Craughwell wins Seanad seat

Gerard Craughwell has won the Seanad by-election.

The independent candidate won it on the second count with 98 votes, while Fine Gael's candidate, John McNulty, had 85 votes.

McNulty had been widely tipped to win, despite asking the electorate not to vote for him following the political row about his appointment to a State board.

Sinn Féin's Catherine Seeley got 22 votes in the first count which were then distributed between Craughwell and McNulty.

There were 205 valid ballots out of the 207 ballots received in the count centre in Leinster House, which means 16 TDs and Senators did not vote and two were rejected for incomplete and missing declarations of identity.