Fine Gael celebrates election triumph

FINE GAEL leader Enda Kenny has hailed his party's victory in the Meath by-election as a "real achievement".

Mon, 14 Mar, 2005 - 00:00

Paul O’Brien

Party members were jubilant after their candidate, Shane McEntee, defeated Fianna Fáil's Shane Cassells by a comfortable margin to retain the seat previously held by former Fine Gael leader John Bruton.

Mr McEntee's victory means Fine Gael retains two TDs in Meath. Damien English is the party's other TD in the five-seater constituency, with the remaining three seats held by Fianna Fáil.

Fine Gael had double reason to celebrate when Mr McEntee was declared the winner shortly after 8pm on Saturday at the count centre in Simonstown Gaels GAA Club in Navan. As well as retaining the seat the party has held in Meath for 35 years, Mr McEntee topped the first count, taking 34.13% of first-preference votes against 32.42% for Fianna Fáil's Mr Cassells.

While Fine Gael had been confident about its chances of winning the seat, several party members said they had not expected to top the first count.

The result defied a poll by a local newspaper in the run-up to voting, which showed Mr McEntee commanding just 20.4% of first preferences against 36.7% for Mr Cassells.

While Fine Gael had strongly disputed the findings of the poll, Mr McEntee said it had spurred his team to work even harder in the final stages of campaigning. "Every time we went to canvass, it was an army (we had)," he said.

Voter turnout in the by-election was disappointingly low. Just 50,183 - or less than 42% - of the total electorate of 120,656 filled out ballot papers. Excluding invalid ballot papers, the final valid poll was 49,706, with the quota set at 24,854.

Mr McEntee was elected without reaching the quota, however. He took 16,964 votes on the first count, compared to 16,117 for Mr Cassells.

In three subsequent counts, the five other candidates were eliminated and their votes redistributed, following which Mr McEntee had 24,047 votes to 21,178 for Mr Cassells.

Key factors in the contest were that the vote-transfer pact between Fine Gael and Labour appeared to work well - with Mr McEntee picking up a substantial portion of Dominic Hannigan's transfers.

Labour expressed satisfaction with the performance of Mr Hannigan, who finished third. Sinn Féin also had reason to be satisfied, as their candidate, Joe Reilly, following a strong showing in the 2002 general election, increased his share of the first-preference vote, from 9.43% to 12.25%.

Meanwhile, the winning candidate pledged to work hard for his constituents. "I've a job to do and I'll do it as professionally as I can," Mr McEntee said.

Meath by-election

Total electorate: 120,656

Total poll: 50,183

Invalid ballot papers: 477

Valid poll: 49,706

Quota: 24,854

FIRST COUNT:

Shane McEntee (FG) 16,964

Shane Cassells (FF) 16,117

Joe Reilly (SF) 6,087

Dominic Hannigan (Lab) 5,567

Sirena Campbell (PDs) 2,679