Crowley wins, but Sinnott beats Collins in South

Disability rights campaigner Kathy Sinnott humbled Fianna Fail tonight by beating MEP Gerry Collins to the third European seat in the South constituency.

Sun, 13 Jun, 2004 - 21:29

Disability rights campaigner Kathy Sinnott humbled Fianna Fail tonight by beating MEP Gerry Collins to the third European seat in the South constituency.

Fianna Fail MEP Brian Crowley, who topped the poll for the third election in a row with around 125,000 votes, blamed the Director of Election John O’Donoghue for the disaster.

“He didn’t consult with candidates and I warned him that this would lead to independents and Fine Gael gaining votes.

“I personally have no bitterness towards anyone but I am saddened that we couldn’t keep the two seats”, he said.

Mr Crowley’s own first preference vote dropped significantly despite the fact that he had begun campaigning in January using five offices and more than 200 campaign workers.

He was re-elected on the first count with over 125,000 first preference votes. He exceeded the quota of 121,068 with the surplus of 4,471 votes.

Fine Gael TD Simon Coveney, the youngest candidate in the race at 31 years of age, will take second seat with around 115,000 votes. He said his party had re-emerged as a serious political force.

“Fine Gael was disillusioned and broken after the last General Election. The result proved that with a good campaign and good candidates, Fine Gael can win again,” he said.

He paid tribute to the party workers who had spent 10 weeks travelling around Munster and to the Fine Gael party strategists, who decided to run one rather than two candidates.

There were tears when Kathy Sinnott entered the counting centre at Neptune Stadium to meet her supporters.

Her victory is expected to be confirmed tomorrow when counting in the three seat constituency is due to resume.

Ms Sinnott said her victory represented a choice for change.

“This isn’t a protest vote. This is a vote for vulnerable people. I am just symbolising that. It’s saying we want the vulnerable people in our society taken care of,” she said.

Ms Sinnott, who is best-known for her campaigning on behalf of people with disabilities, attracted transfers from all candidates, including Sinn Fein’s David Cullinane, Green Party Councillor Chris O’Leary and Labour senator Brendan Ryan – all of whom are expected to be eliminated in further counts.

It was a significant turnaround on two years ago, when Ms Sinnott lost a Dail seat in the General Election by six votes after a recount.

Her daughter Bridget Sinnott said this election had reaffirmed her faith in democracy.

“The one thing I was dreading was a recount because of the General Election scenario. It’s absolutely amazing that so many people gave her a No.1 vote,” she said.

Around 498,000 people voted in the three seat South Constituency but there were more than 14,000 spoiled votes.

Counting will continue while Mr Crowley’s surplus is distributed among the other candidates.

Labour Senator Brendan Ryan who received a disappointing total of nearly 20,000 votes said he wished Kathy Sinnott well in her new career in Europe.

He said: “We have to assume that a number of Labour people voted for Kathy Sinnott for reasons that are understandable.

I wish her well and I have to be happy with the Labour party’s performance in general,” he said.

Fianna Fail Health Minister Micheal Martin rejected claims by Brian Crowley that the election strategy devised by John O’Donoghue TD had lost the party its second seat.

“I think basically we just didn’t have enough votes. We had a decline in the percentages and I think that no matter what strategy we had, we wouldn’t have pulled off two seats.

“There was obviously a significant drop in local support.”

South voting results (First Count):

*Brian Crowley (FF) 125,539

Simon Coveney (FG) 118,937

Ms Kathy Sinnott (Ind Si) 89,127

*Gerard Collins (FF) 73,131

David Cullinane (SF) 32,643

Brendan Ryan (Lab) 19,975

Chris O’Leary (Green) 10,896

Gerard Hannan (Ind Hannan) 6,394

Ms Lily Moynihan (Ind M) 5,831

Anthony O’Connor (Ind O) 1,797