Alan Kelly: Labour will be back as a force
The environment minister endured a nervous night on Saturday as his fate lay in the balance, but transfers from his North Tipperary counterparts Seamus Morris (SF), Michael Smith (FF), and Jackie Cahill (FF), kept him ahead of the Fine Gael minister of state Tom Hayes throughout yesterday’s counts.
The latter was one of two Fine Gael TDs to lose their seats in Tipperary, along with Noel Coonan.
Mr Kelly said it was a “bittersweet” day “in the sense that it’s a terrible day for my party, it’s very emotional to see so many friends and colleagues who have lost their seats”.
He paid tribute to colleagues who lost their seats.
“The rebuilding of the Labour Party starts tomorrow. It’s going to be a big project and I’m certainly going to step up to the plate and ensure that I play my part in that because the Labour Party is a party that’s going to have a huge influence in the future and it’s going to grow and we’re going to start with the local elections and the European elections next, or whatever election comes next, and I guarantee you that the Labour Party will be coming back as a force in this country and I intend to be part of that.”
labour Dep leader Alan Kelly elected in Tipp without reaching quota #GE16 #GE2016 pic.twitter.com/PrFNYPCpn6
— Lesley-Anne McKeown (@LAMcbelfast) February 28, 2016
He said he lost “a huge amount of votes” when part of his hinterland was transferred into Offaly with the formation of the new Tipperary constituency.
“Hopefully after another review of the boundary, that Tipperary will be one county. I’m happy with my first preference, I came third in first preferences so I’m very happy with that. I’m delighted with the spread of the votes as well, which is important, because I want to represent everyone in the county equally and I’ll do that to the best of my ability in the years to come.”
Mr Hayes said FG had “five very, very hard years in government. We took decisions which we knew weren’t in the interests of the party or ourselves, they were in the interests of the country.”
He said Fine Gael should not necessarily be going back into government. “I think the people on the opposition side actually won the election, so let them come up with the policies now to change it and get them together.
“I have watched them for five years in particular telling us how to do things. They had all the issues there. They’ve got the votes now so it’s up to them to put a government together.”
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