Maybe now they’ll listen to the electorate’s litany of grievances

“I’VE lost my Dáil seat” a Fianna Fáil deputy told me last Monday morning.

When I pressed him on how he had come to that conclusion he explained that the Sinn Féin candidates who had run in the two local election wards in his constituency had got a total of more than 5,000 first preference votes between them.

More disturbing for him was the fact that the local elections also threw up a new Fine Gael Dáil contender in his area. This nervous deputy's conclusion was that when the next election comes Fine Gael will get their seat back, but Sinn Féin would also get a seat his.