2%)

Dublin Central

3,754 (15.0%)

Dublin Fingal East

 3,098 (10.7%)

Dublin Fingal West

 3,119 (13.3%)

Dublin Mid-West

7,287 (20.2%)

Dublin North-West

5,033 (20.5%)

Dublin Rathdown

2,651 (6.8%)

Dublin South-Central

5,585 (19.0%)

Dublin South-West

7,537 (14.5%)

Dublin West

4,438 (13.3%)

Dún Laoghaire

3,468 (7.8%)

Galway East

5,250 (12.5%)

Galway West

4,420 (8.7%)

Kerry

7,101 (13.4% )

Kildare North

4,908 (10.7%)

Kildare South

4,904 (15.2%)

Laois

4,156 (14.6%)

Limerick City

4,049 (13.0%)

Limerick County

4,283 (13.1%)

Longford-Westmeath

6,810 (15.0%)

Louth

7,782 (16.0%)

Mayo

6,311 (12.9%)

Meath East

5,512 (14.3%)

Meath West

4,560 (15.9%)

Offaly

4,870 (17.6%)

Roscommon-Galway

3,745 (12.1%)

Sligo-Leitrim

4,828 (11.2%)

Tipperary North

3,999 (12.5%)

Tipperary South

3,889 (13.4%)

Waterford

4,828 (12.2%)

Wexford

4,571 (12.3%)

Wicklow

5,681 (13.3%)

Wicklow-Wexford

4,144 (14.5%)

With additional reporting from Emma Hickey