Archive News
GALWAY EAST – IT’S ALL OVER! KEAVENEY JOINS KITT, CONNAUGHTON AND CANNON IN DAIL EIREANN
Date Published: 27-Feb-2011
BY DECLAN TIERNEY
History has been made as Colm Keaveney becomes the first Labour TD in Galway East following the ninth and last count in the Galway East constituency.
Following the distribution of Micheal Kitt’s surplus of 994 votes, Keaveney outpolled his nearest challenger Tom McHugh to leave more than 1,200 votes between them in the end.
His supporters, many of them rigged out in red jackets and tops, carried Keaveney shoulder high as he was confirmed as having taken the fourth seat.
Earlier the other three seats in the constituency went to Micheal Kitt of Fianna Fail, Paul Connaughton and Ciaran Cannon of Fine Gael.
It has taken two days to complete the Galway East count with a 10 hour recount, which was called by Fine Gael’s Tom McHugh on Saturday night, was responsible for the counting of votes going into Sunday night.
Keaveney, Connaughton jnr. and Cannon are TDs for the first time while Kitt is the veteran of the four.
There is no doubt that Keaveney is the surprise package and particularly when he polled just over 4,200 first preferences on the first count and looked doomed to failure.
But in one of the biggest twists in the count, he received an unprecedented 2,440 of a transfer from his running mate Lorraine Higgins in Athenry. It caused the shock of the count.
Prior to that, Tom McHugh looked in prime position to take a third FG seat and was likely to be involved in a head to head with Independent Sean Canney but that scenario was changed dramatically when the Higgins transfer emerged.
FULL GALWAY EAST COUNT
Number of seats: 4
Electorate: 83,651
Total poll: 59,836
Spoiled votes: 525
Total valid poll: 59,319
Quota: 11,856
FIRST COUNT
Paul Connaughton jnr. (FG) 7,264
Ciaran Cannon (FG) 6,924
Micheal Kitt (FF) 6,604
Tom McHugh (FG) 5,833
Sean Canney (Ind) 5,567
Jimmy McClearn (FG) 5,392
Timmy Broderick (Ind) 5,146
Colm Keaveney (Lab) 4,261
Michael F. Dolan (FF) 4,107
Dermot Connolly (SF) 3,641
Lorraine Higgins (Lab) 3,577
Emer O’Donnell (Ind) 601
Ciaran Kennedy (GP) 402
O’Donnell and Kennedy eliminated.
SECOND COUNT
Distribution of O’Donnell’s and Kennedy’s votes
Connaughton (FG) (+55) 7,319
Cannon (FG) (+134) 7,058
Kitt (FF) (+47) 6,651
McHugh (FG) (+37) 5,870
Canney (Ind) (+78) 5,645
McClearn (FG) (+45) 5,437
Broderick (Ind) (+105) 5,251
Keaveney (Lab) (+89) 4,350
Dolan (FF) (+46) 4,153
Higgins (Lab) (+136) 3,813
Connolly (SF) (+88) 3,729
Connolly eliminated
THIRD COUNT
Distribution of Connolly’s votes
Connaughton (FG) (+247) 7,566
Cannon (FG) (+207) 7,265
Kitt (FG) (+229) 6,880
Broderick (Ind) (+1,036) 6,287
McHugh (FG) (+83) 5,953
Canney (Ind) (+295) 5,940
McClearn (FG) (+194) 5,631
Keaveney (Lab) (+350) 4,700
Higgins (Lab) (+609) 4,422
Dolan (FF) (+135) 4,288
Dolan eliminated
FOURTH COUNT
Distribution of Dolan’s votes
Kitt (FG) (+2668) 9,548
Connaughton (FG) (+244) 7,810
Cannon (FG) (+297) 7,562
Broderick (Ind) (+238) 6,525
Canney (Ind) (+187) 6,127
McHugh (FG) (+84) 6,037
McClearn (FG) (+143) 5,774
Keaveney (Lab) (+92) 4,792
Higgins (Lab) (+227) 4,649
Higgins eliminated
FIFTH COUNT
Kitt (FG) (+270) 9,818
Cannon (FG) (+560) 8,122
Connaughton (FG) (+289) 8,099
Keaveney (Lab) (+2,452) 7,244
Broderick (Ind) (+330) 6,855
Canney (Ind) (+214) 6,341
McHugh (FG) (+90) 6,127
McClearn (FG) (+205) 5,979
SIXTH COUNT
Distribution of McClearn’s votes
Kitt (FF) (+430) 10,248
Cannon (FG) (+1,840) 9,962
Connaughton (FG) (+1,732) 9,831
Broderick (Ind) (+793) 7,648
Keaveney (Lab) (+227) 7,471
McHugh (FG) (+612) 6,739
Canney (Ind) (+89) 6,430
Canney eliminated
SEVENTH COUNT
Distribution of Canney’s votes
Kitt (FF) (+899) 11,147
Connaughton (FG) (+1,052) 10,883
Cannon (FG) (+318) 10,280
Keaveney (Lab) (+1,162) 8,633
Broderick (Ind) (+723) 8,371
McHugh (FG) (+1,630) 8,369
RECOUNT OF SEVENTH COUNT
Kitt (FF) (-32) 11,115
Connaughton (FG) (-4) 10,877
Cannon (FG) (-1) 10,279
Keaveney (Lab) (+3) 8,636
McHugh (FG) (+2) 8,371
Broderick (Ind) (-6) 8,365
Broderick eliminated
EIGHTH COUNT
Distribution of Broderick’s votes
Kitt (FF) (+1,735) 12,850
Connaughton (FG) (+1,733) 12,610
Cannon (FG) (+1,582) 11,861
Keaveney (Lab) (+1,170) 9,806
McHugh (FG) (+294) 8,665
Kitt, Connaughton and Cannon elected