GP scores shock win over main parties

A GP demanding a new hospital in a town where terrorists killed 29 people tonight emerged a shock winner in the Northern Ireland Assembly elections.

Dr Kieran Deeny, 49, stunned the four main parties by coming from nowhere to take one of the six seats in west Tyrone.

It is the first time in the history of Northern Ireland that a candidate campaigning on a single issue unconnected with politics has ever triumphed.

He was declared a member of the next Stormont administration after getting the emotional backing of the Protestant and Catholic communities in Omagh which was bombed by the Real IRA five years ago.

As well as the 29 dead hundreds more were injured and underwent initial treatment in the town’s hospital which has now been stripped of all its acute services.

Dr Deeny, who practices in the village of Carrickmore 10 miles away, was swept to victory after heading the campaign for a new hospital in the area.

One is being planned for the neighbouring county of Fermanagh.

But he is now taking his fight into the committee rooms and unto the floor of Stormont as one of the 108 members.

He said tonight: “This has been a marvellous campaign. It is a major life experience, because I’ve had the backing of people whose first preference votes would normally have gone to all the main parties.”

Sinn Féin, the nationalist SDLP, and the two rival Unionist parties expected the doctor to poll high but well short of the number of votes needed. Amazingly he won through on the first count to shatter the orange and green stranglehold.

Dr Deeny has been a GP in Carrickmore for 17 years. Before that he worked in Newry, Co Down, Scotland and Australia. He is married with three children and once played league soccer in the Republic and Northern Ireland as well as inter-county gaelic football for Down.

He said he would be confining himself to health matters at Stormont.

Dr Deeny added: “I was told this single issue agenda wouldn’t work. It might work across the water and in the Republic, but not here. But I’ve proved them wrong.

“It didn’t surprise me after the feedback I was getting on the doorsteps. People feel very strongly about this and they have broken with tradition to back me.

“It is quite unique and they have also given me the ammunition to redress this health care injustice. We are not giving up. This is the beginning of the end of the decimation of our health facilities.”